♤
☕ Alice’s Mad Tea Party Presents: Storytime
Alice Spills the Tea: The Chilling Tale of Snow-Drop
A retelling of the 1812 Grimm Brothers' version, with all the eerie edges left sharp.
Gather 'round, sugar cubes, and pour yourselves something steamy - because I’m about to take you far, far away to the shadowy pages of the Brothers Grimm, back when bedtime stories had more poison than plot armor and queens were not so much wicked as absolutely unhinged.
Now first things first, Let me drop you a little history nugget:
In some of the earliest versions, our girl wasn’t called Snow White at all. She was known as Snow-Drop (or Schneewittchen in German, which basically means "Snow White" but more tongue-twisty and dramatic).
The Grimm Brothers, those charmingly creepy tale collectors, published Snow White in 1812 in their first edition of Children's and Household Tales - and in that version, she was indeed called Snow-Drop. The name likely referred to the snowdrop flower, which blooms early in spring and symbolizes purity and innocence (oh, the irony).
But don’t be fooled - purity didn’t save her from:
Almost getting gutted by a huntsman,
Being poisoned (multiple times!),
Or chilling in a glass coffin like some gothic decor piece
Before she was your poisoned-sleeping beauty icon, she was a delicate snowdrop flower with a high risk of being murdered. Ain’t folklore grand?
Now that we got that out of the way let’s move on.
Our tale begins with a needle.
Yes. A needle. Because apparently in the olden days, all major life events involved sewing and blood. One winter, a queen sat stitching by the window - its frame made of the blackest ebony wood, mind you - while snow fell gently outside. She pricked her finger, and three drops of crimson blood splashed onto the snow.
And in that moment, she made the kind of wish only someone who clearly hadn’t read a single fairytale would make:
"I wish I had a child as white as snow, as red as blood, and as black as this window frame."
Babes, the color palette was on point - but the foreshadowing? Chilling.
The wish was granted (because that’s how these stories work), and she bore a baby girl with skin as pale as snow, lips red as blood, and hair black as ebony. She named her Snow-Drop, and then promptly died. As was tradition.
Fast forward a bit, and the king remarried. And oof, did he pick a doozy. The new queen was so vain she had a magic mirror to affirm her hotness on the daily. Like, every morning she’d purr:
"Looking-glass upon the wall,
Who is the fairest of us all?"
And the mirror, poor thing, was enchanted to tell the truth. For a while, she was the fairest, and all was well. But one day that mirror betrayed her with six deadly words:
"Thou art fair, but Snow-Drop is fairer."
Cue the unhinged spiral.
Now, let’s talk about attempted murder.
She summoned a huntsman and ordered him to drag young Snow-Drop into the forest and kill her, bringing back her lungs and liver as proof. Real specific. Real gross.
But plot twist! The huntsman couldn’t do it—he had one shred of decency left - so he let the girl go and brought back boar entrails instead, which the queen then cooked and ate thinking it was Snow-Drop.
Yes, darling. She ate what she believed to be a child’s organs. This ain’t Disney.
Snow-Drop, now a fugitive, wandered until she found a little cottage with seven tiny beds and everything in charming little rows (interior decor: chaotic forest gnome). This was the home of the Seven Dwarfs, who let her stay in exchange for cooking and cleaning.
But remember: the mirror snitched.
Every time the queen asked it who was the fairest, it kept answering:
"Thou art fair, but Snow-Drop is fairer."
So this psycho queen disguised herself and went on three separate murder missions:
- Tight lace-up bodice: She pretended to be a peddler and laced Snow-Drop’s corset so tight she fainted. The dwarfs loosened it and saved her.
- Poisoned comb: Next, she gave her a toxic hair comb. Snow-Drop collapsed again. Dwarfs to the rescue.
- Poisoned apple: Finally, she brought the iconic cursed apple - half red (poisoned), half white (safe). Snow-Drop took a bite of the red side and dropped like a sack of tea leaves.
This time, the dwarfs couldn’t wake her. So they placed her in a glass coffin in the woods. Creepy, yet somehow aesthetic.
Now here comes the necro-prince moment.
A wandering prince found her and instantly wanted to buy the corpse. I know. The dwarfs said no, but he insisted on just… keeping her? (Major red flag, but I digress.)
As the prince’s servants were moving the coffin, they jostled it, and that cursed apple chunk dislodged from her throat.
Snow-Drop woke up.
No true love's kiss. No magic spell. Just a good ol’ Heimlich via clumsy servants.
The prince proposed (bold move), she said yes (??), and they planned a wedding.
Now, revenge is served steaming hot at this party.
The wicked stepmother was invited to the wedding - unaware it was Snow-Drop’s. Her mirror even confirmed Snow-Drop was still the fairest. When she arrived, she saw her stepdaughter alive and thriving, and had a full-on villain meltdown.
For punishment, they forced her to wear red-hot iron shoes and dance until she dropped dead.
Darling, they really said: you wanna be hot? Be hot. Forever.
Final Sip of Tea:
Snow-Drop may have been soft and sweet, but her story is anything but. This wasn’t about beauty - it was about envy, obsession, survival, and a whole lot of poison. The Grimm Brothers didn’t come to tuck you in. They came to traumatize and mesmerize.
And that’s the real tea.
Signed,
Alice, Queen of Ink & Lore
Currently avoiding apples and glass boxes, thank you very much.
✒ Pip’s Editorial Note
Before anyone reaches for the nearest apple slicer, a moment of scholarly grounding.
This retelling stays firmly rooted in the 1812 first-edition Grimm version, where Snow White appears as Snow-Drop and the edges are intentionally sharp. Alice has not softened the violence, rewritten motivations, or introduced modern morality where it does not belong. The huntsman’s order, the queen’s cannibalistic belief, the repeated murder attempts, the glass coffin, and the iron shoes are all present in early folklore and are historically accurate to the Grimms’ darker tradition.
Several details often erased in later adaptations are restored here on purpose. There is no true love’s kiss. Snow-Drop awakens due to physical disruption. The prince’s interest is unsettling by modern standards. Justice is not gentle. These elements reflect how cautionary tales once functioned, not to comfort children, but to warn them.
Alice’s tone may sparkle, but the structure remains faithful. This is performance storytelling layered over authentic source material, not revision or reinvention. The discomfort is the point. Grimm folklore was meant to linger, unsettle, and instruct through fear as much as wonder.
So if this tale feels chilling, grotesque, or excessive, congratulations. You are reading it as it was originally intended.
- Pip
Editor, Alice’s Mad Tea Party
