Good Mother, Bad Mother Quiz | Literature

Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts

1. Her mother died immediately after her birth. She later had a very wicked stepmother, who plotted to kill her because she was envious of the princess's beauty.

Answer: Snow White

The Grimm Brothers' "Snow White" begins with a queen sewing near her ebony wood window frame. She pricks her finger on a sewing needle and some blood drops on to the snow. She then wishes for a child who would be white as snow, red as blood, and black as ebony. She has a daughter and names her Snow White, but dies as soon as she is born.

A year after her mother's death, the princess's father took a second wife, a very wicked and arrogant woman. She attempted to murder Snow White, but Snow White eventually lived happily ever after.

The fairy tale says that Snow White was only seven years-old when the stepmother first began to feel hatred towards her. We're talking about a child here, and she hates her. This is her only mother figure after her birth mother's death. How evil can a character be? Well, the only way she could be more evil is if she was her birth mother--like she was in the original version.

2. This princess's mother was originally barren. The queen must have been heartbroken when a malicious fairy cursed her baby to die.

Answer: Sleeping Beauty

In Charles Perrault's "Sleeping Beauty", the princess's mother, the queen, tried for many years to have children, but she never could. Then somehow she was finally able to have a child, a little princess. At the princess's christening, a wicked fairy cursed the beautiful princess to prick her hand on a spinning wheel at fifteen or sixteen years old and die. However, one of the good fairies declared that she wouldn't die; only sleep for a hundred years.

In the Grimm Brothers' version, a frog or a crab (depending on the edition) tells the barren queen that she will have a daughter.

In Perrault's version, Sleeping Beauty's husband's mother, her mother-in-law, is an evil ogre. She tries to eat Sleeping Beauty and Sleeping Beauty's children, named Dawn (girl) and Day (boy). The Grimm version doesn't include any of this because it ends with the prince and princess getting married.

3. Her mother allowed her craving for a plant to get the best of her. A witch took the child from her mother and stuck the child in a tower for years.

Answer: Rapunzel

When Rapunzel's mother was pregnant with her, she saw some rapunzel flowers in a witch's garden. She longed for the flowers and the witch told her that she could have them as long as the witch could have the child after the birth.

The witch named the girl Rapunzel after the plant, and she became like Rapunzel's adoptive mother, although not a good one. Actually, I don't think her birth mother was very good either, but maybe the witch simply had her under a spell.

4. This princess from "The Juniper Tree" had an evil mother who killed her stepson, the princess's half-brother.

Answer: Marlene

"The Juniper Tree" is from the Grimm Brothers. It actually begins somewhat similar to "Snow White", with a woman wanting to have a child red as blood and white as snow. However, the special child is a son. After the woman has the boy, she dies, and then her husband marries again. The second queen gives birth to a daughter, Marlene, and she loves her, but hates her half-brother and kills him. Marlene isn't a wicked character, so when she finds out what her mother did to her brother, she is horrified.

Marlene is a German name based on a combination of Maria/Mary and Magdalene. (Mary Magdalene is a character in the New Testament of the Bible.) In some translations of "The Juniper Tree," the princess is named either Marlinchen or Ann Marie instead.

5. Like with several other princesses, her mother died. However, her grandmother played a large role in her story by telling her about immortal souls.

Answer: Little Mermaid

In Hans Christian Andersen's "The Little Mermaid", the little mermaid's grandmother tells her that mermaids live for three hundred years in the ocean and then cease to exist. She also tells her that while human beings live less years on earth than mermaids do, the humans have immortal souls and live after death.

The fairy tale is about the mermaid wanting to become a human and therefore obtain an immortal soul and go to Heaven.

6. In a Scottish fairy tale similar to a popular German tale, this princess with a metallic name had an envious mother who wanted to kill her.

Answer: Gold Tree

"Gold Tree and Silver Tree" is considered a Scottish version of the German "Snow White". The wicked queen's name is Silver Tree and her daughter, the princess, is Gold Tree. Silver Tree is extremely envious of Gold Tree and she murders her. Gold Tree's husband believes that she is dead, so he marries another princess. Long story short, Gold Tree comes back to life and the prince, interestingly, becomes a polygamist. The second wife offers to go away after Gold Tree's magical resurrection, but the prince asks her to stay. Apparently, the prince and his two wives live happily ever after in the end, while the evil Silver Tree is punished with death.

In this tale, Gold Tree's biological mother, not stepmother, hates her. Sadly, in the original 1812 version of "Snow White", the wicked queen was also her birth mother. It was changed in the 1819 version to tone it down for children.

7. In Madame d'Aulnoy's "The Benevolent Frog", this princess's mother was captured by a lion fairy when she was pregnant with her.

Answer: Moufette

Madame d'Aulnoy's fairy tales don't seem to be as well known as the Grimm Brothers' or even Charles Perrault's tales, but her stories are great nonetheless. I discovered them while researching for a college paper about fairy tales. "The Benevolent Frog" is just one of these great tales. The lion fairy is the villain and the frog fairy helps the young queen, Moufette's mother.

I found out that Moufette is the French word for skunk--so she might as well be called Princess Skunk.

8. She had a loving mother, a cruel maid, and a beloved horse named Falada.

Answer: Goose Girl

"The Goose Girl", by the Brothers Grimm, tells of an old queen who was a widow. She had a beloved daughter, the princess. The princess was betrothed to a prince in a far away country and the queen ordered a maid to assist the princess on her journey to where the prince lived. However, even though the maid was supposed to be a servant, she refused to act like one. In fact, not only did she not help the princess, but she was very mean to her. She forced the princess to give up her horse, Falada, as well as her royal clothes. The maid pretended to be the princess and married the prince. Meanwhile, the real princess was living like a poor goose girl, or in other words, a girl responsible for taking care of geese. In this way, the maid actually acted as a cruel fairy tale stepmother or stepsister. In the end, though, the prince found out the truth and married the real princess.

At least the "goose girl" did have a good mother, unlike other princesses with dead and/or evil mothers. Her father still died though.

9. Her birth mother died and she asked the princess's father, the king, to not remarry unless he could find a woman more beautiful and wiser than the queen was. The king was convinced that he had to marry their own daughter.

Answer: Donkey Skin

Charles Perrault's "Donkey Skin" has some similarities to "Cinderella", but there are vast differences, too. Just like Cinderella, Donkey Skin had a good mother who died. She also had a fairy godmother. But unlike "Cinderella", "Donkey Skin" features a bizzare twist of attempted incest. When the princess learns that her own father wants to marry her, she is terrified and disgusted, so she runs far away.

The title of "Donkey Skin" comes from the fact that her godmother gives her a dress made from a donkey's skin to disguise herself.

10. Her wonderful mother died when she was a child. Her stepmother used her as a slave. Her fairy godmother comforted her.

Answer: Cinderella

There are many, many variations of the Cinderella story in different cultures, but Charles Perrault's is the version that most people probably think of when they think of "Cinderella". It features the pumpkin coach and the fairy godmother. In other versions of the story, the godmother is actually more like the spirit of her dead mother helping her.

Source: Author Ceduh

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Good Mother, Bad Mother Trivia Quiz

Mothers and stepmothers are pretty common in fairy tales. Match the princesses to the descriptions. Most, but not all, of these are from Charles Perrault or the Grimm Brothers.

Questions		Choices
1. Her mother died immediately after her birth. She later had a very wicked stepmother, who plotted to kill her because she was envious of the princess's beauty.		Snow White
2. This princess's mother was originally barren. The queen must have been heartbroken when a malicious fairy cursed her baby to die.		Cinderella
3. Her mother allowed her craving for a plant to get the best of her. A witch took the child from her mother and stuck the child in a tower for years.		Sleeping Beauty
4. This princess from "The Juniper Tree" had an evil mother who killed her stepson, the princess's half-brother.		Goose Girl
5. Like with several other princesses, her mother died. However, her grandmother played a large role in her story by telling her about immortal souls.		Gold Tree
6. In a Scottish fairy tale similar to a popular German tale, this princess with a metallic name had an envious mother who wanted to kill her.		Marlene
7. In Madame d'Aulnoy's "The Benevolent Frog", this princess's mother was captured by a lion fairy when she was pregnant with her.		Moufette
8. She had a loving mother, a cruel maid, and a beloved horse named Falada.		Donkey Skin
9. Her birth mother died and she asked the princess's father, the king, to not remarry unless he could find a woman more beautiful and wiser than the queen was. The king was convinced that he had to marry their own daughter.		Little Mermaid
10. Her wonderful mother died when she was a child. Her stepmother used her as a slave. Her fairy godmother comforted her.		Rapunzel