This is the first of Angela Carter’s well-known “wolf tales” series. Although the beginning resembles the Red Riding Hood children’s story, things soon take a very different turn. A wolf loses a paw, grandma is missing a hand, and the villagers show their bravery by beating the poor woman to death. What I particularly like is the way that Carter uses foreshadowing and omissions in the story-line to leave readers with a question: Was the grandmother really a witch/were-woman, or was the “good child” one of those northern country people with a cold heart mentioned in the opening sentence?
Original Text / PDF (827 words)