☕️ Alice’s Mad Tea Party Presents: Alice Spills the Tea - Rapunzel
Darlings, pour your tea and settle in. Tonight, we climb towers high enough to touch the clouds, listen to whispers in the wind, and peer into the life of a girl with hair like spun gold. You think you know Rapunzel? Pfft. The sugary versions you’ve heard barely brush the shadows. Let’s dive into the real, dark, twisty lore.
Once upon a time, there lived a couple desperate for a child. The wife, heavy with longing, gazed out at the neighbor’s garden and spotted a plant called rampion, known as rapunzel. She craved it with a hunger that gnawed at her very soul. The husband, fearful yet obedient, stole some from the garden. Alas, the garden’s owner was no ordinary woman, but a witch, cunning and unforgiving. She caught him and demanded a payment: the child to be hers.
When the baby was born, the witch whisked the girl away, naming her Rapunzel and raising her in a tower so tall no staircase or door could breach it. The only entry? A single window, and oh, her hair. Golden, long, and strong, it became the rope the witch used to climb up and down, to bring Rapunzel sustenance, lessons, and yes, warnings.
The tower, my darlings, was not a quaint hideaway. It was isolation incarnate. Rapunzel grew unaware of the world beyond her walls, her only companion the witch and the wind that sang of freedom. But the world is cleverer than any witch, and fate, more patient than cruelty.
One day, a prince - or in older versions, a young nobleman - heard her singing. Drawn by her voice, he discovered the secret of her hair. Day after day, he visited, calling up her golden locks, speaking to her in whispers that carried hope and curiosity. Love - or perhaps just longing for the outside world - blossomed in the tower.
Ah, but no fairy tale is without its shadows. The witch, discovering Rapunzel’s betrayal, grew furious. She cut Rapunzel’s hair—golden strands tumbling to the ground - and banished her to a desert or wilderness, leaving the prince to his doom, falling from the tower and into thorns that blinded him in despair. Yes, darlings, the story does not tiptoe around pain.
Yet, cleverness, resilience, and fate conspire. Rapunzel wandered, suffering and surviving, until finally, her cries and her path brought her back to the blinded prince. Her tears, magical and true, restored his sight. And together, they returned to a world that had once seemed cruel but now could hold them both.
The Brothers Grimm, 1812, preserved this version - a tale of desire, consequence, isolation, cunning, and ultimate reunion. Every detail matters: the tower is confinement, Rapunzel’s hair is both a lifeline and a trap, the witch is temptation, greed, and control. The prince’s blindness? A symbolic consequence of curiosity untempered by caution. And Rapunzel’s tears? Proof that resilience, love, and courage can pierce even the darkest enchantments.
So, my lovelies, remember this the next time you hear a tale of a girl locked away in a tower: freedom is earned, curiosity is a double-edged blade, and golden hair can save - or betray. Keep your eyes sharp, your heart clever, and, of course… sip your tea. Some towers hide shadows you’d never guess from the ground.
- Alice, Queen of Ink & Lore
