Are there very many famous hedgehogs in fiction? There’s Beatrix Potter’s Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle, and of course Sonic, if you want to count video games (which I definitely do).
Then there’s the fairy tale from the Grimms’ collection about a hedgehog, known as “Hans-mein-Igel,” or in English, “Hans-My-Hedgehog.”
The story starts with a childless man telling his neighbors that he and his wife would have a child, even if it’s a hedgehog. If only this man had known he was in a fairy tale, he might not have spoken so idly, because his wife gave birth to a baby who was a hedgehog from the waist up. His parents name him Hans-My-Hedgehog and basically resent him, although to their credit they do keep him, giving him a bed of straw behind the stove and buying him bagpipes when he asks for them. Eventually, he goes out to seek his fortune, riding on a rooster with shod feet, and settles down in the woods tending pigs and playing his bagpipes.
Wow, even for a fairy tale, this story is bizarre. Anyway, two kings happen upon him in succession, and when the hedgehog-boy gives them directions, he has them promise to give him the first thing that meets them upon their return home, which in both cases is the king’s daughter. The first king draws up a contract saying that Hans gets nothing, trusting that he can’t read, but the second king is honest. When Hans rides into the first kingdom, the guards try to kill him, but he succeeds in reaching the castle and claiming the king’s daughter. When she decides to ride off with Hans, he pierces her with his quills. She survives, but is cursed for the rest of her life. And that’s what you get for trying to screw a hedgehog out of what your promised him! Well, except that it’s the daughter who’s punished for the sins of her father, which doesn’t seem entirely fair. The second king willingly lets him daughter go with Hans, and on their wedding night the youth removes his hedgehog skin and has it burned up, leaving him in human form and able to live happily ever after.
There are several odd things about this tale, but one that immediately strikes me is how Hans-My-Hedgehog makes an unusual protagonist. While I’m sure he’s not unique, isn’t it more typical for an ordinary person to be the viewpoint character, and someone like Hans to play a supporting role? In “Beauty and the Beast and “East of the Sun and West of the Moon,” a woman is forced to live with a grotesque animal, but in both cases we see the events from her point of view. Hans also functions as a supernatural dispenser of justice, giving rewards to the honest and punishing the dishonest. Since he’s the main character, however, it’s odd how he seems to know things he would have no reason to know. If he was a hedgehog-person since birth, and not transformed by a witch or anything, how does he realize he can remove and burn his skin to turn fully human? We’re not informed of any occasion when he would have been told this. It’s not clear why it works, either, although finding true love is often instrumental in breaking curses. I also have to wonder how big Hans is. The fact that he rides around on a rooster suggests he’s no bigger than an ordinary hedgehog.
If so, does he grow to human size when he manages to remove his hedgehog skin? That’s what I would assume, but it’s not spelled out. Perhaps I’m asking too much of a fairy tale to explain these things, but such stories do tend to have their own rules, and I’m not sure Hans-My-Hedgehog is really operating within them.
My author friend Kate Coombs has a retelling of this coming out next spring. Shameless plug. I guess it’s not shameless since it’s not MY book, but I’m shamelessly plugging it for my friend. EVERYBODY BUY KATE’S BOOKS, thanks.
Hans-my-Hedgehog is one of my favorite stories, and in fact, I’m currently writing up my own retelling for my own blog (I found this page through a hunt for illustrations).
As for how he knew he could shed his skin: taking the story semi-literally, rather than metaphorically (dangerous slippery slope in wondertales), I imagine he could feel that it was getting loose. Like when you’re a kid, and can feel a loose tooth is about to fall out. He wouldn’t necessarily know it would break the spell to burn it; but he may have wanted to have it destroyed anyway, because it represented how his father hated him. I also think what really broke the spell is not “true love” in this case, but simply being recognized as being worthy of honesty and respect — what we all need to claim our humanity.
What I’m really baffled by is “How the heck does a blacksmith shoe a rooster?” (and we don’t know, it may have been a giant, human-sized, bird).
I realize fairy tales aren’t supposed to be taken entirely literally. I just think it can be fun to look at them as if they were. And yeah, it could have been a giant rooster.
If I recall correctly, the German version of Sesame Street features a six-foot tall Muppet hedgehog as the neighborhood’s perpetual child. An interesting pairing with Big Bird. ;-)
I know what you mean about the fun in looking at fairy tales as if they were real; personally, I like to get inside the heads of different characters, and imagine the emotional reality behind the action. And on that score I think the first princess’s dishonestly (for which he punished her) was being all falsely lovey-dovey and flattering, which would have been insulting. What I can’t square is the reconciliation with his father. Everything that man does is motivated by resentment and jealousy. Why does he get to take part in the happy ending?
For some reason, it seems like biological parents always get to share in their children’s fortunes in the fairy tale world, even if they don’t deserve it. It’s the stepparents who don’t. Part of the “blood is thicker than water” thing, I guess, but that doesn’t always work out in real life.