page_title: Beauty and the Beast
section_title: Villeneuve's version
hierarchical_section_title: Beauty and the Beast / Plot / Villeneuve's version
caption_attribution_description: Illustration for Beauty and the Beast. London: George Routledge and Sons, 1874.
context_page_description: Beauty and the Beast is a fairy tale written by French novelist Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve and published in 1740 in La Jeune Américaine et les contes marins. Its lengthy version was abridged, rewritten, and published first by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont in 1756 in Magasin des enfants and by Andrew Lang in the Blue Fairy Book of his Fairy Book series in 1889, to produce the version most commonly retold. It was influenced by some earlier Ancient Greek stories, such as "Cupid and Psyche", The Golden Ass written by Lucius Apuleius Madaurensis in the 2nd century AD, and The Pig King, an Italian fairytale published by Giovanni Francesco Straparola in The Facetious Nights of Straparola around 1550.
  Variants of the tale are known across Europe. In France, for example, Zémire and Azor is an operatic version of the story, written by Marmontel and composed by Grétry in 1771, which had enormous success well into the 19th century; it is based on the second version of the tale. Amour pour amour, by Pierre-Claude Nivelle de La Chaussée, a 1742 play based on de Villeneuve's version.
context_section_description: A widower merchant lives in a mansion with his six children (three sons and three daughters). All three of his daughters are very beautiful, but the youngest, Beauty, is the most lovely, as well as kind, well-read, and pure of heart; while the two elder sisters, in contrast, are cruel, selfish, vain, and spoiled. On a dark and stormy night at sea, all of his wealth was robbed by pirates, who sink most of his merchant fleet, and forces the entire family to live in a small barn to work for a living. While Beauty makes a firm resolution to adjust to rural life with a cheerful disposition, her sisters do not and mistake her firmness for insensibility, forcing her into doing household work in an effort to make enough money to buy back their former home.
  A year later, the merchant hears from one of his crewmembers that one of the trade ships he had sent has arrived back in port, having escaped the destruction of its companions. Before leaving, he asks his children if they wish for him to bring any gifts back for them. The sons ask for weaponry and horses to hunt with, whereas the oldest daughters ask for clothing, jewels, and the finest dresses possible as they think his wealth has returned. Beauty asks for nothing but her father to be safe, but when he insists on buying her a present, she is satisfied with the promise of a rose after none of those grew last spring. However, to his dismay, the merchant finds that his ship's cargo has been seized to pay his debts, leaving him penniless and unable to buy his children's presents.
  On his way back, the merchant becomes caught in a terrible storm. Desperately seeking shelter, he comes upon a mysterious palace. Seeing that no one is home, the merchant sneaks in and finds tables inside laden with food and drinks, which seem to have been left for him by the palace's invisible owner. The merchant accepts this gift and spends the night there. The next morning, the merchant has come to view the palace as his own possession and is about to leave when he sees a rose garden and recalls that Beauty had desired a rose. Without warning, the merchant quickly plucked the loveliest rose he can find, and was about to pluck more to create a bouquet, only to end up being confronted by a hideous "Beast" who warns him that theft of his property, i.e. a rose (after accepting his hospitality), is a charge punishable by death. Realizing his deadly mistake, he merchant begs for forgiveness, revealing that he had only picked the rose as a gift for his youngest daughter. After listening to his story, the Beast reluctantly agrees to let him give the rose to Beauty, but only if the merchant brings Beauty to him in exchange without deception; he makes it clear that Beauty must agree to take his place to the point where he will then treat her as his fiancée, and not his prisoner, while under no illusions about her predicament. Otherwise, the Beast will threateningly destroy his entire family.
  At first, the merchant is hesitantly upset about Beauty being abducted into marrying him, but he reluctantly accepts this condition. The Beast sends him on his way atop a magical horse, along with wealth, jewels and fine clothes for his sons and daughters, but stresses that Beauty must never know about his deal. The merchant, upon arriving home, tries to hide the secret from his children, but Beauty pries it from him on purpose. Reacting swiftly, the brothers suggest if they could go to the castle and fight the Beast together, while the older sisters place blame on Beauty for dooming the entire family. The merchant dissuades his children, forbidding them from ever going near the Beast. Eventually, Beauty sneaks away from home later that night against her father's orders to face the Beast alone.
  Once she arrives at his palace, the Beast becomes excited to meet her face to face, so he throws a welcome ceremony by treating her to an amazing cabaret show. He gives her lavish clothing and food and carries on lengthy conversations with her and she notes that he is inclined to stupidity rather than savagery. Every night, the Beast
caption: Illustration for Beauty and the Beast drawn by Walter Crane.
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