In the Grimm version, Little Red Cap learns from her mistakes and is allowed to live, taking the moral of the Perrault version to heart and learning not to trust the wolf--whether he is a true wolf or a metaphor for male sexual desires. We see her selfishness reversed; in Little Red Cap, she is given a second chance, later taking more pastries to her grandmother and coming across a second wolf, but outsmarting him (because, of course, she had heeded her mother’s warnings this time, and was therefore not at fault.) Red Riding Hood’s redemption and ultimate subservience is what saves her in the end; the second time the wolf attacks, she has learned from her mistakes, has withdrawn her selfish attitude, and is ready to go down the path without …show more content…
Everyone suffers from their selfish actions, and it’s only through the continued focus of the ever-changing plot towards something moralistic that the selfishness ever reaches a head. Before, the selfishness is pointless and mundane--there is no redemption, only violence and, in the end, a moral--or not even that. As the plot thickens, as the sexual overtones die out, we experience something different--something not only focused on the utter destruction of a family, but the rebuilding of it. And so the selfishness is carried away; the girl learns to behave, and think of others, and, as such, outsmarts the wolf, getting her happy ending, and does not, in the end, provide dinner for the