In middle school I purchased a compilation of stories titled, A Wolf at the Door and other Retold Fairy Tales edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling. The book had short stories by acclaimed authors such as Neil Gaiman, Tanith Lee, Garth Nix, and Nancy Farmer. My favorite work was not a short story, but a mini-epic poem by Gregory McGuire from the point of view of the seven dwarves in Snow White after Snow White’s happy ending. “The Seven Stage a Comeback” is divided not by stanzas, but by numbers on the left side of the poem, indicating which dwarf is speaking. After Snow White left with her prince to live out her happily ever after, the dwarves are left to pick up the pieces of their lives, and come to grips with the realization that she is gone. They decide to take the glass coffin with them over the mountain to track down Snow White and “visit” her. They waiver between the idea of just visiting her and putting the poison apple in the coffin, to keep it fresh for when they give it to her, in order to put her back in the coffin and take her home. The ending of the poem has a twist and switches perspectives into Snow White’s, where we see she has a hazy recollection of her time in the coffin and before. I don’t want to give too much away, but everyone gets their happy ending in this re-told story too.
I liked this retelling the most because it was well written, you can clearly assign which dwarf is speaking without being told, it’s a fresh point of view of a story we all know, and it is a little quirky with it’s choice of focusing not on a prince, princess, or even a witch, but dwarves.