Starting with snow white

fathers 
and 
brothers 
to you! And you shall be little 
sister 
and house
mother
to us all!” 
(Merington 2, 12; emphasis added). Although there is a bit of the veneration of the 
Princess at the start of this statement, that air quickly dissipates into language reflecting a 
more equitable distribution of roles—Snow White the “
sister
” to her “
brother
” dwarfs, 

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the “house
mother
”
 
to her “
father
” dwarfs. Where Merritt finds Blick’s relational 
positioning of Snow White reflective of “both an adult and a child role” here, I would 
argue that the parallelism Merington creates displays the status of Blick/the dwarfs and 
Snow White as equitable partners (“The Little Girl/Little Mother” 108). She is, in 
essence, one of “the people,” little though they may be.
Where these additions of equity and democracy display another facet of American 
culture, a reader/viewer sees still more when the queen approaches Snow White as a 
peddlar. Marking the transition into a culture of consumption, the significance of material 
possessions, as well as buying and selling are heightened. When the queen first 
approaches the dwarf’s house, her offerings are not the mere “Pretty wares” of the 
Grimms’ tale, “Staylaces in all kinds of colors,” or the single “poisoned comb” (Grimm 
255, 256). Instead, the queen details each of her wares. 
Here’s thimbles and thread and here’s needles and pins;
Here’s finest of flax for my lady who spins. 
Here’s buckles and brooches and fanciful laces 
And rainbow-like ribbons to set off sweet faces! 
I’ve chains for your lockets and charms for your pockets,
And dolls that can roll their eyes round in their sockets! 
The foot of a rabbit; foot of a hare — 
An excellent habit such baubles to wear, 
To keep off rheumatics that come from damp attics 
And cellars and dairies! 
Here’s beads for your stringing and bells for your ringing,
And seed for canaries. It sets them a-singing! 
Here’s lotions and potions and prettiful notions! 
Here’s balm for complexions with book of directions! 
Here’s knives for the husbands and scissors for wives, 

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And everything else for your natural lives! (Merington 3.1, 4-5) 
In this version, when Snow White is not interested in the queen’s wares, the queen is 
forced to make the sale enticing. Therefore, in each description she details the product’s 
unique properties, or how it will prove useful. Ironically, while almost none of the 
products she names are natural, the queen as peddlar purports that these are the material 
goods necessary “for your 
natural 
lives” (Merington 3.1, 5; emphasis added). In essence, 
it is 
unnatural
to avoid or renounce participation in this culture of commodity, of buying 
and selling, and bettering one’s life by means of material goods.
Thus, when the queen does enter, the discussion of the use value of goods is 
extended still further when the queen starts at Snow White’s appearance. “Why, child, 
what hair! Unkempt, Disordered! Where’s your comb?” (Merington 3.1, 6). Without 
the marketable goods in her possession, Snow White is shamed for her appearance. 
Still Snow White refuses to buy in, for she is “penniless” and therefore has no 
purchasing power (Merington 3.1, 7). When the queen suggests “On credit, then!” her 
young patron still protests. Not until the young woman is given the right to the 
possession by her male counterparts does she concede. “The comb is yours—Aye, fairly 
come by! How? Your dwarfs! They crossed my palm with gold! ‘T will suit her 
princess-comeliness, they said!” (Merington 3.1, 7). Once the sale is complete, Snow 
White “(delighted, takes comb from Queen) My dwarfs—I own it took my fancy from 
the first!” (Merington 3.1, 7). In this exchange, the process of “agree[ing] on a price” 
from the Grimms’ version is greatly extended (256). In this prolonged version, 
Merington illustrates the possibilities for purchase (use of “credit”), the gendered 

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limitations on purchasing power, and the link between material desire and the gaze of a 
male counterpart or audience. 
The elongation of this exchange is not unusual, given the alternate context of the 
play—the stage; however, Merington’s choice of developing this first scene while 
eliminating another of the scenes of temptation is intriguing. Merritt argues, “For the 
adapters, like their successors, the source fairy tale provides, even in the Grimm’s 
expansive later editions, no more than a brief, though event-filled narrative. Motivations, 
when they appear in the Grimms’ fairy tale, are simple and inadequate for the 
requirements of the stage” (“The Little Girl/Little Mother” 107). However, given these 
new “requirements,” it is interesting that where Merington chooses to prolong this scene 
of exchange, she