Author/Illustrator: Paul O. Zelinsky
Genre: Traditional Literature
Awards: Caldecott Honor Award
Age Level: 5-8 years old
Summary: Rumpelstiltskin begins the story in a late medieval castle. Trying to impress the king, the miller speaks of his daughter who spins straw into gold. The king was a fool for gold and immediately asked the miller to send his daughter to the castle. She is frightened as she was thrown into the castle without any knowledge of how to spin straw into gold. Suddenly, a little man steps in and makes a deal with her. He spins the straw into gold ad she gives him her necklace. The next morning, the king steps in and sees all the gold made from last night. His is a greedy king and tells her to keep spinning gold if she valued her own life. This pattern continued three times; the girl had no clue what to do and the little man kept spinning gold for her. The third time the girl has nothing left to give so the little man makes her promise to give her her firstborn child and he will keep spinning gold. She accepts the offer. The girl later marries the king and has a young handsome baby boy. The little man comes back years later demanding what she promised him. She pleads with him and ends up agreeing that in three days if she knows his name, she can keep the child. The queen asks her most faithful servants to search for the name of the little man. The answer was not to be found. When he arrives the third day she calls him Phil. The little man runs away screaming, "the devil told you that!" He then flew out the window and was never to be seen or heard from again.
Illustrations were dramatic, unique and colorful. The illustrator paid close attention to detail with every single piece of straw in the castle. Characters were life-like, excluding the little man.
In my classroom, I would use Rumpelstiltskin to instill the meaning of humbleness into the students. I would have them reflect upon the story and state how they would act differently.
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