The Journey of the Little Red Riding Hood from Literature to Cinema as the Girl with the Red Scarfed / Kırmızı Başlıklı Kız’ın Edebiyattan Sinemaya Yazmalı Olarak Yolculuğu

• Main Author: Süreyya Elif Aksoy
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cyprus International University 2021-05-01
• Series: Folklor/Edebiyat
• Subjects: little red riding hood; red scarf; gender; fairy tale; family; rite of passage
• Online Access: https://www.folkloredebiyat.org/Makaleler/1743994912_8.makale%20S%c3%bcreyya%20Elif%20Aksoy.pdf

Cengiz Aytmatov’s story Selvi Boylum Al Yazmalım, translated from Russian into Turkish, and the film adaptation of the same name, directed by Atıf Yılmaz and with the screenplay by Ali Özgentürk, have both formal and intertextual relations with the Grimm Brothers variant of the fairy tale “Little Red Riding Hood”. I will try to argue that it assumes a similar social and moral function in the context of controlling and limiting the female body and sexuality within the patriarchal family structure. In the review, I will deal with the three texts in order, in terms of plot, signs that make intertextual ties visible, and the formation of characters on the axis of individual-society conflict. The example story presented with a metaphorical expression in “Little Red Riding Hood” is directly expressed in the aforementioned novel and film; The tension between the woman’s effort to exist as a subject who desires and travels outside the home in pursuit of her desires, and the tension between being desired and kept inside the home by the man results in the latter. At the center of the conflict between her social duties, the young girl crosses the threshold of puberty by suppressing her desires and accepting her passive role and maternal identity within the boundaries of the male-dominated holy family. While revealing the links between these three texts, Jack Zipes’s observations on “Little Red Riding Hood” variants and adaptations, as well as Vladimir Propp’s conceptualization on the functions of characters in extraordinary fairy tales, some observations on intertextuality, and determinations on the history of modernity and sexuality were used.