Sleep & Death

"Sleep is the Cousin of Death"

Sleep and death are two occurrences that are inescapable.

More Common Than You Think

Sleep and death have been somewhat intertwined throughout history. One of the earliest examples is in Greek Mythology. Hypnos (the god of sleep) and Thanatos (the god of death) are twin brothers. The relationship is also engraved deep into our culture. For example a contributor on the website VanWinkle's states, "We talk of both waking the dead and sleeping like the dead. To die is to go to your "eternal rest," where you are told to "rest in peace.""

What about in Literature?

Sleep and death have a plethora of examples of being tied together in literature throughout history. Two great examples are the story Snow White and the works of Willaim Shakespeare.

Snow White

In the Brothers Grimm version, Snow White was in a suspended state between sleep and death. They wrote, "Snow White lay in the coffin for a long, long time. But she did not decay and looked as if she were sleeping".

Shakespeare

Shakespeare frequently linked sleep and death together in many of his works like Hamlet, Macbeth, and Romeo & Juliet. One of his best known examples comes from Romeo & Juliet stating,

"To die; to sleep;

No more; and by a sleep to say we end

The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks

That flesh is heir to. ’Tis a consummation

Devoutly to be wish’d. To die; to sleep;—

To sleep? Perchance to dream! Ay, there ’s the rub;

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,

When we have shuffl’d off this mortal coil."

How does this relate to sleeping beauty?

The elements of sleep and death appear multiple verisons of Sleeping Beauty. Most versions include the spell of slumber the princess is under and the death of the queen (wife or ogress). However in the Charles Perrault verison, we see how sleep and death cause that the princess and the queen to have the same function in the story. In the article "Sleeping beauty must die: The plots of Perrault’s “La belle au bois dormant”", Carolyn Fay expands on this by writing, "Although radically different on the surface, the sleeping woman and the devouring woman are excellent substitutes for each other, because they fulfill the same narrative function in the tale. Each constitutes a central, paradoxical figure who threatens the narrative progression, and who ultimately must die" (Fay 270).

Bibliography

Claesz, Pieter. Still Life with a Skull and a Writing Quill. 1628. Met Museum, https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/435904. Accessed 12 Feb. 2025

Fay, Carolyn. “Sleeping beauty must die: The plots of Perrault’s ‘La belle au bois dormant.’” Marvels & Tales, vol. 22, no. 2, 2008, pp. 259–276, https://doi.org/10.1353/mat.2008.a258007.

Fetti, Domenico. Sleeping Girl. 1620. Tumblr, https://artfoli.tumblr.com/post/163723048337/detail-of-sleeping-girl-1620-by-domenico-fetti. Accessed 12 Feb. 2025.

Garth, Eleanor. “The History of Snow White.” Elgiva Theatre Chesham, 5 Dec. 2021, elgiva.com/snow-white-history/.

Morgan, Anna. “Thanatos: The Greek God of Death, Myths & Legends.” Mythology Guru, 26 May 2023, mythology.guru/thanatos-death-god/.

Sowerby, Millicent. Grimm’s Fairy Tales. Sun, Moon, and Talia, https://www.pookpress.co.uk/sun-moon-talia/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2025.

Tatar, Maria. “Brother Grimm Snow White.” The Classic Fairy Tales , Second ed., W. W. Norton & Company, 2017, p. 101. Norton Critical.

“William Shakespeare.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation, www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-shakespeare. Accessed 13 Feb. 2025.

Winkle, Van. “From Hypnos to Hamlet to Zombies, a Look at Our Obsession with Sleep and Death.” HuffPost, HuffPost, 7 Dec. 2017, www.huffpost.com/entry/from-hypnos-to-hamlet-to_b_7743990.

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