Rump: The True Story of Rumpelstiltskin

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. What do you know about Rumpelstiltskin? In the fairy tale, how does he help the miller’s daughter, and what does he ask for in exchange? How does the miller’s daughter defeat Rumpelstiltskin? There are many versions of this story across cultures. What variations do you notice in different retellings?

Teaching Suggestion: Students will likely be familiar with the fairy tale and be able to draw on their prior knowledge to answer the first few questions, but they may need to consult the resources provided below to answer the final question and add details to their responses. To provide context for this question and the resources below, consider explaining to students that the novel they are about to read is a reinterpretation of the fairy tale. To extend students’ discussion and build curiosity for the novel, you might ask students to generate questions about Rumpelstiltskin that they would like to see answered, such as where he comes from and how he learned to spin straw into gold.

• This article from The Guardian provides an English translation of the Brothers Grimm story “Rumpelstiltskin.