The story from Fairy Tales From the Brothers Grimm told a tale about a selfish king who desires gold, a miller's daughter who is suppose to spin straw into gold, and Rumplestiltskin, who turns the straw into gold. The king puts the Miller's daughter into rooms filled with more and more straw threatening her life, the Miller's daughter makes an impulsive deal with Rumplestiltskin bargaining her first born child, and Rumplestiltskin, who showed her compassion and made the wife another deal. In the end the King and Miller's daughter are married and keep their child, and Rumplestiltskin has lost his part of the deal and destroyed himself. So with all that happen, What is the moral lesson in this story?
People look for meaning and lessons in Fairy tales and Folklore, and I am struggling trying to find it in this story. The people who behaved poorly, the king and his selfishness and the miller's daughter and her sneakiness, end up with a happily every after. Rumplestiltskin does not. He shows compassion, understanding, and mercy on the miller's daughter, and he ends up being tricked, and losing what he originally one.
The best idea for a moral I could think of has to do with greed. The King was a greedy man, and his action caused his wife to make a deal with Rumplestiltskin. Rumplestiltskin was greedy exchanging his services from material items to the royal couple's baby, and as a result he lost his winnings. Greed seems to run a lot of motives, but I even feel that this is a stretch. The story seems to be written for more entertainment uses like a written version of "Let's Make a Deal".
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I like how you mention the fact that Rumpelstiltskin showed compassion. Many people paint him as the villain of the story and the queen as the hero for saving her baby. But in reality I think he was just helping her out of a bad situation.
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