Responding to Question #6: Analyze the story's final paragraph in detail. How does it help to elucidate the theme?
"Next day he pretended to be the Prince who braves the terrible thicket of thorns to enter the palace and kiss the Sleeping Beauty back to life..." (P. 236)
The title of this short story implies that the reader is going to be treated to a lovely fairytale filled with princes, princesses, magic spells, and the like. However, the story is practically the opposite. The author tells a story of droll reality in which fear of possibilities that are not quite ideal is the central theme, and that theme is still present in the last paragraph despite the presence of the title of an actual fairytale: Sleeping Beauty. Finally, the reader gets to experience a proximity to a story that actually begins with "once upon a time..." but that reference does not last. The boy's demise via the coils at the top of his parent's security fence is tragic and ironic. They worked to build a fortress around their private little residence, but the fortress actually did the opposite of what was expected of it. It did not protect their family.
The gardener and housemaid were present throughout the whole story, so their place among the last few sentences was practically mandatory. They were the ones to find the little boy first, and they proved their loyalty to the family, which had been questioned the whole story, by trying to save him.
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