Hansel and Gretel

To begin with this title, I find there are lots of these books and I must do some research to find which one Elsie might have been reading.

I am guessing the original Grimm brothers publication of this book is what Elsie was reading.  Everyone has heard of this story from one source or another, but I guess I cannot say I have ever read the actual book.  It was shorter than I expected, I thought it might be more involved.  One aspect I didn't know was the reason the children were in the forest to begin with.  Maybe so that it is not such a terrible story, it has been changed so that the children were lost, no explanation.  But here it is because the step mother hates them (what is with the Grimms and evil step mothers??) and nags the father to abandon them in the forest.   That is so terrible! I can't imagine reading this to my kids. I wonder how old the kids Elsie read it to were.. it would have been very scary to me as a child!