Once there was a poor motherless child who had rags for a dress and no shoes at all. But the child saved cloth scraps wherever she found them and over time she sewed for herself a pair of shoes which she stained red with the juice of berries. These shoes were crude but she loved them. They made her feel rich, even though her days were spent gathering food in the thorny woods until far past dark.

But one day as she trudged down the road in her rags and her red shoes, a gilded carriage pulled up beside her. Inside was an old woman who told her she was going to take her home and treat her as her own little daughter. So to the wealthy woman’s house they went and the child’s hair was washed and combed and a large blue ribbon put into it. She was given purest whitest undergarments and a fine gray wool dress and the whitest of white stockings and shiniest of shiny black shoes. And when the child asked, “Where are my old clothes, and especially my red shoes?” the old woman said, “The clothes were so filthy and the shoes so ridiculous, that she had thrown them into the fire, where they were burnt to ashes and not to worry about it because you have something far better now.

The child was very sad, for even with all the riches surrounding her, the humble red shoes made by her own hand had given her the greatest happiness. Now, she was made to sit still all the time, to walk without skipping, and to not speak unless spoken to, to be seen and not heard, but a secret fire began to burn in her heart and she continued to yearn for her old red shoes more than anything.

As the child was old enough to be confirmed on The Day of the Innocents, the old woman took her to an old crippled shoemaker to have a special pair of shoes made for the occasion. In the shoemaker’s case was already a pair of red shoes made of the finest Moroccan leather that were finer than fine; they were so beautiful they practically glowed. So even though shoes such as these would be scandalous for the ceremony at church, the old woman’s eyesight was failing and the so when the child said, “I would like to have those. “ The old woman could not see the color, so she paid the shoemaker for them and the shoemaker gave a wink to the child as he wrapped up the package.

The next day at church, the church members whispered back and forth about the shoes this child was wearing. “My god they were brilliant red! They were bright like apples!” Everyone disapproved. Everyone stared; even the icons on the wall, even the statues stared disapprovingly at her shoes. But the child loved the shoes all the more because they reminded her of her own lost shoes. So when the pontiff intoned, the choir hummed, the organ pumped, the child thought nothing more beautiful than her red shoes.

By the end of the day the old woman had been informed about her ward’s red shoes. She took them off her feet and said, “Never, never wear those red shoes again!” But the next Sunday, the child couldn’t help but sneak into the closet and take down the shoes, and she and the old woman walked to church as usual.

At the door to the church was an old soldier with his arm in a sling. He wore a little jacket and had a red beard that was pointed at the end. He bowed and asked permission to brush the dust from the child’s shoes. The child put out her foot, and he tapped the soles of her shoes with a wig-a-jig-jig song that made the soles of her feet itch. “Remember to stay for the dance,” he smiled, and winked at her.

Again everyone looked askance at the girl’s red shoes. But she so loved the shoes that were bright like crimson, bright like raspberries, bright like pomegranates, that she could barely think of anything else. She could not hear the people whispering around her, she could not hear the sermon, she could not hear the choir. She was in love with this color and they reminded her of the one’s she had lost. So busy was she turning her feet this way and that, admiring her red shoes, that she forgot to sing.

As she and the old woman left the church, the injured soldier called out, “What beautiful dancing shoes!” His words made the girl take a few little twirls right there and then. But once her feet had begun to move, they would not stop, and she danced through the flower beds and around the corner of the church until it seemed as though she had lost complete control of herself. She did a gavotte and then a csadas and then waltzed by herself through the fields across the way.

The old woman’s coachman jumped up from the his bench and ran after the girl, picked her up, and carried her back to the carriage, but the girl’s feet in the red shoes were still dancing in the air as though they were still on the ground. The old woman and the coachman tugged and pulled, trying to pry the red shoes off. It was such a sight, all hats askew and kicking legs and petticoats, but at last the child’s feet were calmed and the shoes were off.

Back home, the old woman slammed the red shoes down high on a shelf and warned the girl, “Never, never touch these again!” But the girl could not help opening the closet door a crack and peering in to see them glowing there in the dark and longing filled her. To her they were still the most beautiful things on the face off the earth.

Not long after, as fate would have it, the old woman became bedridden, and as soon as her doctors left and pronounced there to be no hope, the girl crept across the room and into the closet where the red shoes were kept. She glanced up at them so high on the shelf. Her glance became a gaze like a person in love, and her gaze became a powerful desire, like a person in love, so much so that the girl took the shoes from the shelf and fastened them on, feeling it would do no harm, just for awhile, just for a little bit, not for very long. But as soon as they touched her heels and toes, she was overcome by the urge to move, to sway, and to dance.

And so out the door she danced, and then down the steps, first in a gavotte, then a czardas, and then in big daring waltz turns in rapid succession. The girl was in her glory and she did not realize she was in trouble until she wanted to dance to the left and the shoes insisted on dancing to the right. When she wanted to dance round, the shoes insisted on dancing straight ahead. And as the shoes danced the girl, rather than the other way around, they danced her right down the road, through the muddy fields, and out into the dark and gloomy forest and in between the trees.

And there against a tree was the old soldier with the little red beard, his arm in a sling, and dressed in his little jacket. “Oh my,” he said, “what beautiful dancing shoes.” Terrified, suddenly feeling illness and omens, she tried to pull the shoes off, but as much as she tugged, the shoes stayed fast as though glued to her feet. She hopped on one foot and then the other to take off the shoes, but her one foot on the ground kept dancing even so, and her other foot in her had did its part of the dance also.

And so dance, and dance and dance, she did. Over the highest hills and through the valleys, in the rain and in the snow and in the sunlight, she danced. She danced in the darkest night and through sunrise and she was still dancing at
twilight as well. But it was not good dancing. It was terrible dancing, and there was no rest for her.

She danced into a churchyard and there a spirit of dread would not allow her to enter. The spirit pronounced these words over her, “ You shall dance in your red shoes until you become like a wraith, like a ghost, till your skin hangs from you bones, till there is nothing left of you but your entrails dancing. You shall dance door to door through all the villages and you shall strike each door three times and when people peer out they will see you and fear your fate for themselves. Now dance red shoes, you shall dance.”

The girl begged for mercy, but before she could plead further, her red shoes carried her away. Over the briars she danced, through the streams, over the hedgerows and on and on, dancing still dancing till she came to her old home and there were mourners. The old woman who had taken her in had died. Yet even so, she danced on by, and dance she did, as dance she must. In abject exhaustion and horror, she danced into the forest where lived the town’s executioner. And the ax on his wall felt her coming and began to tremble as it sensed her coming nearer and nearer.