Edna Krabappel

"Ha!"

- Edna's catchphrase

"Do what I mean, not what I say."

- Edna Krabappel

"No matter what you've done, I always thought there was a spark of decency in you, Bart Simpson, but I was wrong. I never thought I'd say this to a child, but you are bad on the inside."

- Edna Krabappel

Edna Krabappel–Flanders (see "Love life" below regarding her last name) was a 4th Grade teacher at Springfield Elementary School. Edna Krabappel lived at 82 Evergreen Terrace, and later 744 Evergreen Terrace, after marrying Ned Flanders, the widower of Maude Flanders. Outside school Edna was portrayed as a typical mid-life single adult, heavy smoker, gambler and occasional solitary drinker trying to find the right man. She had numerous affairs with many Springfieldians, her reoccurring choice always being Principal Skinner, usually out of pity rather than affection. From Season 23-25, Edna Krabappel was married to Ned Flanders. She was 54 years old.

Al Jean announced Edna would be retired in due to the death of Marcia Wallace (her voice actress) on October 25, 2013. The process began in "Four Regrettings and a Funeral" when "We'll really miss you Mrs. K." was shown on the chalkboard during the title sequence, which premiered nine days after Marcia's death. In the Season 25 episode "The Man Who Grew Too Much", Ned and Nelson both said that they miss her. Her passing was indicated by Ned wearing a black armband. In the episode Dogtown, it's confirmed that Edna is deceased.

Biography
Edna was born on November 4, 1957, in Springfield. She was an A-grade student back in school and held a Master's in Education from Bryn Mawr College. Her life dream once was to teach to young students; however, after years of teaching jaded her positive image, and after her husband left for another woman, their marriage counselor, Edna started drinking her days away. She got fired from teaching in a prestigious private school, and eventually made her way into Springfield Elementary. From then on, she was portrayed as a caricature of the American public school system, as evidenced on the occasion when Lisa steals all the teachers' editions of the textbooks (which contain the answers). Moreover, dealing with Bart Simpson and his shenanigans did nothing but aggravate Edna's apathy.

Edna apparently did come from Springfield, as she can be seen running through the background in Springfield High School when Clancy Wiggum is being videotaped as a hall monitor,  suggesting that she probably left Springfield young but returned when unable to keep up with her dream life. Moreover, she graduated from Springfield University.

Krabappel, like many other teachers at Springfield Elementary School, smoked heavily, especially during school hours. It was also implied that Edna Krabappel drank heavily, as when Marge arrived at the school to use a restroom and noticed Edna sleeping in class and uttering "stupid hangover".

During her more recent years at Springfield Elementary School, in general, Edna didn't care at all about teaching the children properly anymore. Edna was usually annoyed by her straight-A student Martin Prince. Her attitude towards her class ranged from a bit of fondness to open dislike. She was known to remark that her students would end up in blue-collar jobs, such as gas station attendants. Edna fought hard for improved materials, leading a strike against Principal Skinner. During class time, Edna presented material in a monotone, apathetic manner, indifferent to the children's disinterest.

Edna was usually shown to be involved with many activities around Springfield. Edna was a member of the Investorettes. She was also a member of Marge's book club, although nobody in the club seems to read the book they are supposed to. Edna seemed to be friends with fellow teacher Elizabeth Hoover, as they were often seen smoking together and often made comments and criticisms about the state of Springfield Elementary to each other. When Edna thought she had met her dream man through a personal ad, Miss Hoover seemed to be her confidante; Edna showed her the letters and discussed what she would do on future dates.

Love life
The most recurring theme about Krabappel was her non-existent love life, and as a result, loneliness and wish for a partner. She was formerly divorced; her first husband ran off with their marriage counselor. She did talk about her ex living somewhere else exotic, but at one time, a man at the local gas station, while diagnosing a fault with her car, tasted sugar in the gasoline and states "Your ex-husband strikes again!" As a result, she severely missed a man's love, and it was occasionally implied that she felt her biological clock ticking. She was shown as very sexually aggressive: she tried to pick up Joey Kramer (Aerosmith's drummer). She had an on-again-off-again relationship with Principal Seymour Skinner and once had sex in the backseat of her car with a Sushi chef. She can be seen at a Green Day concert on top of Seymour's shoulders wearing a T-Shirt saying "Not my boyfriend" with an arrow pointing down at Skinner in The Simpsons Movie. She also had a relationship with Jeffery Albertson (whom she almost married) and a pen pal who she believed was the man of her dreams, Woodrow (who is actually Bart).

It's shown in a flashback that Krabappel was in a serious relationship with Moe Szyslak when she first moved to Springfield, before meeting Skinner or even becoming a teacher. She was about to run away with him (and possibly get married) but then changed her mind when she met Bart Simpson, a student she believed needed help. (This story may or may not be canonical, as it was part of a tale told second-hand or possibly made up.) Indeed, Krabappel appeared to be the object of many a man's desire, as evident by Sideshow Bob's outrage when his romantic date with her is ruined by a spying Bart: "You only get one chance with Edna Krabappel!" One time, during an "edutainment" show at Springfield Elementary School, she did a balloon dance wearing nothing but balloons while she pops them to the tune of "Fever," Mortifying the audience (especially Bart, who even went as far as to say "Kill me!" from witnessing it). This event was also implied to have driven Homer to steal concessions as compensation for having to sit through and watch it (or as he put it to Lisa, "I saw Krabappel's butt. I paid!") She often had dinner at The Pimento Grove with her on-again, off-again dates. She was also seen kissing Jacques on camera footage in Burns' Surveillance Room. She once danced with Bart in Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind.

In "Ned 'N Edna's Blend", she married Ned Flanders. From then on until her death, she was referred to simply as "Edna", so it is unknown if she kept her maiden name, took Ned's surname, or chose a hyphenated name like Krabappel-Flanders.

At the end of "The Man Who Grew Too Much", Ned is shown remembering a happy memory of dancing with Edna. He then looks at the picture of her next to the one of Maude, saying sadly that he misses her laugh. Outside, Nelson laughs, then admits he misses her too. The black armband Ned is wearing shows Edna had died some time previously as they generally mark the remembrance of a deceased person. Edna's death had been hinted at earlier in Season 25 in "Four Regrettings and a Funeral" when a sad Bart wrote "We'll really miss you Mrs. K." only one time on the chalkboard during the title sequence. The episode premiered on November 3, 2013, nine days after Marcia Wallace's death. In Dogtown her gravestone is finally shown, it has written the iconic phrase "Ha!" in it.

Personality
Edna Krabappel is defined by her cynicism, short-temper, loneliness and uncaring attitude towards her students. Like nearly all of the teachers in Springfield Elementary she constantly buts heads with fourth grade juvenile delinquent, Bart Simpson. Despite this the Bart and Edna are close friends at heart, so much that he nominated her for Teacher of the Year and went to a movie with one another when she was depressed that Skinner had blown her off. Edna is quite the disciplinarian at times, an example of this would be when the new yo-yo craze overran her classroom and in response, she confiscated the toys but despite this, she is normally quite ignorant towards their well being or concern.

Edna has something of a reputation among the other teachers, she is a sexually-experienced woman and was not above using her own sexuality to reel in men. A good example of this is when she was writing to her "boyfriend" Woodrow and delivered a very appealingly sultry picture of herself. Edna's reputation is revealed when Lisa and Bart were sent to the third grade and the teacher (non-discreetly) coughed over her breath "slut" while referring to her and while showing her students a sex education video Edna remarked that "she's faking it." However despite this Edna is lonely and depressive woman, such was shown when she tried to bargain the students to stay behind by saying she'll do their homework and such was further shown when she tried to get a hot date and to be only met with dial tone it causes her to pound her fist on the table and yell "I NEED A MAN!"

Edna was a woman of vice, she enjoys to smoke cigarettes (even in class which was banned by school laws) and was something of a heavy drinker and normally taught classes with a hangover. She takes no effort in hiding her dislike of children and is normally left very irritated by her star student, Martin Prince. Edna displays a mostly sarcastic denouement, normally using jabs or biting quips towards students, she isn't normally aggressive towards children but if her temper is pushed to its limits Edna would lash out, even if this was very rare, so far the only time that she was violent towards students was when she slapped Bart Simpson square across the back of the head.

Marriage
She was originally married to Mr. Krabappel, but was later engaged to Seymour Skinner before she was remarried to Ned Flanders.

Trivia

 * She had a red marking pen named "Old Red".
 * Her last name is a spin on the word "crab-apple," as she was originally supposed to be a constantly crabby teacher. It is also reminiscent of Miss Crabtree, the crabby teacher in the "Little Rascals".
 * She seemed to be a fan of the European comic book/film character "Barbarella", as she was seen wearing her costume during the Bi-Mon-Sci-Fi-Con
 * It is assumed that Homer killed her as in "Holidays Of Future Passed" Ned states "That's why after Homer accidentally killed Edna, I married Maude's ghost."

Non Canon Appearances

 * Edna had appeared in Treehouse of Horror Series.
 * In Treehouse of Horror III she is a zombie like other Springfielders, this was the first time she was a zombie in the Treehouse of Horror Series. She was also indirectly responsible for the zombie phenomenon, as she sent Bart over to the library, which was how Bart stumbled upon the spellbook and later his (accidentally) reviving all zombies in Springfield.
 * In the Treehouse of Horror V segment "Nightmare Cafeteria", she is among the teachers who eat some of the children after a certain someone explains how he made the discovery. Towards the end of the segment, all but a few members of the 4th grade class remain, and she is shown to have gained a significant amount of weight.
 * In the Treehouse of Horror XVI segment "I've Grown a Costume on Your Face" she appears to be a snake.
 * She was in all segments in Treehouse of Horror XIX, she was killed by celebrities in the 2nd segment and presumably killed by Tom Turkey in the 3rd.
 * In Treehouse of Horror XX she was a major/secondary role as Bart forced Lisa to try to kill her but killed Bart instead and walked away with Edna as both were pleased with Bart's death in the first segment 'dial M for murder'. In the second segment "don't have a cow mankind" she is again zombie but is only seen twice for less then even a second and very easy to miss.

Creation
Her last name is pronounced crah-bopple and is a play on the fruit "crabapple" and it is also a reference to the teacher Miss Crabtree from the 1930s Little Rascals series. Part of the original joke of her last name was that nobody ever mispronounced her name and called her "Miss Crabapple", Milhouse was the first to make this joke which had the other students in class amazed and feeling stupid for not noticing it before. In the season 8 episode, "Grade School Confidential," Homer mentions that he's called her "Crandall" for quite some time.

International versions

 * In France, Edna Krabappel was called Krappabel: "Kra" sounds like "cra-cra" which is used by young children to describe something dirty and "ppabel" sounds exactly just like "pas belle" (not pretty). Homer Simpson even called her "Cracrapoubelle", which has "cra-cra", which infants in France say for "dirty", and "poubelle" which is French for garbage can. In the Québec French version, she retained her original name.
 * In Italy, she was called Edna Caprapall: Capra in Italian means Goat, and Caprapall recalls the image of a goat.
 * In Spain, her name was pronounced Edna Carapapel: in Spanish it means paperface. The Latin American version of the show, dubbed in Mexico, kept "Krabappel" as the US name, though in earlier seasons when many names and surnames were replaced with Spanish ones, her surname was "Clavados" ("nailings").

Retirement
Marcia Wallace had provided the voice for Edna but died on October 25, 2013, due to pneumonia. Al Jean has stated that the character of Edna will be retired. In The Man Who Grew Too Much, a brief scene at the end of the episode showed Ned mourning her loss, how she passed away is overlooked. In the episode Holidays of Future Passed, Ned mentions that Edna was accidentally killed by Homer; however, future episodes are non-canon.