Literature to 1950

Poetry collections | Andersen's Little Mermaid | Wilde, "The Fisherman and his Soul" | Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock | Novels and stories | Poetry | Obscure, deservedly

Poetry collections

Excellent florilegium of mermaid poetry from the Northstar Mermaid Gallery.

Andersen's Little Mermaid

The Annotated Little Mermaid by Heidi Anne Heiner. The tale's the same, in Paull's 1875 translation, but the notes are exceptional. Heiner's effort is scholarly, but not pedantic, with frequent explanatory glosses, backward and forward references to other versions of the story, and relevant details from Andersen's life. Other highlights include illustrations from six editions, a books page, and a scholarly bibliography . Heiner's website Sur La Lune is a dazzling collection of fairy tale and folklore resources.

Wikipedia: The Little Mermaid. Plot summary, with details on the Copenhagen statue, and its vandalism[1]. See also an excellent entry on Hans Christian Andersen.

Simple, illustrated edition of H. P. Paull's 1872 translation, from Hans Christian Andersen: Fairy Tales and Stories , a Anderson megasite with translations of all the published tales.

H. P. Paull's translation broken up for college students, with questions at the end of each section. From Laura Gibbs's University of Oklahoma course Mythology and Folklore.

Plain text from Nina Auerbach's course on Victorian Faith and Fantasies.

Encyclopedia Mythica: "Retold by Robert Hoffman" But the text is completely the same.

Clean edition, hosted by—of all people—Danish doctors of dermatology and venereology. I guess the Danish explains it.

Wilde, "The Fisherman and his Soul"

"The Fisherman and his Soul" by Oscar Wilde (1888), from Heidi Anne Heiner's Sur La Lune. In her Annotated Little Mermaid Heiner describes Wilde's story as follows:

"About 50 years after [Andersen's] The Little Mermaid was published, Oscar Wilde published his own mermaid story, The Fisherman and His Soul. In this tale, a fisherman falls in love with a mermaid and seeks to give up his soul so she will accept him as a lover. Wilde's story incorporates mermaid lore and also appears to be somewhat of a reaction to Andersen's tale."

Amazon. Oscar Wilde: The Fisherman and His Soul and Other Fairy Tales by Oscar Wilde (Bloomsbury Poetry Classics)

Simple, attractive edition from PlanetMonk's Oscar Wilde collection.

"Andersen's 'The Shadow' and Wilde's 'The Fisherman and his Soul': A Case of Influence" by Christopher S. Nassaar, Nineteenth-Century Literature (September 1995).

"'The Shadow' and 'The Fisherman and his Soul' have not been linked before, probably because of the obvious influence on Wilde's tale of Andersen's famous fairy tale 'The Little Mermaid.' In this tale a beautiful mermaid abandons the sea for the dry land and acquires legs and an immortal soul for the sake of marrying a human. Wilde, in his usual paradoxical way, inverts this basic situation in 'The Fisherman and his Soul.' But the influence of 'The Little Mermaid' remains technical and sharply limited; 'The Shadow' is by far the deeper influence.'"

Information on a 1956 ballet version, by Harry Somers and Grant Strate, from Encyclopedia of Music in Canada.

Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

T. S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." (1910–1911). As it's one of my favorite poems, I shall quote the ending in full.

"Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown."

AlfredPrufrock.com. What the heck is going on here? A parody of eCommerce templates?

Full text of the poem. (Wait, isn't this in copyright?)

Novels and stories

Summaries of mermaid fairy tales, take from The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature, on Karen Jacubec's History of Mermaids page.

1874 German romance by Wilhelmine von Hillern, mentions Andersen's tale.

"Undine" by Friedrich de la Motte Fouque (1811). Complete text, adapted from Project Gutenberg. Includes a brief introduction.

Wikipedia: Friedrich de la Motte Fouqué.

Poetry

John Donne, "Song." Cited by Eliot as his source.

"Go, and catch a falling star,
Get with child a mandrake root,
Tell me, where all past years are,
Or who cleft the devil's foot,
Teach me to hear mermaids singing,
Or to keep off envy's stinging,
  And find
  What wind
Serves to advance an honest mind."

John Keats, "Lines on the Mermaid Tavern". For more on the famous mermaid tavern see:

Shakespeare and the Globe: Mermaid Tavern.

Pushkin's "Water-Nympth" with a mermaid gallery, from Lady Gryphon's Mythical Realm, a large and impressive omnigatherum of the mythical and legendary.

Arthur Lloyd, "Married to a Mermaid" song.

Obscure, deservedly

I thought I'd spend some time poking around on MOA: The Making of America. There's more, of course.

"To a Mermaid" by George Edward Rice (1822-1861), from his collection Nugamenta. Questions posed to the Feegee mermaid, not elsewhere (not should it be). Sample stanza:

"Are any of the Mermaids politicians?
  Do they fulfil each promise to the letter?
And do you find, if you employ physicians,
  That of their stuff the less you take the better
Your health becomes? In fact, I'm very sure
You must be patrons of the "Water Cure."

"The Mermaid" by James Gates Percival (1795-1856), a tedious description of a mermaid's song.

"With what a thrilling ecstasy
I heard the music of her lyre;
The very soul of melody
Seemed warbling on the trembling wire..."

"The Mermaids Waking Song" by Bell, Mary, Overland monthly and Out West magazine (1898). Long. Dreadful.