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Week 6: Undine

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The story Undine from the Penguin Book of Mermaids was the most interesting of the readings this week. While the other readings focused more on accounts of mermaids in the past few centuries, this story was of romance between a human and a mermaid. What I found most important in this story was the connection between mermaids and nature. As we have discussed in class, there are many connections between mermaids and nature throughout many stories. Mermaids often embody or represent nature, and how humans interact with them can represent their attitudes toward nature and the environment. This story has some of the most explicit connections between nature and mermaids that we have seen so far. During Undine’s speech, she states: “We and our like in the other elements, vanish into dust, and pass away, body and spirit, so not that a vestige of us remains behind; and when you mortals hereafter awake to a purer life, we remain with the sand and the sparks and the wind and the waves. Hence we also have no souls” (p. 105). This quote shows the difference between mermaids and humans, and the connection that mermaids hold with nature–they are one and the same, and mermaids will eventually return to the earth. Another important part of this quote to note is the choice of words ‘purer life’. This reveals the Christian nature of the text, as purer life is implied to be heaven. Toward the end of this chapter, Undine also makes a comment about her uncle that furthers strengthens this melding of mermaid and nature: “I will dive into this brook, which is my uncle; and here in the forest, far removed from other friends, he passes his strange and solitary life. He is however powerful, and is esteemed and beloved by many great streams” (p. 106). This quote also reveals the deep connection between nature and merpeople. Not only is Undine’s uncle a brook, but she is also able to recognize him in his nature form (unless this knowledge was acquired previously). It seems to imply that when a mermaid dies and goes back to the earth, they become some sort of water, as Undine will do on her husband’s grave when he dies. Perhaps the overarching storyline described in italics at the beginning of this chapter is supposed to represent man’s troubled relationship with nature–at one moment, in love and full of respect, the next having betrayed her.

Another interesting part of this story was the elements of Christianity–the gaining of a soul, the inability to go to Heaven/any sort of afterlife without one. I also found it interesting that similar to Melusine, Undine is not upfront about who she is to her romantic partner. Although she does willingly tell her husband of her mermaid side (unlike Melusine), she still decides to hide her true self before they marry. Is this to add a lack of trust to mermaids? Or to make commentary that one does not need to fully divulge every bit of one’s self to be in love? That some things can be kept secret without hindering a relationship?

Week 6: Undine

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This week’s excerpt on Undine reminded me of the tale of Melusine from last week’s class. In both stories, the husbands are in charge of either accepting the women’s secret/ otherness or not. On the one hand we have Melusine, whose secret is only revealed through her husband not giving her her space which leads to her flying away from the castle, and on the other hand we have Undine, who openly shares her origin of being a water princess that was only given a soul by marrying Huldbrand. Undine in the end transforms into a body of water surrounding the grave of her husband. Both Undine and Melusine are described as being beautiful. But the biggest difference I saw is the following: Melusine was able to flee and live her life, whereas Undine had to vanish into the sea which leads me to the following:

Undine has given her husband the choice of accepting her origin or not: “Such as we are, however, can only obtain a soul by the closest union of affection with one of your human race. I am now possessed of a soul, and my soul thanks you, my inexpressibly beloved one, and it will ever thank you, if you do not make my whole life miserable. For what is to become of me, if you avoid and reject me? Still I would not retain you by deceit. And if you mean to reject me, do so now, and return alone to the shore” (p.105). While reading that I thought that I must be reading a tragedy. Undine seems to be highly dependent on her husband. I thought that her being dependent on her husband might be an aspect worth a discussion. Even though Undine is a half-human-half-water being, she is almost craving to become a human that has a soul. Why would she want to do that? Does that mean, that all water beings are inferior to humans? In the last weeks we often learned that half water beings have the power to allure men by their sinful creature. Where does that shift now come from, that it is a WOMAN that is dependent of a man? Why does she even have to vanish if her husband does not stay by her side? I would be glad if we can discuss that in class!