The Little Mermaid
This tale talks about the lost love of a little mermaid who sacrifices her voice, the sweetest one ever to be heard, and suffers the deepest of the pains, for the sake of her love. The mermaid falls in love with a very handsome prince, who is a human being. She saves the prince from the ship wreckage and brings him ashore. She understands that she must turn into a human, to love a human and that her soul will become immortal, once she is united with a human. She approaches the enchantress in order to get rid of her wonderful tail and get a pair of legs in its place. But alas! The enchantress demands her voice in return and cuts out her tongue. The magic drink drops through her throat as though it is a sharp knife cutting through her body right from the top to the bottom. She gets beautiful and soft legs. Each gentle step she makes with them gives her immense pain and blood sheds from them. But that most charming beauty dances gracefully for the prince who loves her deeply for her looks and good nature. He calls her, ‘dear little foundling’. As for the prince, she resembles the girl who has saved his life, when he was thrown to the shore by the waves of the sea after the wreckage! How sad! The little dumb foundling hears it with a broken heart. How she wishes to speak out that it is she who has rescued his life by bringing him ashore from the deep sea. And that her love for him has cost her, her voice. The story ends with the mermaid, turning into foam as she fails to unite with the prince and drops deliberately her chance to return to the sea as a mermaid, by killing the prince and washing her feet with his blood. Is it true to say that ‘love demands life’? Would it sound meaningless now, if I say that the dumb Mermaid’s love speaks louder than any other love stories?