How unusual was the man who brought to Denmark the magical world of a fairy tale - Hans Christian Andersen! āThe Little Mermaidā ... A brief summary of this work has been familiar to us since childhood. A touching love story. A huge love that settled in the soul of a sea beauty and transformed her world. Made millions of children's eyes shine when reading her story.
Coral castle
Andersen begins to expound from the author a classic narrative syllable. "Mermaid". A brief summary of the introductory part of the work introduces us to the life of the underwater coral royal palace. The main character is the youngest of six mermaid sisters, daughters of the lord of the waters of the sea, the dowager King Triton. The prettiest of all mermaids is the blue-eyed sea princess. In the underwater world, she has her favorite corner with red underwater flowers and a marble statue of a boy sank to the bottom as a result of a shipwreck. The grandmother who lives with the family helps the son manage the palace. The sisters (she has five of them) are friendly and have fun in games, despite the age difference (they were all born with a difference of a year). According to the customs of the underwater world, after the little mermaid is 16 years old, she is allowed to emerge and consider the surface world.
Upper world
Thus, as it should be for an experienced story-teller, Andersen sets the intrigue in the title itself: āThe Little Mermaidā. The summary of the observation scene of the upper world by a fabulous sea girl comes down mainly to her contemplation of a handsome prince aboard a three-masted ship. The ship makes a pleasure trip, the little mermaid hears music. The young man looks like a marble statue with which Ariel played for many years. When she first saw her, she fell in love with a black-eyed prince. A sudden storm causes a shipwreck. The prince is drowning, the little mermaid rescues the beloved, independently dragging him to the land, who has lost consciousness. Leaving the prince near the temple, she, hiding, waits until he is found by the girl who left the gate, and then swims away.
Unhappy mermaid love
Did Andersen - āThe Little Mermaidā belong to his optimistic creations? The summary (5-6 sentences are already able to make it clear that there is a place of sadness) is sad, and probably cannot be otherwise. The Great Dane believed that joy always coexists with sadness: both in life and in a fairy tale.
Different, sometimes insurmountable obstacles stand in the way of love. This is perhaps the most famous tale of the great Andersen. The little mermaid, a little blue-eyed sea beauty, who later became a symbol of Denmark, is ready to make any sacrifices and deprivations in the name of her love.
The author tells of those sorrows that promise the mermaid love for man. At the same time, the Great Dane wrote objectively about things that were clear to his compatriots, since he took advantage of the popular beliefs of his homeland about mermaids - the characters of Danish folklore. It is believed that they live longer than people - three hundred years. However, these sea fairies are devoid of the main human wealth - the immortal soul. Nevertheless, the Scandinavian, Mediterranean, British, Germanic, Slavic epos keeps the history of marriages of sea nymphs (mermaids) with people. In a happy family life, as follows from the legends, sea nymphs become ordinary mortals, gaining the human soul.
Selfish witch
Having decided on love for a person, our fairy-tale heroine should have resorted to witchcraft - Andersen believes. The little mermaid Ariel goes to the mighty sea sorceress, able to help her marry her beloved prince. She asks her by means of witchcraft to replace the swift and indispensable tail in the sea elements with a pair of slender female legs.
The sea sorceress is far from disinterested. In return for her services, she demands the magical crystal voice of the little mermaid - her main wealth. This turn of events was invented by Andersen; he no longer occurs in the epic. In this turn of action, the authorās intention is visible. Andersen writes The Little Mermaid as a multi-layered, not only magical, but also philosophical, deeply psychological composition. A summary for the reader's diary can express the main idea in two words: love and self-sacrifice.
Ariel rushes into the pool of feelings
To emphasize this aspect of the work, to make it more embossed, the author forces the wayward sorceress to present the conditions more radically: if the little mermaid's love does not provoke a reciprocal feeling from the prince, then this will threaten her with death - at sunset she will become the foam of the sea. However, this does not stop the sea beauty. She acts emotionally, deciding to sacrifice everything for the sake of finding love. At the same time, Ariel does not even remember his father, his sisters. The whole world, the whole meaning of her life has been reduced to one thing - gaining the love of a prince, and in comparison with this goal, everything, even her own life, is perceived by her as something secondary.
Stone heart boy
Andersen's fairy tale "The Little Mermaid" further follows the logic of commercialism: the prince does not stand the test of love of the sea princess. His "talking eyes" were not affected by the numbed mermaid in love with him. He follows the wishes of his parents, because he believes that he āshould marryā a long-chosen passion for them - princesses from a neighboring country. She, by chance, turned out to be a girl from the temple, who discovered a prince rescued by a mermaid. At the same time, tactlessness is obvious: the crowned egoist urges the little mermaid to be happy for him!
"The Little Mermaid" ... Andersen ... The content of the tale leads the reader to the obvious conclusion: the little mermaid was deceived, the handsome prince is in essence only a cold marble boy, unable to feel the beating of a loving heart.
He will marry another, broken heart of the little mermaid.
Bravo, storyteller!
That's where the real magic of the pen is hidden! This just makes the hearts of readers feel the true height of love. It would seem that the plot is completely divorced from life ... Just think, a creature that does not exist in nature is a mermaid in love ... Andersen is an awkward lanky old man who writes his own tales with a myriad of grammatical errors ...
So why, having reached this place of the tale, which once beat the readerās heart? Why are the eyes of children that cannot be pulled away from the book so glittering? Hans Christian Andersen, the storyteller for all time, "just" makes the reader look at the blue-eyed little mermaid Ariel not from the standpoint of reason, but with special sight, the sight of the soul.
The little mermaid is doomed. However, precisely at this moment, in suffering, the immortal human soul is born in it. She is now ready for self-sacrifice. She is ready to forgive the prince and wishes him happiness.
Indeed, one of those books that help the child to become cleaner, to be kinder, Andersen wrote - āThe Little Mermaidā ... Summary (āSchool Knowledgeā is one of the sites for placing works by this author), of course, will help orient the child to read this particular fairy tale.
The little mermaid reconciled. She made a choice of fate. She is dying for love. Is everything lost for her?
Overcome temptation
Her sisters find her. They found a way out. Mermaids asked the same sorceress to help. The sorceress agreed. But the girls were cut off, they gave their braids and ringlets for this help. Our little mermaid's sisters pass a bewitched dagger given by a sorceress. It is now also possible for her to regain the appearance of a mermaid, to regain a carefree life in a coral castle. It is only necessary to kill the sleeping prince with a dagger. And everything will return. This is a temptation.
Can Ariel accomplish such a villainy by regaining the mermaidās nature? No, she chooses the immortal human soul and, having kissed the prince, she herself turns into sea foam.
Fairy tale appeal
Why is there only one exclamation of the author, said by the mouth of the little mermaid and addressed to an adult audience: āStrange people, do you think that love and mermaids do not exist ?!ā This phrase contains an invisible key.
The key is to make our sometimes grayish surrounding world a rainbow, to help him suddenly shine brightly, reflecting the gentle sun in different colors. The little mermaid Ariel is trying to shake up, bring back to real life people who have forgotten that they themselves, owing their birth to love, must also love ...
This person is unusual and non-naughty, who made his name sound for music for millions of people in different corners of the Earth - the name of the creator and the name of his work: Andersen, āThe Little Mermaidā ... A summary of this exciting, childishly touching story about how the little mermaid in love changes her silver voice for a pair of slender legs, and then dies, turning into sea foam, without the prince's reciprocal love, can not leave the reader indifferent.
Conclusion
For many, many generations of people on Earth, this is one of those tales that shape the world of childhood.
At the same time, for any Dane, this work, which was written by Mr. Andersen - āThe Little Mermaidā - is a high cultural heritage. Since 1913, ships entering the Copenhagen harbor have been greeted by a bronze sculpture of a little mermaid - one of the country's symbols: a touching, tender, loving sea nymph.
Hans Christian Andersen in the manner of a little mermaid convincingly shows his readers that true love always relies on a willingness to sacrifice for a loved one, that true purity of the soul is a willingness to positively accept the happiness of this person even if he is not with you.