My first surprise was when it was argued that the Disney version was better by virtue of its simplicity because without the immortality of the soul as a subtext, it would be more accessible to those who were atheist or agnostic, and so did not wish for their children to be exposed to difficult questions that would then require explanation. Also, the replay value of a text with such an unhappy ending--one that instructed rather than amusing--was called into question. This rather put a damper on the prospect of discussing Andersen's text on its own terms, but then, with such a popular version as a comparison, I guess the original was at a disadvantage. The essay argued that the happy ending does rather a disservice to the reader, creating expectations that wishes will always be fulfilled, and attributing misfortune to the will of a single malevolent force. We wound up discussing the issue of representation of parental authority, and why parents feel threatened when fictional characters disobey (and get away with it)--not an issue in the original. Another point was that it contains more relevant topics--like not to talk to strangers--than the immortality of the soul. I tried to compare the complexity of the two issues. Even if you're not interested in the immortality of the soul, you can still concede that the question is more complex, no? The issue of why the mermaid could not achieve both a soul and true love was raised--the dichotomy was seen as a false one.
I admit that I felt a bit at a disadvantage because the Andersen text was being charged with not being politically or socially relevant. Maybe that's why it was excluded from the anthology!! But then, I think it's a problem when the expectation is that the world should be fair, and fiction is expected either to create a safehaven where the world looks fair, or becomes more fair (just), or acknowledges its unfairness in a way that places blame or suggests a remedy. I never had a problem with the notion that toils and suffering could be fruitless, even as a child--except that her toils were not fruitless, as she was granted the opportunity to gain for herself an immortal soul. But if that consideration is alien to your worldview, it's rather difficult to entertain that as a concrete gain. So how to discuss texts with a Christian subtext in a secular university context?
I was particularly interested in the nature of love and the representation of marriage. Observe this passage:
“So I shall die,” said the little mermaid, “and as the foam of the sea I shall be driven about never again to hear the music of the waves, or to see the pretty flowers nor the red sun. Is there anything I can do to win an immortal soul?”
“No,” said the old woman, “unless a man were to love you so much that you were more to him than his father or mother; and if all his thoughts and all his love were fixed upon you, and the priest placed his right hand in yours, and he promised to be true to you here and hereafter, then his soul would glide into your body and you would obtain a share in the future happiness of mankind. He would give a soul to you and retain his own as well; but this can never happen. Your fish’s tail, which amongst us is considered so beautiful, is thought on earth to be quite ugly; they do not know any better, and they think it necessary to have two stout props, which they call legs, in order to be handsome.”
In order to have something to discuss, I did ask what a feminist perspective might be, but that was too easy, really. She is dehumanized--being non-human in the first place doesn't really matter, or rather, it does because the female protagonist is alienated from the patriarchal world from the very nature of her being (or non-being)--and depends on finding a husband for her very soul. Her identity depends on him. Now, the Disney version does not really vary from this--rather, it validates that Ariel's existence depends on the prince. We learn that that's O.K. I'm not happy with seeing the Andersen version as negative in this way, and I don't think Disney's rebellion theme redeems their dependence on the handsome prince to justify Ariel's transformation. I presented this poem by Judith Viorst as an alternate "take" on the story; I liked this one in high school, but (point being taken--don't change who you are, yadda yadda), it doesn't exactly satisfy me in its interpretation of the story:
A Mermaid's Tail (Tale)
I left the castle of my mer-king father,
Where seaweed gardens sway in pearly sand.
I left behind sweet sisters and kind waters
To seek a prince's love upon the land.
My tongue was payment for the witch's potion,
And never would I sing sea songs again;
My tail became two human legs to dance on,
But I would always dance with shards of pain.
I risked more than my life to make him love me.
The prince preferred another for his bride.
I always hate the ending to this story:
They lived together happily; I cried.
But I have some advice for modern mermaids
Who wish to save great sorrow and travail:
Don't give up who you are for love of princes.
He might have liked me better with my tail.
I left the castle of my mer-king father,
Where seaweed gardens sway in pearly sand.
I left behind sweet sisters and kind waters
To seek a prince's love upon the land.
My tongue was payment for the witch's potion,
And never would I sing sea songs again;
My tail became two human legs to dance on,
But I would always dance with shards of pain.
I risked more than my life to make him love me.
The prince preferred another for his bride.
I always hate the ending to this story:
They lived together happily; I cried.
But I have some advice for modern mermaids
Who wish to save great sorrow and travail:
Don't give up who you are for love of princes.
He might have liked me better with my tail.
For all the validating of identity for girls, it is an oversimplification--likely by design. So how to avoid that kind of oversimplification in classroom discussion? We discussed (briefly) ecofeminism, which is so over the top that it's really about use of language rather than perceived oppression, and so is fun for me. Briefly, briefly we discussed Matthew Arnold's "The Forsaken Merman." I think that comparison could have been fruitful on the religious front, with the contrast between nature/paganism and humanity/religion, and all of the various associations. But we wasted too much time talking about Disney. :P
My previous post about politics, perspectives, worldviews in the classroom was kind of poking (admittedly smug) fun at myself, though it did culminate in a very real frustration with what I see as the limitations and expectations of my teaching in my discipline. I worry about including texts that I don't like or with which I don't feel familiar enough to teach simply in order to represent a diversity of voices. I worry that when I include multi-ethnic selections or female authors as an afterthought, that I'm being a phony--or that I will come across that way. And that's a lot of baggage to add to the already considerable pressures of teaching.
And what about Catholicism? If to teach is my vocation (or part of my vocation), and I'm supposed to live my Faith, how do those things work together? As far as I can tell, it doesn't mean that I have to be nicey-nicey in the classroom (or on the blog, for that matter). I certainly DO have to engage with these questions, and this is a good format for me to do so. But what about subject matter of research and teaching? Surely I shouldn't shy away from the Christianity, though I can't really pursue the themes in more than superficial terms in my current position. And I have a problem with texts being taught simply for their Christian elements (usually in a simplified form)--like is done with the Chronicles of Narnia, which are typically embraced or rejected by scholars or teachers for their Christian elements. That is a bit simplistic on both sides.
With research, it is easier than teaching, I think. If we are selective in our research, well, that's part of being specialized. And I'm not sure how we can live the Faith through academic publishing, unless it means not publishing that thing I wrote about S & M in the films of a certain Spanish director. Yeah, that topic has been shelved permanently for a few years now.
5 comments:
I'm going to reread this post when I get a quiet moment--children climbing all over me--but I wanted to say right away how much I love the original little mermaid as a child. my grandmother had a recording of someone reading it (on vinyl!) and I begged her to play it over and over and I would just lay there on the floor and listen. replay value indeed.
I'd be interested in reading that essay on the moral simplification. Any chance you could get me a copy?
"But if that consideration is alien to your worldview, it's rather difficult to entertain that as a concrete gain. So how to discuss texts with a Christian subtext in a secular university context?"
The irony is that if it were a Hindu text, say, it would be quite straightforward to discuss the matter of a foreign worldview. It wouldn't be hard to explain how what seems to the students to be a loss would be considered a gain within a different cultural context. The real crux of the matter is that the academic environment is not just secular/non-Christian it's hostile to a Christian worldview. (And I don't just mean the professors, in my experience much hostility came from the students. The anti-Christians may have been a minority but they were universally the most vocal minority and they would not allow a dispassionate discussion.) If you dare to even mention Christianity in a neutral way-- not even positive-- then you must be proselytizing. So that you can't even discuss Christian subtexts as dispassionately as you would a Buddhist or Sumerian or ancient Greek worldview.
I wonder if a bold teacher might be able to push the students into analyzing the text on its own terms if she introduced the Judeo/Christian worldview in exactly the same way as she would a Hindu worldview before approaching the text. Short lecture bringing up the salient religious texts and points of doctrine, assume it is alien to the students and tell them up front that they need to lay their prejudices both pro and con aside at the door.
I can definitely see how the discussion of this text would play out much differently at a Catholic college like the one I attended where you could really tease out the sacramental ideas of marriage. The irony here is that the class would probably not have been offered at my school which had a great books program and not many electives of this sort. (Not that it couldn't have been taught had a faculty member championed it. I'd have welcomed something in this vein as the only children's lit class in the catalogue was offered by the education department and didn't really address literary questions at all.)
I'd never read the Arnold poem before. That would be an interesting discussion. But I think it would be impossible to put the Disney aside since that is going to be the point of departure for the majority of the students and the lens through which they will judge the original story. You'd probably have to take two classes to cover it all and that's just not feasible, I'm sure.
The real crux of the matter is that the academic environment is not just secular/non-Christian it's hostile to a Christian worldview.
This is true, because it is seen to be the dominant ideology--hence, the one we have to unseat, work against, etc. Then you have the notion that Christianity is responsible for any number of ills, from oppression of women to slavery or Empire, or at least the fact that Christianity was used in support of all of these things (misused, as the case may be). Since many of the contemporary currents in criticism are devoted to examination of historical injustices, Christianity must be examined as a contributing factor. That's essentially the rationale. With the Hindu comparison, you have the fact that it is not part of the dominant, Western tradition, and so 1) is not assumed to be known to the students, and 2) is not what needs to be questioned, subverted, etc. I don't think that every critic out there harbors a conscious and overt hatred or distrust of Christianity, though there are some who do. I think some also get carried away with the "questioning" of Christianity and start representing a Christian perspective as inherently suspect, or worse. I think a lot of people probably don't know how to address it, so do not. Of course, this varies according to one's specialization. A Medievalist can discuss Catholicism, a Milton scholar or someone working with early American Lit is obligated to address certain Christian beliefs. Other areas, not so much...
Short lecture bringing up the salient religious texts and points of doctrine, assume it is alien to the students and tell them up front that they need to lay their prejudices both pro and con aside at the door.
I think that in order to do this, I would have to be teaching a special topics "Christianity and Literature" course or something. I would like to teach something like "Sacramental Literature." (It's a concept-in-progress, but this one works for me!) I wouldn't want to treat the "typical" Christian/Catholic texts, and the texts would not be entirely neutral. Dubliners would definitely be on the syllabus--there's a lot of good stuff there. But you're right--establishing the context in an instructive manner would work. But it's not something that can be done casually as part of a survey or other-topic course. Or at least, I haven't managed to succeed with it this time around.
Victorian lit, like the Arnold poem, leaves open the possibility of discussing religion. I was taken when I was an undergrad with the Victorian "crisis of faith" phenomenon, and probably would have been a Victorian specialist had I ever been able to take a decent Victorian lit grad course. I understand that there WERE some, I was just never able to TAKE them. I am fascinated by the strange attraction that many of the Victorian writers had with Catholicism, and the hostility that they harbored toward it at the same time.
Classroom dynamic has something to do with this, too. Had I more students in the class, and if one or two voices didn't tend to dominate, it might have turned out better. At any rate, I'm making mental notes for next semester.
I should be able to scan a copy of the article to send to you, Melanie! It's interesting. I think the examples from the film got in the way of the argument for the students. I was surprised by that! I thought they would appreciate the examples.
Anastasia--Can't wait for additional thoughts (if you get the chance). Thanks for the mention of your own experience with the story. But you know, when faced with a "would kids really want to hear this again," what does one say? "They do, just trust me"? Or maybe, "Well, if we didn't sanitize all of their literature, maybe they could deal with a story involving suffering!" Children's lit is a strange animal. It's hard not to talk about the "child reader," so I'm consciously trying to remind the class that these are characterizations of children imposed by adults. And yet, we all bring our own experiences to the party. *sigh* Time to go grade response papers, anyway. . .
This was a fascinating read. Thank you!
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