The sea sighed, and kept its secrets

[dolorosa_12]

Today's December talking meme prompt is from yarnofariadne, and it's a great one: favourite folktale or fairytale, and why.

I like folktales about crossing places, and moving between one state and another, and above all women transformed, and I feel a very intense set of feelings about the sea, so it probably surprises no one that my absolute favourite folktale of all is the story of the Selkie Bride, in all its variants.

It's a hard story, and a cruel story: at its heart it has such a monstrous violation — the selkie woman, trapped on land, in human form, and in marriage by a man who steals and hides her sealskin — and the resolution is cruel, too, since although the woman regains her freedom and her shapeshifting ability, she has to part with her land-born children as a consequence. (The touch in many variants of the story — that the woman's youngest child is the one to discover the hidden sealskin and innocently gives its existence and location away to the trapped mother — is just the final, brutal twist of the knife.)

(It feels gauche to link to my own fic here, but I've tried so many times to write stories that grasp at what it feels like for those children in the aftermath, standing on the shore, and my AO3 account has many variations on this theme, plus stories for other fandoms that are essentially 'woman has emotions triggered by, about, and near body of water.' It's my very, very favourite thing to write.)

What I love about this folktale in particular is how it's all about the relationship between people who live at the water's edge, and the sea that lives beside them, and about the way those watery tideline places have a sense of liminality and blurred boundaries, and that the beings of the sea, and the humans on land can sometimes cross over, in both directions. The sea sustains those coastal communities, but it can also be violent, unpredictable, and dangerous. It gives and takes, but remains fundamentally unknowable.

Comments

[chestnut_pod]

Ditto. I love it, too, because the selkie wins, however imperfectly. It's a cruel resolution, but in the end, she is free, and of her own volition -- and in some variants, with the help of her daughter, who tells her selkie mother where her skin is and sets her free at the cost of her own family.

[dolorosa_12]

Yes yes yes, that is exactly why I love it. She frees herself, and returns to the sea, which never stopped feeling like home.

[lokifan]

YES, exactly.

[thatjustwontbreak]

Oh my gosh this is THE FOLKTALE. Absolutely. I love it so much.

[dolorosa_12]

It's such a good one!

[yarnofariadne]

I love this story too, for all the reasons you've mentioned here. And I've loved reading your own stories inspired by it.

[dolorosa_12]

It's such a good story! And thank you for your kind words about my own writing.

[falena]

Just a quick comment to let you know I'm catching up on your answers to this meme and I'm so glad you're doing it because I could read you write about..anything. You have such a way of make whatever you're writing about interesting and easy to follow even for those who might not be familiar with the topic.

[dolorosa_12]

Oh wow, that is such a kind thing to say! Thank you so much, and I'm glad you're enjoying these posts as much as I'm enjoying writing them.

[author_by_night]

Wow!

. The sea sustains those coastal communities, but it can also be violent, unpredictable, and dangerous. It gives and takes, but remains fundamentally unknowable.

Interesting. I like that. I saw it as having more to do with women being trapped in marriage, but of course that's also a very modern interpretation, and unless it was written when those narratives were being devised, is unlikely. I imagine people were lost to the sea often - sailors and fishermen, obviously, but even someone walking on the rocks or swimming. Add a little fog and you get a story.

[dolorosa_12]

It's definitely about being trapped in marriage too, although a lot of folk- and fairytales involve marriages that don't seem very consensual from a modern perspective, so it's hardly unique there. But I really think that beyond the individual marriage, the selkie woman sort of represents the sea, and the fact that the sea cannot be controlled by human hands nor contained within human walls.

[scripsi]

I've always been facinated by selkies too!

[dolorosa_12]

I love them! Swan-maidens, fox spirits — all sorts of shapeshifting folkloric women — but selkies are my favourite.

[scripsi]

Yes, me too. I love folklore period, though. So facinating! Have you read The Green Man book series by Juliet McKenna? Rather a light read, but I really enjoy the various mythic creatures that are featires, which includes swan maidens.

[dolorosa_12]

I haven't read that McKenna series, but thanks for the recommendation!

[scripsi]

They are fairly quick to read, sometimes feels a bit repetetive, but on the whole I enjoy them a lot!