Rachel Federman - Mermania: The Little Book of Mermaids

HarperCollinsPublishers

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London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published by HarperCollinsPublishers in 2019

Copyright HarperCollinsPublishers

Rachel Federman asserts her moral rights as the author of the text.

Illustrations by Laura Korzon

Cover and interior design by Jacqui Caulton

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

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Source ISBN 9780008358013

Ebook ISBN 9780008362799

Version 2019-08-20

For Wally & Petra

shapeshifters who always

seem to know who they are

Contents

Always follow your

dreams,

NO MATTER HOW

unrealistic

others think they are.

M ermaids belong to an enchanted realm. Their seascape is at once tantalizingly out of reach even the greatest underwater diver must eventually come up for air and achingly familiar, water being our first home.

From the Middle English word mere meaning lake or sea mermaids are maids of the sea, the stuff of legends, but at the same time ever-present in our modern world. From TV series to music videos, from childrens illustrated books to feminist magazines, graffiti, stamps, tattoos, young adult lit, and manga comics, to inspirational postcards and cosy fish-tailed blankets, it seems that wherever you turn, our oceanic alter egos are there. Sprung from ancient fish gods, reborn from the tragedy of forbidden love, combined with the seductive power of the half-bird sirens who sang to Odysseus, and a warning against temptation in the Middle Ages, today mermaids exist as everything from birthday party entertainment to a reclaimed site of political and particularly feminist power.

While we humans dream of being able to breathe underwater and many a young child longs for the shiny scales of a multi-coloured tail of his or her own throughout art and story, mermaids are seen yearning for life on land. A 2012 special on the Discovery Channel led viewers to believe that mermaids did in fact exist, a NYC parade near Mermaid Avenue celebrates the dazzling creatures on the Coney Island Boardwalk each year, a bronze statue in Copenhagen has been rebuilt after many attacks by vandals, and from as long ago as the Bronze Age these enchanted creatures have served as our muse.

Surely, part of the mermaids appeal is how they dramatize our own dilemma feeling our animal selves to be immortal, something more than the transient beings that we are. Perhaps these magical sea creatures help us to access a place beyond our material existence. And given that most of the worlds oceans remain unexplored, how can we be sure they dont really have a material existence themselves?

But perhaps their greatest effect on humans is the way mermaids remake our world. Their desire for a life on land helps us reimagine the one we already have. In their eyes, ordinary elements air, feet, rain take on a new hue, becoming extraordinary, even miraculous. Mermaids remind us that the realm to which we belong is enchanted too. Those who love the Earth, with its rising oceans, have increasingly embraced mermaids in their duality as both harbingers of doom and agents of protection to swim forward in the fight against climate change.

If mermaids have a legacy that lasts for ages to come, one hopes it will be to help humans preserve the water-filled planet that were so lucky to have.

Mermaid Names Around the Seven Seas

Throughout history,

mermaids

have been known by many names:

AQUATIC HUMANOID

KELPIE

LIMNIAD

NAIAD

NERIAD

NIX

OCEAN NYMPH

OCEANID

SIREN

SPIRIT

SPRITE

SYLPHE

UNDINE

WATER NYMPH

Mermaids have been known to live for up to

three hundred

years

in their aquatic form.

TRADING FINS FOR LIFE ON LAND TENDS TO SHORTEN THEIR LIFESPAN DRAMATICALLY, PLUS IT OFTEN MEANS

giving up their voices along with their tails.

IN RETURN, THEYRE GRANTED A TERRESTRIAL ROMANCE, OR

perhaps even a soul.

SADLY, ITS SAID THAT

mermaids

dont have souls;

ONCE THEY DIE THEY SIMPLY