THE LITTLE MERMAID
I hate fairy tales.
I hate fiction for the most part. They’re not productive. It’s hard to see them as anything but a waste of time because of how little I get out of reading them.
But for some reason, adults seem to think girls like fairy tales and try to give them lots and lots of picture books.
Thin books, decorated with stories as sweet as cake and sparkly illustrations.
It’s always the same. There’s a princess who falls in love with a prince, but some evil witch gets in their way and they have to overcome it to get married in the end.
These books get crammed full of too many things adults think girls like.
Like castles, chariots, rings and glass slippers and poison apples, dwarves and wolves, weddings …… and kisses.
None of these interests me at all.
Actually, I find them revolting.
I hate being treated like a child in the first place. I’m not a child anymore.
Although, there was one story I did like.
The Little Mermaid.
I’m sure you already know, but the story goes like this.
A mermaid princess falls in love with a human prince and goes to a sorceress for help in hopes that her feelings may someday reach him.
However, the sorceress demands a high price for turning the mermaid princess into a human.
That price ……
It was her voice.
Although the mermaid princess becomes human, she can’t convey her feelings to the prince without it.
Then, well, there is a big fuss.
As for the ending …… The original ended on a sad note, but the animated movie had a happy ending.
Even the first version I read, one written for children, was changed to have a happy ending.
Adults must think children can’t handle a mournful conclusion. Not only does the princess have her heart broken, she turns into nothing but bubbles in the original. Very depressing. Out of all the fairy tales in the world, it might be one of the heaviest emotionally.
But the ending doesn’t matter.
What matters is what the story teaches us. It has so much more meaning than the ending.
Something must be sacrificed in order to gain something else.
I think this is a very realistic moral.
The mermaid princess gave up her voice to become human.
Marrying the prince would be impossible without becoming human (admittedly not impossible but highly unlikely without the prince having a condition far worse than a Lolita complex), so her actions were necessary.
Unfortunately, she couldn’t complete what she set out to do because she lost the only means she had of telling him how she felt.
It’s similar to Shogi in that you can protect your King by deploying pieces from your piece stand, but you lose your best weapon at the same time. In the end, it could cost you the match.
Then what should the mermaid princess have done?
I have no idea, nor have I given it any thought.
Why should I? I’ll never fall in love with a prince.
I only have Shogi. So, my story from here on out will be about Shogi.
No sparkly illustrations like in the picture books. It will be a story of guts and grit, a clash of resilience. A tragic, bloody story of Snow White and Cinderella trying to kill each other with their bare hands.
I wish for you to stay with it to the end.
And see–––what is gained and what is lost for yourself.
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