Tag Archives: Melusine

Final Project: The Myth of (Human) Superiority

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In the stories of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, Agnieska Smoczynska’s film The Lure, and André Lebey’s version of Melusine the characters embark on journeys away from their home environments with aspirations of establishing their lives in new homes and bringing the talents they possess to benefit their new community as immigrants, but they are unable to bridge the social barriers of their new environment because of all they must sacrifice to assimilate. In these stories this rejection from their chosen environments with their designation of “other” preserves the power of hierarchical systems and serves as an allegory of outsiders and immigrants being a threat.

In Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, for the title character “there was nothing she delighted in so much as to hear about the upper world. She was always asking her grandmother to tell her all she knew about ships, towns, people, and animals” (109). The little mermaid idealized and revered the human world like immigrants who dream of joining another community. Her interest in the world above water predated her interest with the prince, making the human world her first infatuation and aspiration. The little mermaid impatiently waits for her access to this land of her dreams and is further enthralled on her first visit to the surface by seeing the human experiences of celebration and mortality. The prince’s birthday party shows new experiences that the little mermaid has not encountered such as dancing and fireworks, “large suns were throwing out sparks…and all these wonders were reflected in the calm sea below” (Andersen 114). This comparison shows how the little mermaid sees the brightness and life of the human world that does not reach into her world.  She stays late into the night, not wanting to let go of this experience and inadvertently becomes entangled in the lives of humans.   

When the prince almost drowns during the storm, she remembers humans’ inability to survive under water like her. This is when the first of her abilities benefit the human world. Not only in the single life of the prince, but also the kingdom he reigns over. The little mermaid’s choice to save him and carry him to shore more than likely saved a kingdom’s power in the political world. The little mermaid saves the prince as an individual, not as a political act but she soon sees in the land-based rescue of him contributing to the happiness of the community around him. “And the mermaid saw that the prince came to life again, and that he smiled on all those around him. But he did not send her a smile, neither did he know she had saved him, so she felt quite afflicted” (Andersen 116). She understands her contribution, how she has added value to the human world, but because she is separate from the space of humans, her contributions are not recognized by the population she hopes to be considered equal to. 

In Andersen’s story the little mermaid believes the possession of an immortal soul is another quality of humans that puts them in higher position than mermaids. Her grandmother explains to her that only the love of a human and a Christian marriage would grant her the same status as a human, “But this will never happen! Your fish’s tail, which is a beauty amongst us sea-folk, is thought to be a deformity on earth…” (Andersen 119). This additionally deepens the little mermaid’s belief that her form and species is beneath humans, making her willing to reject her world to be part of the human world that is depicted as superior.

The cost of having human legs is the little mermaid’s voice, as a stranger to a new land this immediately puts her at a disadvantage. She cannot assert her personality or identity without a voice and much like her grandmother had explained a tail was a deformity, her absence of speech will also be considered another type of deformity to humans. As Pil Dahlerup states, “but, being mute, she, who in her former element was the foremost singer in the whole world of land and sea, cannot express her feelings of love and longing, and her exquisite looks and expressive dancing turn her into a mere pet for the prince” (413). The little mermaid even after having crossed the boundary between being an inhabitant of water and then of land is still considered inferior to the humans around her. Her lack of voice is similar to what immigrants experience in their chosen homes as language and political standing prohibits their participation in the environment around them.

The little mermaid understands the importance of a voice and knows that her voice is one of the talents she could bring to the world of humans, she will have to relinquish not only her tail that made the rescue possible but the voice that is a unique talent. When the Sea Witch asked for it as payment, the little mermaid answers, “but if you take away my voice…what have I left?” (Andersen 122). She is told by the Sea Witch that her new human body will be all that she needs to complete her task and obtain an immortal soul. The human form and status are set up as the ideal that can conquer all obstacles, both to reader and the characters of the story.

When the human form does not negate the little mermaid’s payment of the talents she sacrificed, she is presented with a new moral problem. Through the further sacrifices of her sisters, the little mermaid can choose to resume her own life as a mermaid by killing the prince that rejected her or die herself. With being underestimated by humans in what they determined to be her inferior state she has access to the prince and can easily kill him while he sleeps. This exemplifies the threat some see of the “other” in their community, that the unassuming and subordinate people from outside can cause substantial harm to the people in the community they join.

In The Lure (dir. Agnieska Smoczynska) the threat of the “other” is more evident because unlike the little mermaid, the mermaids in the film do not have to sacrifice their tails to participate in the human world. The mermaids Silver and Golden in the film bounce back and forth between being considered dangerous animals and innocuous sexual objects by the humans around them. They are suspected to be threats and kept in dependent positions in their life and work. Even after their talents have brought money and success to the band they join on land, they are kept under a restricting level of the human’s control. Silver confronts the humans saying, “we can’t go to restaurants or bars. We work, but we don’t get any money,” (The Lure 53:37). The response from the character of a Krysia, a mother-figure and vocalist of the band, infantilizes the mermaids by replying, “You’re still kids. Kids can’t have everything they want” (The Lure 53:50). The treatment and approach to Silver and Golden by humans in the film does not reflect an opinion of the mermaids being kids, but because of their unfamiliarity with the human world they have started to make their lives in, the human band members are able to exploit them with presumed authority.

Reducing them to children makes the humans feel superior to the mermaids, while also being terrified of them. This and other physical impediments make the human world experience muted for the mermaids. Mietek, the love interest of Silver tells her “to me you’ll always be a fish, an animal,” (The Lure 33:59). This causes Silver to see herself through a perspective of not being worthy of the human world. Silver wants to participate fully in the human world so she can enjoy it in the same way as other humans. Golden wants to maintain her mermaid nature as she plans for their current home to be just a visit not a new home. For Golden, the talents her and Silver have of singing and enchantment are a way for them to access the human world, not become members of it. Golden still hunts humans and uses the oceanic language with Silver without the concern of how uncomfortable it makes humans, even after it leads to violence against them.

With this divergence of their approach towards the human world it shows the challenges of maintaining identity in new surroundings with people who do not trust them for being outsiders. Silver hides her power and tries to share it with humans to be accepted while Golden refuses to deny her power or abilities. Golden is considered more of a threat for her unwillingness to accept humans as being superior, reflecting that the “other” or immigrant who does not assimilate is a threat to the community they are residing in.

Visiting the human world does not mean a mermaid has to give up being a mermaid. It is a temporary state that they have the power to flow in and out of, but to assimilate they must cut off their tail like the little mermaid. In the world of the film there are several mermaids on land, all of them aware and most believing that “…if you cut off your tail, you’ll lose your voice” (The Lure 1:09:13). This creates an experience of not being able to truly assimilate into the culture of humans they are living around because they lose their strength and talent to be there. Cutting off a tail isn’t about participating or having a presence in the human world, it’s about joining the human world permanently and cutting themselves off from their mermaid world. It is a transition from visitor to resident. When immigrants are forced to reject or cut off their connection to the lives they lived before, it becomes a loss in identity and truly a loss for the new places they have decided to call home.

Silver choses to cut off her tail so she can be with her lover Mietek, but it comes at the great sacrifice of her voice. Her interactions in the world become strained and as a singer it does take away her ability to participate in all the things she enjoyed as just a visitor. The operation makes her disabled both physically and professionally, without these talents her worth in the community she has joined is diminished. She is unable to bridge the transition to being part of the human world because she had to give up all the talents that granted her entry to the human world. Soon after her transition to human, her lover rejects her and marries a human. This puts Silver in mortal danger as it was for the little mermaid, and she must choose her life or Mietek. 

Silver makes the same choice as the little mermaid. Believing her rejection is justified, she sacrifices herself for a human, keeping the hierarchical system of human superiority over all others in place. While Silver is reduced to sea foam, her sister Golden who did not endorse the system of humans, kills Mietek before returning to her home in the water. The threat of the unassimilated visitor is portrayed as a scarier risk in this story because it is resilient to propaganda of ranked systems. It relies on exclusion to bring a sense of inferiority, pressuring the visitor to commit to the ways and structures of the land they occupy and become the subordinate to the structure or leave. The story in The Lure shows how the “other” or immigrant who does not conform to the model of being inferior can lead to disruption and danger in a new chosen environment. 

In the story of Melusine she is able to bridge the barriers of the human world for a longer span of time than the little mermaid or the mermaids of The Lure. This is in part because she maintains her talents in the human world and is protected through her marriage to Raymondin. Having her talents of magic and political understanding she can create her own secure territory. He gives her residency in the human world with his position as a lord over land and she has more protection with this marital commitment than the other stories’ mermaids. Though eventually her position as an “other” and immigrant ruling over land puts her in the position of a political target when her power is challenged. 

On the first meeting of Melusine and Raymondin he comes to her in a position of weakness. Raymondin “too broken to have any pressing need for the unknown” (Lebey 23). He has killed a family member and fears the retribution of his family, leaving him isolated and ready to flee his homelands. Perhaps becoming an immigrant to different lands himself and understanding his loss in position in the human world. Melusine offers him an alternative to this fate by joining in a marital alliance with him, promising “without me, without my counsel, you cannot escape being accused of murder…if you listen to me, and take account of what I say, I promise to make you the greatest lord of your line and the wealthiest” (Lebey 25). She is offering a partnership that will not only save him from the consequences of his actions but also improving on the position he held before the crime he committed. The little mermaid, Silver, and Golden could not offer this level of power to their suitors because of what they had to give up being in the land of humans. In return Melusine asks for a marriage between her and Raymondin as well as his acceptance of her maintaining a boundary of her body and time. Melusine acts with the power she knows she possesses “these tales offer a catalogue of behaviors that exemplify the power that husbands wielded over their wives and how they were prepared to use it… These are notmutually exclusive desires as both could co-exist, but the presence of the pact shows that the fairy woman did not seek belonging at any cost” (Shaw 113).

When Raymondin does agree to her terms, unlike when he first meets her “he began to feel a man again, full of vigour” (Lebey 26). This alliance has strengthened him, not only in his mind but in his position in the world. Both he and Melusine understand the hierarchical system of humans and place themselves at the top so they may rule and not be subject to it. Instead of believing in a lesser position as an immigrant to the human world like the little mermaid and Silver, Melusine does not subscribe to non-humans being subordinate though most around her will.

Melusine does keep her promise of the alliance. Raymondin and the heirs she births into the world accomplish and conquer many things, pursuing their own journey of the unknown and placing themselves in positions of power around the land. Her talents build and preserve their castle Lusignan, a neutral space. “In Melusine’s case, while she appears to create a third space protected by ownership, once these boundaries are secured, she introduces alternative ways of thinking that trouble traditional understandings of ownership and the boundaries upon which they depend” (Shaw 119). Melusine secures for herself and the people of the land a place where she is not the “other” but connector of community.

Her upholding of their alliance benefits both as well as their family. Still the marriage is not without problems as the children of the ruling couple have various forms of deformities, but Raymondin is still made happy by the marriage and the success it has given him. This shield of power covers both members of the marriage; he does not need to be beholden to any other power, and she maintains the image of being human like her husband and thus not suspected as an “outsider” threat.

Though as time passes Raymondin grows too comfortable in this position of power and forgets the position he once occupied which his wife secured for him with her talents and resources. He has conquered parts of the world as has his sons, which he is reminded of while reading a letter from them before he breaks the boundaries of his wife’s territory. This coupled with the suggestion of his family member about Melusine reignites this desire to conquer unknown territories, because Melusine with her boundary was not entirely his possession like he hoped for when they first met. His family member reminds him of this inadequacy, setting off the events that will lead to the destruction of the marital alliance. As the beginning of The Romance of the Faery Melusine implies humans often go looking for fights when idle, “it seemed that the one existed to give rise to the other, for humans do not show their mettle if left to themselves” (12). With no new lands to conquer Raymondin sets out to prove his dominion over Melusine. 

The power of Melusine’s autonomy was also her weakness, as it conflicted with the human hierarchal system that places husbands in power over their wives. While Lusignan is a neutral space she built, in it are people from other backgrounds that uphold the systems of inequality. When Raymondin is confronted with her Saturday-serpent form, Melusine’s “otherness” erases the image he has held for her for years. “But then saw her husband lying there at her with a look of hatred” (Lebey 138). Raymondin then retroactively blames Melusine for all the lives and actions of their children, “serpent always…you are only a phantom, and so is your fruit! None of those who have come from your cursed womb know how to come to a good end, because of the sign of reprobation with which you have marked them by you sin” (Lebey 139). Now Raymondin has the opportunity to blame the “outsider” for any misfortune as he has now separated his feeling that they were “themselves one” (Lebey 121). This translates to the threat of Melusine or any outsider bringing the pollution of her “otherness” to be inherited down to her children who will inherit the land and position of their father.

This is the perceived ultimate threat of the “other” and immigrant, a continuation in the community containing an outside influence in the form of future generations. Inclusion results in the loss the structure that thrives on categorizing and establishing superiority. In the stories of Hans Christian Andersen’s The Little Mermaid, Agnieska Smoczynska’s film The Lure, and Melusine mermaids joining the human world is a clear reflection of how human communities require the sacrifice of identity and talents to gain access to their environment because they fear their self-designated importance being challenged. The little mermaid was stripped of all the things that made her distinctive and exceptional for the promise of a body that was portrayed as the pinnacle of lifeforms on land and sea, only to be treated as an inferior. Silver had power that was used by others, while they still demeaned her non-human qualities until they shamed her into giving up her advantages so she would be as mediocre as the humans that surrounded her. Melusine shared and used her talents with the support of humans as long as it put them at an advantage, but the first time her magic could not protect she was expelled from the world she had built. These stories demean and vilify the outsider or immigrant as threats to give justification for the exclusion and mistreatment a hierarchal system is designed to prosper on. Assimilation is presented as way to bridge the regulated barriers of inclusion, when it only provides support to the concept of inequality that is built within the myth of human superiority.

Works Cited

Anderson, Hans Christian. “The Little Mermaid”. The Penguin Book of Mermaids, edited by Bacchilega, Cristina, and Marie Alohalani Brown. Penguin Books, 2019. 

Dahlerup, Pil, et al. “SPLASH!: SIX VIEWS OF ‘THE LITTLE MERMAID.’” Scandinavian Studies, vol. 62, no. 4, 1990, pp. 403–29. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40919202. Accessed 14 Dec. 2025.

Lebey, André, and Gareth Knight. The Romance of the Faery Melusine. Skylight, 2011. 

The Lure. Directed by Agnieska Smoczynska, Janus Films, 2015.

 Shaw, Jan. “Belonging in the Borderlands: Narrative, Place-making, and Dwelling in Jean d’Arras’s Mélusine.” Exemplaria, vol. 36, no. 2, 2 Apr. 2024, pp. 109–130, https://doi.org/10.1080/10412573.2024.2406698. 

Final Paper Proposal

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For my final essay I am planning to write about the parallels between the story of Melusine and Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid. Examining the concept of “otherness” to the environments they journey to after psychological and physical expense still does not give them access to the environment of their choosing. Their dehumanization and the infantilization of their bodies by their chosen homes safeguards a concept of superiority by imperialistic and patriarchal systems.

I have been researching my chosen texts and have dropped using The Lure as there has not been much academic mention of it. I believe there could be a connecting point of between the two remaining stories with how hybridity equates monstrosities and aids in the exclusion the characters feel from their chosen homes.

Thesis:

In the stories of Melusine and The Little Mermaid the characters embark on journeys away from their home environments with aspirations of establishing their lives in new homes and bringing the talents they possess to benefit their new community, but they are unable to bridge the social barriers of their new environment. In the stories this rejection from their chosen environments with their designation of “other” preserves the power of hierarchical systems and serves as an allegory of outsiders being a threat. 

Final Project (Essay) To-Do

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For my Final Project (Essay) I need learn more about The Little Mermaid in reference to crossing of borders and the sociopolitical implications. There are a few academic papers I have been reviewing to better understand the more political elements of the story I am not familiar with. I plan to compare the Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid to the story of Melusine and possibly to the film The Lure, which has comparable elements of The Little Mermaid’s lore of the lives of mermaids. I also need to learn more about how the story of Melusine is depicted in sociopolitical academic analysis.

Before I begin my Final Project (Essay) I need to reread The Little Mermaid and the Melusine readings. After making my own notes I will research academic papers that address my approach and compose my thesis. I hope peer review will help me better establish my claims. Once that is set, I will select the references that best support my thesis and then compose an outline.

At this point I am not planning to do a visual or alternative media accompaniment to the essay.

Discovery 1: Hybrid Bodies and Betrayal in Melusine

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In The Romance of the Faery Melusine, one moment within the story that I would like to closely analyze is Melusine’s serpent transformation and how it is not framed as a decent into monstrosity but rather as a moment of revelation. Instead of describing her as a grotesque creature, the text instead describes her transformation as that of being radiant, imagery more akin to divinity than horror. Through this luminous description and natural symbolism, the passage portrays her hybrid body as powerful, sacred, and deeply connected to the environment. This aesthetic refreshing shifts the meaning of her transformation where the conflict from this scene is not of Melusine’s difference but rather Raymondin’s failure to accept it. Melusine’s revelation as a beautiful hybrid being is contrasted with the unsettling reaction is produces by revealing that the true threat lies not in the feminine wilderness, but in the patriarchal instinct to reject whatever resists containment.

The language surrounding Melusine’s revealed body is deliberately reverential. Rather than dwelling on minute details such as her scales or deformity, the scene is enveloped in a radiant “pale light” which fills the room as she emerges from the bath and her arms “shone like liquid gold” (Lebey 124) while she reached upwards toward the moon. Even her serpent form is transfigured as an extension of the natural world, shimmering like water. This description elevates her body into an elemental spectacle, treating her transformation as a moment of holy communion which aligns with the principle that view the feminine and natural world as two sides of the same coin. Feared because they are incredibly powerful, not becase they are inherently evil. Melusine’s hybridity is presented not as demonic but as ecological: she embodies both human intimacy and nonhuman fluidity.

Raymondin’s response to all this, however, fractures this sublimity. Where the narration illuminates Melusine’s with awe and wonder, his language is riddle with instability and uncertainty. He imagines, “implacable doors” and wonders whether he is “even in the true way to Melusine’s” (Lebey 123). His anxiety arises not from witnessing evil but witnessing something that he cannot categorize. The passage emphasizes his fear of ambiguity where his first instinct is not of compassion or curiosity but that of intrusion. The moment he spies on her, violating her trust and request for secrecy, is when the tragedy of the story truly begins. It is not Melusine’s serpent form that is an act of treachery, Raymondin’s gaze is. He cannot love that he cannot define and in this way, the scene dramatizes a broader ecofeminist critique where patriarchal consciousness recoils when confronted with beings who resist binary classification. In this case woman or monster.

Understanding this passage through this lens allows it to speak not only about gender perception but also environmental ethics. Melusine is punished for being a hybrid: a state of coexistence between human and nonhuman. Her rejection by her loved one reflect the cultural rejection of things that do not conform to human management. Like nature itself, she is cherished when useful, romanticized when passive, but feared when autonomous and unable to be tamed by man. Her serpent body can be seen as a form of resistance as she will not sever herself from the wild to appease a man who is terrified of boundaries. This passage mirrors the societal relationships the environment and teaches that ecological destruction begins with the refusal to recognize kinship across differences.

In the end, the betrayal is not Melusine’s but Raymondin’s. Her transformation teaches that the monster was not her hybridity but rather the impulse to sever ourselves from nature in order to feel a false sense of security. By portraying her serpent body as sacred, the passage advances an early ecofeminist principle: environmental and feminine autonomy are not threats to be subdued or domesticated, but ways that demand open mindedness and reverence.

Melusine: the Mermaids, the Marginalized, the Merry

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Dion Jones

Prof J. Pressman

ECL 305; Literature and the Environment

18 October 2025

Melusine: the Mermaids, the Marginalized, the Merry

“Then hear my request. It is that you must by all sacraments you hold holy as a Chrisitian that on each Saturday, from sundown till dawn on the following day, never—and I will say it again so there is no doubt about it—never must you try to see me in any way whatever, nor seek to know where I am.” Andre LeBey The Romance of the Faery Melusine (27).This quote gives invaluable insight into the social environments in which Melusine was concocted. The titular character offers to be both a powerful ally and resource to a man seeking power and legitimacy. This single stipulation is all-but-guaranteed to be violated. I believe that the inclusion of this quote sets up the story as a critique of the powerful and its eventual overexertion of its resources—human and otherwise.

 She Was a Faery; She Was a Hybrid. A Hybrid of What; of Who?

Following our class’s themes of mermaids and other nature/human hybrids, I seek to explore the hybridity of Melusine as part insider, part other/outsider. I accomplish this by reading Melusine as a woman of Jewish ethnic and cultural heritage and as a natural resource. The traditional Hebrew Sabbath day—day of rest and worship—is on Saturday, as opposed to its daughter faith’s Sunday. While Melusine’s Sabbath lasts only half as long, and bridges the late hours of Saturday to Sunday rather than Friday through Saturday, it strikes a parallel. Days of worship suggest the practice of rituals either public or private, allowing Melusine to adhere to her Sabbath without the prying eyes of her Christian partner—Raymondin. 

The natural world is an invaluable resource that makes life possible for itself and for those who make use of it whether they understand themselves as extensions of it or not. Melusine may act as a metaphorical representation of the natural environment, her request for the strict adherence to her personal Sabbath and boundaries may reflect the fact that wildlife, air, and water systems tend to need time to repopulate/replenish unimpeded in order to avoid the tragedy of the commons: a problem/condition where a person(s) is encouraged to act in their self-interest, depleting a shared and limited resource to the detriment of the common good of all.

How Does this Relate to Power?

The legends that inform LeBey’s story were in circulation well after the Edict of Expulsion by the English King Edward I—which expelled his Jewish subjects from the lands—and even longer after the Norman conquest of England. According to George Hare Leonard‘s The Expulsion of the Jews by Edward I. An Essay in Explanation of the Exodus, A.D. 1290, Jewish people were used by the wealthy and powerful—especially English Kings—as a source of revenue from their banking/money lending businesses due in part by non-Christians being barred from Christian guilds which controlled most other professions (104). Further, Christians were essentially barred from banking and money lending businesses due to scriptures—or assumption of surrounding them—not shared with their mother faith, creating a niche that could only be filled by members of outsider groups (Leonard 106).

Jewish people—especially the money lenders and bankers—were brought from Normandy—France—to the British Aisles by William the Conqueror as a protected class for the express purposes of enriching him and his line. Through the alienating nature of their relationship to power and the masses, antisemitism festered over the centuries, became weaponized by the powers that exploited them, and were ultimately harmed by and expelled by the non-Norman rulers who, again, benefitted from moneylending. 

I argue that this same relationship between power and the exploited is the core of The Romance of the Faery Melusine whether or not we read Melusine as an insider/outsider hybrid or as a human/nature hybrid. . Those who are powerful will form social and political contracts with more vulnerable people and extract whatever value they can. When receiving value, Christian sacraments may bind a noble, but their greed likely won’t be stopped. Melusine can give Raymondin the world, but he will always thirst for that which he cannot have. If timber builds chips and palaces, a noble will have every last tree fell if it will maintain his seat or aid in robbing another of their own. 

 Works Cited

LeBey, Andre. The Romance of the Faery Melusine. Pearson Professional Development, 2011.

Leonard, George Hare. “The Expulsion of the Jews by Edward I. An Essay in Explanation of the Exodus, A.D. 1290.” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 5, 1891, pp.  103–46. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3678048. Accessed 18 Oct. 2025.

Vogeler’s Melusine; a study of the narrative capacity of still images.

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Do not be fooled by their static nature! Images have the power to play with time as well as space. It’s easy to dismiss still images as limited in their ability to interact with stories— but here is an example that says otherwise. In this 1912 painting, Heinrich Vogeler calls on cultural knowledge of the famous story of Melusine to tell a new story, in a single image, through the compositional manipulation of recognizable elements; a shining example of the power of visual art in interaction with stories. 

In order to discuss how Vogeler manipulates and communicates with literature, we have to demonstrate that the painting is recognizable as Melusine to a viewer familiar with the story. The central figure– almost perfectly, in fact, centered in the middle panel– is a young, white woman, sitting contemplatively nude on a rock in an edenic forest scene. Our first hint to her identity is that her legs are blue and scaly, ending in fins which dip into a pool of water. So far, this figure might represent any number of semiaquatic characters– an Undine or a naiad, perhaps. It’s the other humanoid figure in the scene that identifies Melusine– Raymondin, only a third of her size in the image, peers from the forest background, divided from her by a river. He holds the tools of hunting: a spear and a crossbow. His clothing, similar to a medieval kirtle and bycocket hat, is reminiscent of Robin Hood, placing this image contemporary with Melusine in human history.

However, the identification of the figures as a medieval hunter and a scaly-tailed woman ends the direct allusion to the familiar story. After the revelation of the characters’ identities, the viewer will realize that the scene in this image never occurs in the story of Melusine. The forest setting, and Raymondin’s hunting garb, call to mind the beginning of the story, when Raymondin and Melusine meet for the first time in the forest. Critically, when they meet, Melusine is fully human. Her hybridity is a secret, a secret which (we know), is responsible for her tragic end. However, in Vogeler’s painting, she displays her hybridity fully at the first meeting.
Her comfort in her mermaid form, her peaceful contemplation, believing herself alone and not knowing she’s being watched– not holding a mirror, but perhaps looking at her reflection in nearby water– is reminiscent of another iconic scene in the story: the final scene, when, after a life of love and service, Raymondin breaks his vow to Melusine and discovers her hybridity. 

How can a painting illustrate the first scene and the climactic scene of a story in one composition? How is the story still recognizable, despite this distortion of plot and time? The painting is, after all, a triptych; if Vogeler wanted to paint the beginning and end of the story, couldn’t he have done it on two separate panels? And what does his choice to compress the two scenes into one do to the viewer’s mind?It is questions like these that demonstrate the ability of paintings to interact with stories beyond simply representing snapshots of the action.

There is much to be said about how Vogeler’s choices respond to the story of Melusine. The convergence of the beginning and end of Melusine’s story offers the viewer the opportunity to completely rewrite it. As we know her story, the span of Melusine’s interactions with the human world, her actions to shape it, her building of castles, her delivery of powerful sons, happens after she meets Raymondin (as a human) and before he discovers her “curse”. In the well known version, the reader might ask themself whether the arguable success of her foray into the human world is worth the (arguably) inevitable tragic end. In Vogeler’s version, though, her secret is apparently revealed before Raymondin even speaks to her. The viewer might ask instead– who would Melusine have been, without Raymondin? (The implied inverse, “what might Raymondin have been without Melusine”, is certainly minimized by his diminutive stature in the painting). There is not a single built object in this scene. The Melusine of legend is known for having left an immortal mark on the earth in the form of the castle of Lusignan; Vogeler’s Melusine appears as if her influence on the world may begin and end at her relationships with the short-lived woodland creatures surrounding her. Another, more “romantic” line of thinking asks whether the “fate” that brought Melusine and Raymondin together would still connect them if Raymondin had happened to commit manslaughter on a Saturday. Is the value of their relationship only that it resulted in a powerful ruling family– or do they have a compelling romance on their own, in the forest? Does this premature discovery, in fact, offer a solution to the tradegy– could Raymondin have still taken her as his wife if she had no secret?

There is actually something unique about the power of a still image to compel us to look deeper. Film, or music, or even literary fiction, which we can progress through in linear time, which calls our attention constantly to something new, boast the ability to create immersive worlds that we can feel part of. But still images move only as quickly as our minds; we cannot travel through a painting on a set path, we experience all of its elements in whatever order they catch our eye. In this way, paintings are a singularly compelling form of storytelling. Written and spoken word can tell us things, but paintings invite us to ask our own questions. 

Femininity Through the Male Lens

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Women have always struggled with living in a patriarchal world, constantly being told what to do and how to live. In “The Revenge of the Faery Melusine”, André LeBey uses the character of Raymondin in his distressed ascent to Melusine to highlight how femininity is adjusted through the male gaze of mistrust and domination. Raymondin’s suspicion exposes how male imagination defines a woman’s reality rather than through female actions. These thoughts in Raymondin’s head portray the patriarchal impulse to see female freedom as wrongdoing, inevitably forcing women, like Melusine, to live within a narrative constructed from male fear over veracity. 

From the moment they got married, Raymondin and Melusine had agreed on one thing: that Raymondin must never disturb her on Saturday nights. This agreement lasted many years, until Raymondin’s imagination got the best of him. LeBey states that as Raymondin was making his way up the steps to Melusine, he thought to himself, “He climbed quickly in his eagerness to strike, his heart pumping…there where he had never been before. Neither he, nor anyone, except her—and—who else? He believed there must be someone, but without entirely believing it” (Lebey 121). The language LeBey uses in this passage portrays Raymondin’s fears and imagination that led him to break his promise with Melusine. The use of his “eagerness to strike” and “his heart pumping” presents the notion of desire and hostility that Raymondin is experiencing. This wording is significant to the storyline because of how it portrays his relationship with Melusine, the fusion of rage and love. It portrays Raymondin as an intruder of Melusine’s precious space by expressing his actions as a “strike”. His motivation at this moment is jealousy rather than love; he no longer wants to understand Melusine but to conquer her. This, as a result, displays Raymondin’s desire to control a mystery that intimidates and threatens his masculinity. Not knowing this one aspect of Melusine’s life creates a more significant issue for his identity because she is choosing her own space over him.

LeBey’s language provides a deeper context for Raymondin’s toxic masculinity towards Melusine and her female freedom. When it’s stated that he was making his way to a place “where he had never been before. Neither he, nor anyone” (LeBey 121), it enhances the idea that Melusine has a space that has been untouched by the male presence. A space that gives her independence from Raymondin. This independence is the exact reason Raymondin feels he must defy it, furthering the idea that Melusine is forced to live in a male narrative created out of fear and jealousy. This furthers the thoughts that he had while scaling the stairs to Melusine. 

As Raymondin thinks, “her—and—who else? He believed there must be someone” (LeBey 121), it materializes from nothing but his own imagination, furthering his own insecurities. By providing the context of using his own imagination, LeBey can show how patriarchal narratives are created. Not by how women inherently act, but by how the men in their lives interpret female actions, based on their own imagination and free will. This assumption stems from the patriarchal idea that women hold secrets that are incomprehensible to their male counterparts. Secrets which Raymondin feels entitled to know at this moment in time. Without thinking about how Melusine might feel about his intrusion or “strike” into her female space. This loss of common sense is shown when Raymondin thinks, “He believed there must be someone, but without entirely believing it” (LeBey 121). Highlighting the aspect of suspicion without confirmation, further forcing this narrative he has created onto Melusine. This exposes the idea that Raymondin feels that he knows his wife, but has been so corrupted by the patriarchal gaze of control and mistrust. By picturing Melusine as an unfaithful wife, he can keep her in a story that he is ultimately controlling.

Overall, LeBey’s language in describing Raymondin’s inner thoughts in this passage highlights the male-created narrative Melusine has been forced to live in during her marriage. It’s important to note how this use of language exposes how Raymondin’s want to “strike” stems from this narrative he has created in his mind to control Melusine. Through the relationship and mistrust of Raymondin and Melusine, LeBey can critique the unsteady male authoritative foundation that makes it so easy for uncertainty to mutate into allegation. This passage sheds light on the concept of how female narratives stem from the male fear. Ultimately proving how patriarchal narratives are built to control the lives of the women they are forced onto. 

Honouring Boundaries: Marital Alliances Reflecting in the Political Environment

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In The Romance of the Faery Melusine the violation of Melusine’s boundaries when her husband Raymondin disregards their agreement of her seclusion on Saturdays, reflects the patriarchal fear of autonomy in women and the unknown. When boundaries are violated domestically or politically it creates distrust in partners, severing a relationship which brought prosperity and safety to them and their society. 

On the first meeting of Melusine and Raymondin he comes to her in a position of weakness. “too broken to have any pressing need for the unknown” (Lebey, 23). He has killed a family member and fears the retribution of his family, leaving him isolated and ready to flee his homelands. Melusine offers him an alternative to this fate by joining in a marital alliance with him, promising “without me, without my counsel, you cannot escape being accused of murder…if you listen to me, and take account of what I say, I promise to make you the greatest lord of your line and the wealthiest” (25). She is offering a partnership that will not only save him from the consequences of his actions but also improving on the position he held before the crime he committed. In return she asks for a marriage between the two and his acceptance of her maintaining a boundary of her body and time.

He agrees to this martial alliance, in part for its favorable promised outcome but also because he is enamored with her beauty. It is a beneficial relationship, marriages of his position were often made for the alliance of two families and territories, desire for the spouse was not necessary. Though in his reasoning he is pulled by the thoughts about her of “whom he wanted to know more and more, and above all to possess” (27). This attitude towards Melusine as being a possession was and is a mindset of some who dehumanize women or wives, as they do not find them to be equal to men. A woman can be to some another territory to conquer and rule over.

When Raymondin does agree to her terms, unlike when he first meets her “he began to feel a man again, full of vigour” (26). This alliance has strengthened him, not only in his mind but in his position in the world. He is not alone, but now part of team. 

In political alliances, while each partner maintains their own territory it does present a united front that is larger than they are on their own. Like in the marriage of Raymondin and Melusine, political alliances give access to shared monetary and defense resources. If a foreign or domestic threat strikes at the alliance, they are attacking a united front. When kingdoms and countries form alliances it is to benefit both and within this political relationship there is an emphasis of mutual respect for each other’s autonomy.

Melusine does keep her promise of the alliance. Raymondin and the heirs she births into the world accomplish and conquer many things, pursuing their own journey of the unknown. Her upholding of their alliance benefits both as well as their family. The marriage is not without problems as the children have various forms of deformities, but Raymondin is still made happy by the marriage and the success it has given him. 

Raymondin has kept his vow as well, respecting Melusine’s boundary of not seeing her on Saturdays. Though as time has passed Raymondin has grown comfortable in this position of power and forgets the position he once occupied which his wife secured for him with her power and resources. Relationships both personal and political evolve with time but also can stagnate when not nourished. It is only when a cousin of Raymondin, a part of his family he once feared for retribution, calls into question Melusine’s fidelity in claiming this time for herself does Raymondin think to violate his marital vow. 

This is an interesting departure of commitment for Raymondin to Melusine. Raymondin has had the privilege to age, he is no longer fueled by a need for the unknown in the world outside of the castle Melusine built for him. He has conquered parts of the world as has his sons, which he is reminded of while reading a letter from them before he breaks the boundaries of his wife’s territory. This coupled with the suggestion of his cousin about Melusine reignites this desire for the unknown, because Melusine with her boundary was not entirely his possession like he hoped for when they first met. She still maintained the autonomy of her own body, her territory. She had not been conquered and enveloped into his territory. His cousin reminds him of this inadequacy, setting off the events that will lead to the destruction of the marital alliance.

Raymondin often refers to honour, in his first meeting of his wife and then while he prepares for the violation of their agreement. Later Raymondin declares, “women do not know, know nothing of what we call Honour!” (138). While he has thought of Melusine and himself as one, he conveniently separates her from himself in this statement. Implying woman do not have the capability of honour like men, it categorizes Melusine’s position as his partner as not being equal. After she sees this disrespect towards her and all she has provided him in their long relationship the alliance is broken and the power they both held together. 

There are consequences of this broken alliance with violating her boundary, Melusine’s fate is now to be separated from Raymondin and her soul unable to reach a Christian afterlife. She then explains after Raymondin is out of power, “no man will be able to hold the country in such peace as we have seen” (142). Outside of him not having the same strength as their united front, betraying her reflects on his character and will change the perception of any alliance he hopes to make after. Raymondin is now isolated and not trustworthy in the political and personal realm. He is a now target for those who were not strong enough to conquer his empire when it was strengthen by his marital alliance. Making Melusine’s prophecy true, because once a great territory loses its footing it is nearly impossible to recover. There will be stain of his betrayal in his life and heirs with the fallout of the turbulent political environment he created by not honouring the sovereignty of another.

Work Cited:

Lebey, André, and Gareth Knight. The Romance of the Faery Melusine. Skylight, 2011. 

Love at First Sight or Blinded by Lust?

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There are a number of relationships that start to form slowly after a couple of nights out or social events being attended. However, there also seems to be a select group of bonds that immediately start to take course within the first few seconds of conversation or even just with a couple of glances back and forth. These very relationships that spark from the first altercation between one another is by no means “untrue” since there are in fact sacred bonds that form rapidly, but when someone decides to choose a companion after the first encounter it is quite a risk and after going over the reading and truly delving into the moments leading up to Raymondin and Melusine’s first altercation, it is quite evident that this was more so a lustful connection more than it was a passionate bond between to souls.

Although one may argue that what Raymondin felt towards Melusine was pure and that the betrayal was just a mere innocent mistake, one also needs to realize that Raymondin was also incredibly hesitant to initiate the bond right from the beginning. Now, this sort of reaction is something that is common in people that are under pressure (like Raymondin in this instance) or it could also be that he was truly infatuated with Melusine from the beginning which is quite odd seeing as how they have had no true interactions beforehand. This hesitancy from Raymondin’s part can be seen in when they converse about their future intentions,

“‘That is well Raymondin, but there is something else.'” “Surprised, he could not stop himself from blurting out ‘You have me at your mercy!'” (Lebey,Knight 27)

This sentiment Raymondin has is something that can be defined as an action driven by lust and pressure which resulted in him committing to something he was not emotionally prepared for, further showcasing the consequences of following through with a relationship after just one altercation between one another. Not only does this turn out to be true after Raymondi is adamant on Melusine becoming his bride, but it later officially establishes itself when he betrays Melusine and breaks the vow he did not even take as seriously as he should have to begin with; only proving that he rushed out of lust and not because of actual love.

Jealously into Concern

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This post is about Chapter 14: Betrayal

This chapter focuses on Raymondin being deathly curious about what Melusine is doing privately during the one day he can’t see her. From what I can understand it seems to prove what I thought in my previous post where Raymondin was tempted/egged on to seek the truth. From this quote on page 121, “There where he had never been before. Neither he, nor anyone, except her – and – who else? He believed there must be someone, but without entirely believing it”, it seems Raymondin is driven by jealously and paranoia. Once the thought of Melusine doing something behind his back with another person (implied a man) he becomes “Suddenly frantic” (121). I like how in this chapter we focus on Raymondin’s perspective and are given more of a reasoning why he breached the trust between him and Melusine, despite all the love he held for his wife he is still human and allowed his insecurities to drive him. Admitting being unable to understand why he wasn’t deathly curious before, “He could no longer understand why he waited”. I would like to point out while this can be seen as infidelity, a man being possessive, alongside possibly control, Raymondin’s jealously soon shifts to concern.

“Suddenly a terrible idea seized him. Suppose he came from the parapet, out of the high airs? Could it be the Devil…? The painful thought of what he might be undertaking, despite his grief and shame, slightly relieved his jealousy, and even strengthened him. Ah! If that should be the case he would be sure to win, since he fought on the side of God! And above all, to save her! It seemed to him that when he rescued her she would thank him for overcoming the evil.” (121)

One can see this as him deflecting/downplaying his jealously but he has little evidence to go off of that Melusine could be cheating. As she only spends one day a week without letting anyone see her, and Raymondin more alludes to someone, aka anyone, seeing something he’s can’t as the main reason for his jealously. I see this part as Raymondin now seeing it as an odd situation, why is Melusine going off on her own for a single day every week? I believe he thinks something else is going on and is shown even more terrified that his beloved wife could be in danger. This serves as a sympathetic way to tell the reader that while Raymondin’s actions were unfounded and aren’t justified, they are understandable. Showing the situation is black and white, and it simply isn’t a breach of trust or Raymondin not believing in his wife enough.