Frankenstein and the Mermaid

http://www.retronaut.com/2012/12/frankenstein-and-the-mermaid/frank/

“”Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid” was shooting near a set where “Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein” was filming. Tourists were shocked to see Glenn Strange’s Frankenstein Monster having lunch with Ann Blyth in her fishtail costume. Both Strange and Lon Chaney in his Wolfman make-up were invited to the Mr. Peabody wrap party, where they hammed it up in make-up.”
- IMDb

Glaucus

Usually mer-folk are born that way or at least have an undersea ancestor. Glaucus is an exception. He began as a normal human although he was unusually skilled at building boats. He built the Argo which Jason used on his quest for the golden fleece.

One day he noticed that the fish he caught were reviving and escaping back into the water. It turned out that he had dumped his catch on a strange herb and it was responsible.

Glaucus tried the herb and felt a compulsion to dive into the water where he changed into a merman with green hair. He learned prophesy and became known for helping sailors in distress.

A different version has Glaucus plunging into the ocean during the fight between Jason against the Tyrrhenians. Glaucus sunk to the bottom of the sea and was transformed.

Review: Drowning Mermaids

Drowning Mermaids (Sacred Breath, Book 1) by Nadia Scrieva

This is not your typical mermaid novel. For one thing, the mermaids have legs instead of fishtails. Als, it is written for a more mature audience - not that it contains adult subject matter, it just has content that will interest adults.

The aging captain of a fishing boat takes his crew to a stipper bar to unwind after losing a crew member. There he becomes entranced with a young stripper and invites her to be his house guest along with her two sisters.

Actually, she is over six hundred years old and ruler of an undersea kingdom. Even her youngest sister is 90 but looks 10. They are on the surface to raise money in order to buy weapons to defend their kingdom from aggressors.

This is a very well-written book. All of the plot twists were thought out in advance. The characters are well-developed and each has a distinctive way of speaking.

This book avoids one of the big traps of mermaid books - the undersea world is fully integrated with the modern world. Too often the undersea parts seem dreamy and indistinct compared with the modern world but not here.

Also, the writing itself is compelling enough to keep up interest even though very little actually happens in the first half.

One warning - while this is novel-length, it breaks off abruptly and is continued in the next novel. The first one is free (as an e-book) just to get you hooked. I've already bought the sequel.

Mermaid Technology

Mermaids are usually depicted as naked. If they carry anything, it is a comb and mirror. This shows just how alien life in the sea would be from life on land.

The basic building blocks of technology were fire, rocks, and wood. There is evidence that cooking food predates modern humans and that the extra calories gained from cooking food allowed us to develop our larger brains.

But there is no fire underwater.

Tool-making also predates humanity. These were a combination of stone and wood. Knives and scrapers were made from hard, brittle stone like flint but spears began as pointed wood with stone heads being added later. Flint is hard to come by on land or sea but the initial impulse to pick up a stone and use it is not as obvious when stones are as close as your feet. And wood just doesn't grow underwater.

The main tools that mer-folk would have to work with are shells and coral. Coral is soft enough that it could be worked with shells although there are limits on what can be made. Traditionally mer-folk have made things like necklaces and bras from sea shells but that would require drilling holes in the shells. How would this be done?

Clothing is its own issue. The first clothing was made from animal skins that had been dried and later tanned. It was worn to protect humans from the weather.

While you can make leather from many sea creatures, it cannot be done underwater. Also there is little point. Sea people would not need protection from the sun or rain and leather will not keep you warm in the water. Also, wearing clothes does not affect travel appreciably in the air but can slow you down underwater.

All of this is an intellectual exercise. Novelists depicting mermaid civilizations have to account for these things or their civilizations will feel off. If the mer-people live in set villages then the novelist has to explain why. What is the benefit of this way versus living in a constantly-moving school like dolphins? If they make things then the novelist has to know how and why.

This is a problem in some of the mermaid novels I have read. The set-up is detailed, down-to-earth. Then the lead character travels to a mermaid settlement and the tone becomes dreamy. The change can be jarring.

Granted, it is much easier to describe existing civilization than to make one up from scratch and still seem authentic. Thinking through these questions would help. How did the mermaid civilization develop and why don't they live like dolphins? If you can sell this to yourself then you can sell it to the world.

Control Your Own Mermaid

Do you want a virtual mermaid that you can control? You can have one through Second Life and it's free.

Second Life has been around for years. It is sort of a cross between a multi-person video game and a chat room. It takes place in a virtual world made up of islands. Like real life, some of these islands are public and some are private. When you join you select an avatar (which is supposed to represent you) from a series of pre-packaged ones. You can get new clothing for your avatar or even replace it completely. After that you can wander around or teleport to specific landmarks.

To create an account in Second Life go to their web site and sign up. This will give you a link for the Second Life Viewer. Everything you do in Second Life is through this. You can walk around with your avatar or interact with special animations for things like dancing.

The first thing that you need to do to make a mermaid is to modify your avatar. Start at Freebie Island. This is full of signs showing clothes and body parts. The default avatars have permanent underwear which conflicts with the mermaid look so you will need a replacement skin. Be sure that you get the full thing and not just a demo. You have to look around and you might need to change your preferences to include "adult". You can also look around for some new hair and eyes.

Now, use your web browser to go to the Second Life Marketplace and search on "mermaid tail". You will find an overwhelming number of hits, many of them free. I'm using the term "mermaid" but there are male version also. Some of them are pretty fierce.

A note on money. Purchases are made in "Lindon Dollars". Free members have to buy these but they are pennies on the dollar. Premium members get L$300 each Tuesday which is enough for almost any tail.

Mermaids are handled three different ways in Second Life. The most common is to include an Animation Override (AO) that keeps the legs together so that they resemble a tail. The fluke is attached to one foot. There may be additional fins. Most of the mermaids done this way have a light, airy look. They can also take up a lot of room with all of these fins floating around.

The second way of handling a mermaid is to make the legs invisible using something called an "alpha channel" and to attach a tail at the waist. This can be very convincing but many of the animations looks a little strange unless they were specifically designed for mermaids. Also, sometimes your tail gets on crooked. When this happens you can fix it by removing it and putting it back on. In between you are floating since your legs are invisible. Also, if you are wearing anything like anklets, they will seem to be floating below you.

I haven't tried the third way yet. It involves removing one leg and reshaping the other into a tail. This is, of course, painless. That would resolve the problem of animations since you still have a leg and it should look better than trying to fuse two legs together.

Once you have your mermaid, what do you do with her?

If you search for locations with the term "mermaid" you will find several. These are mainly bars where you can hang out and stores where you can buy more mermaid-related things.

If you really want to get into Second Life then you can buy property and start decorating it. There are numerous mermaid beds available. You can also get poses, animations, and props such as seaweed.

All of this is great but the truth is that Second Life peaked some time ago. Most of the areas I have been through have been empty or nearly empty. The Trident Bar has a nice mermaid dance floor with enough animations for multiple mermaids to be dancing at once but out of several visits I've only found one other mermaid present. The dance with only two mermaids is impressive. It must be spectacular with all of the animations in use.

Another issue with Second Life is that a good bit of its content is adult oriented. Some of the mermaid beds include animations for mermaid sex. Many areas are devoted to casual or kinky sex and some to violent sex. I would strongly recommend that anyone below 18 stay well away from Second Life. It is also easy to underestimate the strength of on-line relationships so even adults need to be careful.

Melusine

Currently it is pretty common to depict mermaids as being able to grow legs when needed. As far as I know, that mainly dates from Splash. Before that, mermaids did not change form.

But, if you go back far enough, you find some exceptions. One is Melusine. I first ran across this term in an article about Starbuck's logo which is a topless, two-tailed mermaid. The article claimed that this creature is called a melusine.

It turns out that when you look it up, Melusine refers to a specific character in a number of medieval myths. She appeared to be a normal human most of the time but changed into a mermaid (or a half-serpent) on Saturdays. She married a noble (possibly a king) on condition that he not disturb her on Saturdays. Of course, he does eventually and she left him (possibly turning into a dragon on her way out).

Wikipedia concludes by saying that Melusine is a holdover water sprite from pre-Christian legends.

Mermaid Divers

Here is a video of a scuba diver in a mermaid diving suit. This is the next step up from swimable tails. You can order them from Otter Bay.

Here is a similar video.