re: TulaneLSU's review of Disney's 2023 The Little Mermaid

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Who the hell are you??

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Legend

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They saw little use for fairy tales.

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Have you read Tolkien’s essay On Fairy Stories? You can find it in the book Tree and Leaf, a collection of Tolkien’s essays. He discusses similarities between his faith and his writings.

Imagine being on your death bed and coming to the realization that you devoted this much time to a character on a message board

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they were adamant that I did not read the works of Hans Christian Andersen (HCA).

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My parents were the same. My friend, we share that same parental censorship, but I am grateful because HCA sucks.

Friend,

No, I have not. To be frank, I do not like the majority of Tolkien’s writings, and never enjoyed Lord of the Rings. But I will try to read your suggested reading tonight.

calcotron, we should arrange a Movie/Arts Board meet up for conversation. I would hate to have to wait until this coming Front Day when Mother plans to next open the New Orleans house to guests. Sadly, The Neutral Grounds closed last month. Do you have any recommendations where this symposium could gather?

Yours,
TulaneLSU

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Indeed, on a trip to New York in 2008, Mother and I were walking through Central Park. Halfway between the Loeb Boathouse and Pilgrim Hill, where I learned to sled, we came across the statue of Hans with his ugly duckling.

“Mother, let us take a picture together with Mr. Andersen and his duck.”

“No, son. We do not take pictures with frivolous people.”

Father later explained this prohibition a product of his reading of Kierkegaard’s “From the Papers of One Still Living.” This work, of course, was Kierkegaard’s first published work and it was a damning critique of HCA personally and his fairy tale Only a Fiddler. Kierkegaard’s primary critique is that HCA lacked a world or life view. Compounding his literary woes, HCA inserted himself as the narrator, and at the time, Kierkegaard did not hold HCA as a moral or religious man. For Kierkegaard, the narrator must belong to the religious realm and have a clear and potent life view. I doubt Kierkegaard would enjoy reading most of what is written today.

Lacking that life view, Kierkegaard, wrote that HCA’s stories showed no coherence and were sloppy and contradictory. Fairy tales, Kierkegaard believed, were competent vehicles to express life views. He did, afterall, begin his most influential work, Fear and Trembling with the words “once upon a time.” Father clearly did not understand this about Kierkegaard, nor that the two Danes reconciled later in life, so I was left to live my early life deprived of the works of Andersen and other fairy tale tellers.

It was not until I was a freshman in high school that my rebellious streak appeared. It was a crisp November Saturday, several weeks after we celebrated Front Day. A brisk north wind rustled the magnolia leaves along Prytania St. I swung right at Soniat Street and quietly entered Latter Library. I had what I thought were untoward intentions, so I tried to remain as discreet as possible. After looking through the card catalog, I found the book in the stacks.

The librarian knew me by name and said, “You are going to enjoy this story, TulaneLSU!” She lifted up the hardcover book and my neck flexed as I felt the shame. The neck is the one joint in the body that when you flex, you are in a humble or contrite position. My shame came from the cover, which showed a topless mermaid sunbathing on a mostly submerged rock, her blonde hair flowing in the light wind. Sensing someone would see it, I quickly grabbed the book and threw it in the bag, zipping the bag even faster.

Later that night, after Mother had told me my bedtime story, I pretended to fall asleep. Under my bed, an antique burl walnut twin that my Great, Great, Great Grandfather used as a boy, I retrieved a flashlight and the library copy of Andersen’s The Little Mermaid. Asking the Lord to lead me not into temptation, I decided it would also be a good idea to tape a sheet of paper over the book’s cover. While many here may actively lust after the pictures of loosely clothed or unclothed women, I take Jesus’ words about lust to heart.

Covered and protected by my Pendleton Glacier blanket, no glow of my lantern’s light allowed to emanate through its virgin wool, I devoured the tale in short time. I instantly fell in love not with the mermaid but with the Sea King’s mother. It is the mermaid’s grandmother, the dowager and rock of the family, who raised the King and all of his daughters. When the six mermaid granddaughters need advice, they do not go to the Sea King; they go straight to grandmother.

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Yea, none of this happened

People bitch about the casting but the fish eyes on TLM fit