The Little Mermaid lives in an underwater kingdom with her father the
sea king; her grandmother; and her five elder sisters, each born one
year apart. When a mermaid turns 15, she is allowed to swim to the
surface to watch the world above, and as the sisters become old enough,
one of them visits the surface every year. As each of them returns, the
Little Mermaid listens longingly to their various descriptions of the
surface and of human beings.
When the Little Mermaid's turn comes, she ventures to the surface,
sees a ship with a handsome prince, and falls in love with him from a
distance. A great storm hits, and the Little Mermaid saves the prince
from a near-drowning. She delivers him unconscious to the shore near a
temple. Here she waits until a young girl from the temple finds him. The
prince never sees the Little Mermaid.
The Little Mermaid asks her grandmother whether humans can live
forever if they do not drown. The grandmother explains that humans have a
much shorter lifespan than merfolks' 300 years, but that when mermaids
die they turn to sea foam and cease to exist, while humans have an
eternal soul that lives on in Heaven. The Little Mermaid, longing for
the prince and an eternal soul, eventually visits the Sea Witch, who
sells her a potion that gives her legs, in exchange for her tongue (as
the Little Mermaid has the most intoxicating voice in the world). The
Sea Witch warns, however, that once she becomes a human, she will never
be able to return to the sea. Drinking the potion will make her feel as
if a sword is being passed through her, yet when she recovers she will
have two beautiful legs, and will be able to dance like no human has
ever danced before. However, it will constantly feel like she is walking
on sharp swords hard enough to make her bleed. In addition, she will
only get a soul if she finds true love's kiss and if the prince loves
her and marries her, for then a part of his soul will flow into her.
Otherwise, at dawn on the first day after he marries another woman, the
Little Mermaid will die brokenhearted and disintegrate into sea foam.
The Little Mermaid drinks the potion and meets the prince, who is
attracted to her beauty and grace even though she is mute. Most of all
he likes to see her dance, and she dances for him despite her
excruciating pain. When the prince's father orders his son to marry the
neighboring king's daughter, the prince tells the Little Mermaid he will
not, because he does not love the princess. He goes on to say he can
only love the young woman from the temple, who he believes rescued him.
It turns out that the princess is the temple girl, who had been sent to
the temple to be educated. The prince loves her and the wedding is
announced.
The prince and princess marry, and the Little Mermaid's heart breaks.
She thinks of all that she has given up and of all the pain she has
suffered. She despairs, thinking of the death that awaits her, but
before dawn, her sisters bring her a knife that the Sea Witch has given
them in exchange for their long hair. If the Little Mermaid slays the
prince with the knife and lets his blood drip on her feet, she will
become a mermaid again, all her suffering will end and she will live out
her full life.
The Little Mermaid cannot bring herself to kill the sleeping prince
lying with his bride and as dawn breaks she throws herself into the sea.
Her body dissolves into foam, but instead of ceasing to exist, she
feels the warmth of the sun; she has turned into a spirit, a daughter of
the air. The other daughters of the air tell her she has become like
them because she strove with all her heart to gain an eternal soul. She
will earn her own soul by doing good deeds for 300 years; for each good
child she found, she would obtain one year less while, for each bad
child, she would cry, and each tear would mean one month more and she
will eventually rise up into the kingdom of God.