Erl-King: Notes!

NOTES

The Erl-King: An Unexpected Journey

The Erl-king is essentially Radagast
on military-grade marijuana.

The Erl-king is, in a nutshell, about a young girl who wonders into a forest and, via a whistled bird-call, falls into the clutches of the infamous Erl-king, a lonely and slightly more human version of Shrek who turns women into birds.

INTERTEXTUAL REFERENCES

• Der Erlkonigsberg - a poem written by Johann Goethe, and turned into a composition by Franz Schubert.
• Little Red Riding Hood - literally littered with references to this, most obviously when Carter actually refers to the narrators journey as being like that of Little Red Riding Hood.
• The Green Man (nothing to do with traffic lights) - a traditionally pagan symbol, usually representing nature or rebirth. 
• Othello - "green-eyed monster", with the Erl-king being described as green-eyed when he looks at the forest.

ENTRAPMENT

The theme of entrapment, also an important element of Gothic literature, is present:

• "verticals bars of brass-coloured distillation" - the bars, like in a prison or indeed a cage, present a feeling of being trapped
• The bird-cages - the birds trapped in cages, again symbol of entrapment

THE FOREST

Forests - they're never really portrayed
gleefully in fairytales, are they?
Good thing ROUS' don't exist.

The forest is beautifully described in the first paragraph; it has a poetic quality, despite it's often gruesome, damp descriptions. It has a fairytale-like quality.

A similar description is given to the Erl-king, when the narrator is making love to him. It shows how the Erl-king and the environment around him are practically symbiotic (also, see "How the Erl-king is presented)

Seriously, people just don't like
forests!

HOW THE ERL-KING IS PRESENTED

• The Erl-king is presented as being almost at one with nature. It could be that the Erl-king is in control of the nature; in other words, he is a dominating figure (which would tie in with the feminism debate), however, it could be interpreted to mean that he himself is trapped (see "My Interpretation")
• Animalistic and evil; connotations to a wolf, especially with descriptions of his teeth (again, referencing Red Riding Hood) OR a werewolf!
• "do you grevious harm" - a caution; warning of danger, yet this presents curiosity, a natural human attraction to the mysterious
• he is given an almost wise appearance sometimes; there are descriptions of him as "elder" and, also, he smokes a pipe; something we commonly associate with characters of wisdom
• "eyes quite green" - jealousy? (see "My Interpretation")



Not these kind of wild strawberries,
although the forest does have certain
personal qualities for the Erl-king.

• unusual diet - the Erl-king has an unusual diet, he is described as eating dandelion salads which taste like wild strawberries - this could show a distance to the norm, and emphasises his loneliness AND peculiarity.

MY INTERPRETATON

Together, Rachel Wilbur and I came up with the idea that the Erl-king may represent the idea of a woman being trapped within a man's body.

The Erl-king is shown to have a "green-eyes" which could represent jealousy, jealousy of the girls he ensnares because he is not naturally one herself. The idea that he traps these girls as birds in a cage shows how he himself is trapped in his body.

This notion of entrapment in a man's body may also present in the idea that he is at one with nature. He is trapped by his natural body.

He is also known to look after his house like a "housewife", he also does his own cooking. This view is stereotyped with women, and shows how the Erl-king may himself possessive feminine qualities.

The narrator could represent society; how the character portrays the Erl-king as simultaneously disgusting yet alluring. In other words, the narrator is showing how many in society still fail to accept the transvestite and transgender community. 

Perhaps a less murderous version of Buffalo Bill.
Turning females into birds isn't considered homicide, right?