Beautiful and graceful-limbed dancers balancing on the point of a toe as they spin in feathered, moon-pale costumes.

Timeless and tragically evocative music you’ve definitely heard in a commercial or two.

A maiden transformed into a bird by a dastardly sorcerer.

An enchantment that can only be broken by an oath sworn by one who has never loved before.

I’m of course talking about Swan Lake, 🦢 my second favorite ballet. My first, of course, being The Nutcracker.

And it’s the only one I’ve actually danced to.

When I was 6.

But it was definitely memorable.

Our costumes were magically gorgeous, especially to a 6-year-old girl, with their real swan feathers. And being in that one little performance firmly cemented my love of the stage and the magic of storytelling forever.

Unfortunately, ballet wasn’t the dance form for me. I was too high-energy as a child, so after that, the teacher “kindly” asked my mom to move me to jazz instead. Apparently, I was “too entertaining,” and the other children preferred to pay attention to me instead of the teacher. 😬

But I never stopped loving to watch ballet. So for Valentine’s Day this year, my husband bought us tickets to the Ukrainian Grand Kyiv Ballet’s performance of Swan Lake at the local Uni.

And maybe you also love Swan Lake, Reader.

Or maybe you’ve never heard of it. Unlikely, but possible.

Or maybe you’re wondering why I’m even talking about a ballet about girls being turned into swans at all.

Well, Reader, it’s because inspiration can come from anywhere. And Swan-stories rank rather low on the list of overdone fairytale retellings.

So if you’re looking for something fresh to spark your creativity…

Here are 3 Swan Story variations:

1) Cursed Characters

Much like werewolves or Briar Rose, the characters in this first variation are inflicted with a curse or enchantment that transforms them. In the case of Swan Lake, into a swan. 🦢

This is the plot of Swan Lake: A beautiful maiden and her female attendants are transformed into birds by a malicious sorcerer. And though they usually transform into waterfowl from dawn to dusk, you can change it to whatever suits your needs for a good story.

Same goes for the rules of breaking said curse. Which range from lover sacrifice to slaying to villain to snatching the mantle of power off his head.

Trust me on this one, there are over a hundred endings to Swan Lake already, so no one will get pissy if you make some changes of your own.

2) Heavenly Creatures

Maidens descend from the heavens in the form of waterfowl to bathe for reasons that are, of course, never explained. Unfortunately, to do so, they must remove their cloak of feathers, which men always steal. 🙄

The maiden is then forced to marry said man and bear his children.

Sometimes, she lives out the remainder of her life on earth. Sometimes, she ditches him and the kids the moment she gets her feathered cloak back. And sometimes she takes the kids with her and books it back to the sky.

All of these situations parallel very human ones—feathers aside. Which is probably why these celestial maiden stories are so prevalent that nearly every culture on earth has one in its fairytales and lore.

From Scotland, to the Korean The Heavenly Maiden and The Woodcutter.

There’s even an old Norse poem, the Völundarkviða, about 3 smith boys coming upon 3 valkyries bathing.

The other reason for their widespread prevalence—according to folklorist Yuri Berezkin—is that they occur in regions with a population of migratory water birds such as swans, geese, ducks, cranes, or herons. 🦢🪿🦆

Basically, in this variation, the “bird-person” is zoomorphic. As in they are able to remove their robes of feathers and take human shape.

Want to use this Swan-story variation, but writing Fantasy or Urban Fantasy isn’t really your thing? No problem. Mangaka Yuu Watase used celestial maidens as the basis for her award-winning Urban SciFi Ceres: Celestial Legend. In the manga, Aya Mikage discovers her family’s progenitrix was a tennyo (celestial maiden), and she’s inherited all her immense powers.

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3) Everyone’s Enchanted but Me

In this variation more commonly seen in the Brothers Grimm fairytale The Six Swans, the main character (the princess) is not transformed into a swan, but her 6 brothers are.

During the course of the story, the princess must then perform a series of impossible tasks to break her brothers’ enchantment and return them to their rightful form.

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In my own upcoming Dark Cozy Fantasy, Seventh Swan, I combine these various Swan-stories together and swap the gender of the lead character.

What about you, Reader, has all this talk about heavenly maidens and enchanted shapeshifting waterfowl inspired you to create your own Swan-story?

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Well until next time, this is your friendly neighborhood storytelling Kat wishing you a wonderfully creative week.

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Your cohort in storytelling,

Kat Vancil

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PS 👉 The Grand Kyiv Ballet company will be performing across the US between now and November. Please consider catching a show if they’re coming to a performance hall near you.

If Grand Kyiv won’t be traveling to your area, please consider making a donation to the young dancers fund. Currently, over 200 young ballet students live on the school’s grounds because they’ve lost their homes during the war.

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Steven J Morris SJMorris Writes Hi! If you enjoy fantasy with snarky humor, I've got some books for you. My newsletter takes you along the creative journey, and keeps you informed of what's brewing. Subscribe​

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