What if the seal looking back at you from the water isn't simply a seal?

In Episode 21 — The Selkie: Between the Land and the Sea, Jan travels north to Orkney and down to the shore for a traditional story that belongs to the sea.

A man discovers Selkie women dancing on a beach after shedding their seal skins. He steals one of the skins, leaving its owner unable to return to the water. She remains on land, becomes his wife and has children — but she never forgets the sea. Years later, when her hidden skin is discovered, she finally has a way home.

There isn't only one Selkie story. These tales have been told and retold in different places for generations, with versions of Selkie traditions found beyond Orkney, elsewhere in Scotland and in related stories in Ireland.

Living close to the shore in Orkney, Jan reflects on the landscape in which stories like these have travelled: seals watching from the water, creatures disappearing back beneath the waves and thick seaweed lying along the coastline. She doesn't claim this explains how the Selkie tradition began — we don't know — but it's easy to understand how landscape, animals and imagination might make somebody wonder: what if?

Jan also considers echoes she hears in other stories about land, sea and the human imagination, while being careful not to equate Selkies with The Little Mermaid or the Sirens of The Odyssey.

And underneath it all is a question she keeps returning to:

What did the Selkie want?

Different listeners may hear love, belonging, homesickness, possession or freedom. Others may simply hear a wonderful story about people who become seals.

Perhaps that's part of the reason these stories continue to travel.

Explore further

Scottish writer and storyteller Kenny Boyle is someone Jan thoroughly enjoys listening to. His YouTube channel offers another doorway into Scottish folklore and storytelling:

https://www.youtube.com/@KennyBoyleOfficial