Folklore

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back of my hand, bond, British, culture, English, faerie, fellow countrymen, folklore, ghost, ghoul, King Arthur, literature, national, robin hood, things that go bump in the night

I don’t waste much time on ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night.  I get frustrated with those at the Inkwell (Creative Writing Forum) who seem to only write fantasy.  It seems any piece I open currently has to contain a vampire or zombie.  I have opined this to be laziness on the part of the author(s); ducking the need to make anything real or believable.

I have no belief in anything religious or metaphysical.  My regular readers will know, there are several starkly atheistic posts within this blog.

Folklore is not a subject that has challenged my mind much.  It has occurred to me however, over the last week or so, that this is a blinkered approach.  Britain has a rich and varied folklore, inherited over thousands of years, that informs our national character and outlook.  I doubt King Arthur or Robin Hood ever took breath, but I know their tales like the back of my hand, and so, I’d wager, do my peers.  That’s a bond of sorts.

I rarely find cause for pride in “Britain’s” activities in the world, but I still have a kinship with my fellow countrymen.  I will not be chasing faeries down the garden any time soon, but I have to accept that faeries form part of our history, albeit imagined history.  And maybe, that is it imagined, doesn’t really matter anyway.  The important distiction is that sufficient of our forebears felt the need to pass this material on to the next generation and so it lives with us.

Orbiting Teapots & the Cyborgs from Zog

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Bertrand Russell, fantasy, fiction, message, science, teapot, writing

The Inkwell’s Half Hour Challenge for April: “Idiocy”.

Both science and art describe the human condition; tell us about our place in the universe and our relationships with people and things around us. Any work in art or science which lacks reference to the world we live in is worthless. Bertrand Russell tendentiously postulated a teapot orbiting the sun between Mars and Earth. He countered the lack of evidence for the teapot by saying the telescopes searching were not powerful enough. He bogusly asserted his right to “believe” in the teapot, but questioned the benefit that teapot belief conferred on mankind.

Fiction is not history. Both the fiction and the history of Russell’s teapot are equally worthless: neither can tell us anything about anything. Anyone can write a fiction of wild imaginings, starting from a blank sheet, completely unfettered, no rules or constraints, but like the teapot, what would it tell us? We have a rich history of fictions that changed the way people thought about the world. The works of Dickens, for example, shamed folk into action. Could you imagine tales of a cyborg from the planet Zog prompting social change? That is not to say that science fiction is necessarily devoid of meaning (as anyone who has witnessed Captain Kirk spreading American “morals” around the Universe will know).

Are the best writers those who have something to say? If so, it would seem logical to start with a message and then decide on the carriers. You may decide that the carriers best suited to your message are ghosties and ghoulies, vampires and werewolves, elves and goblins, warlocks and witches. But remember: the scariest nightmares are the ones that you believe.

Mirror, mirror

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beauty, life, musings, thoughts, women, writing

The Inkwell’s monthly Half-hour Challenge for February is “Dreams and Nightmares”:

“Mirror, mirror on the wall, who is the fairest of them all?”
“Depends what you mean by “fairest”, Luv. Some folk mean “blonde” when they say “fair”. Others mean “just” or “sporting” or “egalitarian”.”
“You’re a magic mirror: I’m consulting you about beauty. Am I not the most gorgeous creature in the world?”
“I think “creature” is a mistake, to be honest, Luv. This is difficult enough without getting non-species specific.”
“All right! Am I the most beautiful woman in the world then?”
“Of course you are.”
“Why “of course”?”
“You own me. I’ve made a judgement that you want to be the most beautiful. Therefore, you are the most beautiful.”
“But am I REALLY the most beautiful?”
“Well, I think so, of course, but these things are very subjective.”
“That’s not good enough. I want you to tell me that I’m REALLY the most beautiful.”
“You’re REALLY the most beautiful.”
“But would you still say that if I didn’t own you?”
“Of course.”
“But would you still say that if someone else owned you?”
“Yes.”
“But wouldn’t she, your new owner, I mean, wouldn’t she want you to say that she was the most beautiful?”
“Possibly.”
“So what would you say then?”
“Look Luv, I’m doing my best here. My job is to please. I don’t know what my new owner looks like. Isn’t it enough that you’re the most beautiful owner I know?”
“Am I not the only owner you know?”
“Well, strictly speaking, yes, but I think you’re beautiful.”
“What’s the point in having a magic mirror, if I can’t get a straight answer?”
“With respect Luv, you don’t want a straight answer.”