This Fairytale World of Mine

"The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords. " - J.R.R. Tolkien, On Fairy-Stories

 

"She lived happily in her nest, standing at the edge in the sunset looking upon the beautiful world," Little Wildrose, Artist Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there lived a girl-child, very young and very eager. She lived in a little room papered with Flower Fairies, and hung with twinkling lights. She slept in a little bed, guarded by a menagerie of stuffed toy animals, each with their own personality. In a garden there were flowers and butterflies and sunshine, and she had two (later three) little brothers with whom to play and adventure. This child was always surrounded by love and possibility - and books. Every day her mother (or father) would read to her - children's stories or poems; little songs, Aesop's fables and fairytales.

The Nine Peahens and the Golden Apples
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Snow White and Rose Red
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Most important of all to her developing sense of self, were the fairytales. In a bookcase of dark, richly stained wood, on the top shelf (beyond the grasp of stretching little fingers) stood a row of magical tomes, the Lang Fairy Books: Red, Blue, Yellow, Orange, Brown, Violet, Lilac and (a truly ancient first-edition with gold embossed Art Nouveau cover) Crimson. More stories than a child could count - and so they blended in her mind together into a tapestry of story, a window to a world... Every day - or almost every day, her mother would read a tale to her. The stories in these books spoke of something true within the child's soul; something strange and infinitely marvellous - a perilous beauty that enriched every instant and added an incomparable colour to the world. The stories told of heroes, male and female, of cunning and courage, of speaking animals and shape-shifting spirits, and of the restless desire to go beyond the realm of the ordinary - to climb into the sky and bring down a singing harp; to divine the secrets of the wizards' book; to be stronger than fate; to seek the Bird of Truth and learn the shivery wonder of the words "East of the Sun, West of the Moon".

"The crown returns to the Queen of the Fishes" , The Girl-Fish
Artist Henry Justice Ford

How Ian Direach Got the Blue Falcon
Artist Henry Justice Ford

You will have guessed by now the name of that girl-child. My own fairytale began this way, snuggled between my mother's legs, resting my head against her stomach and looking with wide, wondering eyes at the pages she held before my face - the arcane script I was to understand a few years later, and the pictures which I understood immediately on a deep, instinctive level. These were in truth pictures of Faerie, full of a life, emotion, beauty and detail - and more, a solemnity that I trusted. They took themselves seriously; they contained no falsity and cliché. They were not confined to any particular time-period or culture, and so felt at once universal and uniquely faerie. They helped to mould my own imaginings. As I heard the words of each story, other, vivid images bloomed in my mind, in beauty and kind like unto the Lang illustrations by Henry Justice Ford. I would find later that music, as well as words, evoked such fantasies in my mind - and even later would be able to name that joyful gift as synaesthesia. 

"When she stood upright her ugliness had all gone", The Groac’h of the Isle of Lok,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"Pivi dives for the shellfish", Pivi and Kabo
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"Under the golden apple tree", The Nine Peahens and the Golden Apples,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Later I would be able to create my own stories, and to depict some of my imaginings with pencil and paint. I would discover that I had an inner world that I could quite literally explore and recount and describe the things I saw along the way... I would eventually discover my potential for heroism. But that would be later. The first notes of the "horns of Elfland" echoed in my mother's voice, and my first glimpses of Faerie were through beguiling, beautiful illustrations of H.J. Ford.

Lung Lung
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Mother Holle,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

This was the first page of my fairytale. But in my life there have been (already) many chapters and many developments of my persona from the baby girl to the young woman - many stories. Let us turn the pages...

"The Princess at the Curtain",  The Enchanted Knife
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"The kitchenmaid listens to the nightingale", The Emperor and the Nightingale
Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there lived a girl-child, who walked half her waking hours in Faerie; an adventurer and a dreamer, avid for knowledge and story. She read anything and everything she could find: natural history, ancient history, children's stories, recipe books and first-aid guides, and - smuggled into her bed when she was supposed to be having her afternoon nap - Anne of Green Gables.  She read poetry too - anthologies that filled her mind with half-understood images and scenes of far-off times. She thrilled to them.

"Petru is forced to turn back", The Fairy of the Dawn
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"The King sees the Snow-Maiden", The Snow Maiden and the Fire-Son
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there lived a girl-child who, when bullied at school, garbed herself in invisible armour and saw scales on the skin of her tormentors; a child who turned every obstacle, in her own mind, into just another a trial in a heroic quest; a child who whispered to the trees in her garden and made offerings of berries and hair to the spirits of the flowers and the trees. 

East of the Sun, West of the Moon
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there lived a girl-woman who, restless, began to seek new knowledge and new stories - who discovered ugliness, triteness, evil and cynicism in her quest to find the Bird of Truth, and who learned "what fear was" on her quest. A girl-woman who discovered true friendship, love (and loss), confidence (and doubt). A girl-woman who discovered further insights into Faerie through the books of Tolkien, Jordan, Hobb and Dart-Thornton; the paintings of Burne-Jones, Kinuko and John Howe; the poems of Tennyson, Keats and Yeats; and the music of Enya, Loreena McKennit and Kitaro, among a galaxy of other inspiring luminaries. A girl-woman who named herself for the hero she wanted to be - a magical, strong and beautiful "second self" - then later realised that "alter-ego" was herself. A girl-woman who stumbled and despaired; knew exhaustion and elation and uncertainty; who was understanding, and unfair; who knew great bliss and shone most gloriously.

"The North Wind seizes the wreath", The Fairy of the Dawn
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"Fairer-than-a-Fairy summons the rainbow", Fairer-than -a-Fairy,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there lived a girl-woman who began to set her feet on "the Road less traveled", and who decided on a monster to pursue, and a gleaming goal to strive towards... Who pushed herself to create, and to excel - but who nonetheless found many distractions along the road. A girl-woman who understood that the heart of Faerie is Mystery, and the heroic quest a journey towards "that untraveled world whose margin fades/Forever and forever as I move". 

"Among the flowers were lovely maidens who called to him with soft voices", The Fairy of the Dawn
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"Then she reached the three cutting swords, and got on her plough-wheel and rolled over them", The Glass Mountain,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Here I pause, where the ink is wet. 

The rest of the page is blank. This is my fairytale - so far. But it is part of the beauty of a fairytale, that it can be told again and again with slight variations and in different voices, and yet mean much the same thing... The heroes (female and male) of the Lang books are all archetypes that we contain within us. Thus while my story is uniquely, magically mine - many of you may have stories that are similar in kind, though not in form.

"The Witch-Maiden sees the youth under a tree", The Dragon of the North,
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"The Blue Fairy transforms Prince Darling", Prince Darling
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Tolkien wrote:

"In the Trees of the Sun and Moon root and stock, flower and fruit are manifested in glory". 

"The hero Makoma and the spirit of the river-fever", The Hero Makoma
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"Queen of the Snakes, give me back my husband!", The Queen of the Snakes
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Whatever our twists our paths may take - no matter how long the road, or how dark the forest, or whether we meet with dragons, demons or fair Fortune herself - this is truth. For those of us who choose to walk partway in the world of Faerie - all reality and all our journeys are given a particular dimension and added joy. 

The Magician's Wife
Artist Henry Justice Ford

"The Queen saves the prince from Death", The Story of the Prince Who would Seek Immortality
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Once upon a time there was a writer... and a reader. And a path.

"The shepherd comes to the arch of snakes", The Language of the Beasts
Artist Henry Justice Ford

And see ye not yon bonny road
That winds about yon fernie brae?
That is the road to fair Elfland,
Where thou and I this night maun gae. - Thomas the Rhymer 

In the Forest
Artist Henry Justice Ford

Why Do We Desire Dragons? A Dragon-Seeker's Quest

“The dragon is the patron saint of all storytellers and artists” – Guillermo del Toro

"I choose to believe in dragons." - Robin Hobb 

Tintaglia by John Howe, for Robin Hobb's "Ship of Destiny" 

 This blog post was inspired by Terry Windling's "Moveable Feast" on the topic of The Desire for Dragons: What Brings Us to Myth and Fantasy?.

I think it is a question that every person who has ever felt the "desire for dragons" should ask themselves, not in an attempt to "explain the magic away" but in a quest to discover these elusive beasts and on the way, perhaps to ourselves... It is a question that leads into a hundred other questions, for example:

Why is it that we out of everyone in the world feel most strongly a desire for Faerie - for myth and story - for transcendence and legend and perilous beauty? Is it innate - like a magic of old - or is it something that is taught? Why do only some people feel it, and why do others become accountants?  What is the "real" basis of our desire and belief? How much should we care about "reality" anyway? Is story more important than reality? Does story create reality? What is lacking in modern life, that we turn with wistful eyes to a mystical past that never existed save in story? How can we live according to such precepts? How can we use story to make the world we live a better place? Why dragons?

Dragon and Warrior Princess by John Howe

Well, I think the answers to all these questions can only fully be discovered, and crafted, over a lifetime. So as Woolf would say, if you are looking for a "nugget of truth" I'm afraid you won't be getting one (sorry dragons - but gold is shinier than truth anyway). 

Smaug the Golden by John Howe
He seems to agree...

Instead I invite you on my dragon-seeking quest. With staff in hand and dusty sandals, armed with nothing more than a pencil and a roll of parchment (or pad of paper, take your pick) we shall follow the road that leads away across the hills, into the mountains and beyond. And perhaps on the way we will find some glimmerings of the elusive answers to our questions, on the sun-caught wings of a dragon high above, or the dully metallic scales of a Worm wrapped around a hill; or between the serpents coiling at the edges of an old map...

Earthsea by John Howe

Where shall we seek? It does not matter. Dragons are not difficult to find. As anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of world mythology would know, dragons have colonised all the earth and sea and sky. From China to Australia; from South America to Africa to Britain - in all places where humans have settled, it would seem that dragons have preceded them. Sailors feared the deeps for the serpents that lurked below the surface, beyond sight but not beyond knowledge. When the first maps were created the edges of the "known" were marked and everyone knew that dragons were beyond. After rain, we glimpse the tail of the Rainbow Serpent. Look up into the sky at night, and the shining length of "Draco" can be seen. Dragons can be sought - and found - everywhere. It all depends on how you look.

Sea Dragon by John Howe
You would be wise to fear the deeps...

I seem to be blessed with the ability to see dragons. Almost everything I see can be evidence of a dragon - the jagged, granite peaks of a mountain so easily becomes the spine of a sleeping, half-buried dragon, and a massing bank of clouds becomes, with little effort, dragon's breath. Of course, at the same time I "know" that the granite spine was formed by erosion and geological forces of the earth, and the clouds are shaped by air pressure and evaporation. But somehow, strangely, all my scientific knowledge does not diminish my wonder. 

Dragon Isle by John Howe 
I see dragons everywhere... and clearly so does John Howe. 

The dragons and the "magic" of the world I sense every day have the same solidity in my mind as the scientific phenomena. They exist, in my mind, on parallel planes. I do not deny scientific "reality", nor do I believe that the "real-ness" of magic and dragons is the same kind as this more mundane knowledge (though it is as important to me). 

The Stone Dragon by John Howe for Robin Hobb's "Assassin's Quest" 

Tolkien wrote in his essay On Fairy Stories:

“Fairy-stories were plainly not primarily concerned with possibility, but with desirability. If they awakened desire, satisfying it while often whetting it unbearably, they succeeded… The dragon had the trade-mark Of Faerie written plain upon him. In whatever world he had his being it was an Other-world. Fantasy, the making or glimpsing of Other-worlds, was the heart of the desire of Faërie. I desired dragons with a profound desire... the world that contained even the imagination of Fafnir was richer and more beautiful, at whatever cost of peril.”

That is the gift of dragon-sight; the purpose of the dragon quest. Dragons embody the beauty and the peril of an "other world" that is "richer and more beautiful" and full of strange and marvellous things. Ah - I see a glimmer of an answer - a flash of desire on the wing of a dragon! I understand a part of why I desire Faerie - and dragons - with such aching passion. When life can contain "even the imagination" of such eldritch possibility - when a world of unplumbed depths of mystery exists alongside our own - then what a glory is opened to the soul! What visions of wonder, far beyond the ken of mortal sight, unfold before the inner eye, lit by a "light better than any light that ever shone; a land no one can define or remember, only desire"... 

 "In this unfolding, ever-changing but constant drama, dragons have always played a role. They are among the First...They embody concepts of considerable importance and they are clothed in scales. Their origins are inextricably interwoven with our psyche, and they breathe fire. They are Freudian and, better still, eminently Jungian, and they spread vast wings over the sky.”  - John Howe, Forging Dragons

Dragon of Chaos by John Howe
The dragon that created the cosmos...

Volcanic Dragons by John Howe

I have heard people say that science killed magic. I disagree. Science is an exploration - an attempt to penetrate mystery. Artists and writers; scientists and mathematicians - all share a desire to explore and to discover. I do not think that science explains everything - Mystery abounds yet, and dragons were ever the gate-keepers of mystery.

The Gates of Night by John Howe

This is why, I believe, dragons are such potent and universal figures; so beloved by storytellers and artists from the beginning of human thought. That is why they are so tenacious, and will not let themselves be rooted from our stories, from the land or from our consciousness. That is why I follow their fiery trails, ever seeking Faerie. And that is why I think dragons are eternal. No matter how "advanced" humanity becomes in scientific pursuits, the dragon will be there.

"The skies of this world were always meant to have dragons. When they are not here, humans miss them. Some never think of them, of course. But some children, from the time they are small, they look up at the blue summer sky and watch for something that never comes. Because they know." - Robin Hobb, Golden Fool

Dragon Moons by John Howe

Fool's Fate by John Howe, for Robin Hobb's book of the same name 

Laus Veneris - Burne-Jones and the Splendid States of Love

Her beds are full of perfume and sad sound,
Her doors are made with music, and barred round
With sighing and with laughter and with tears,
With tears whereby strong souls of men are bound. 
- Algernon Charles Swinbourne, Laus Veneris 

Laus Veneris (1873-75)
oil on canvas
Edward Burne-Jones

In this blog I have written a great deal about the strange and wonderful worlds found within books and movies; evoked by music or by poetry... This time I wish to journey within a land lit "by a light better than any light that ever shone - in a land no one can define or remember, only desire", that is, I wish to enter the personal, mythic and altogether splendid dream-world of Edward Burne-Jones, Victorian painter, and of all artists my best beloved. 

Burne-Jones' pictures are full of strange, fantastic beauty and seethe with emotions, expressed not in the faces, but the attitudes of the figures; and the symbolism and context of his paintings. Often the subject matter was drawn from myth or medieval romance, but the pictures always from his private inner world, wherein story, symbol and ideal combine with the artist's turbulent emotions to form highly complex pictures of depth and meaning as well as aesthetic loveliness.

Laus Veneris (In Praise of Venus) is an exploration of love as a force through which the world, as perceived by the lover, is transmuted into something altogether grander and more vibrant (but potentially more desolate) than the world of the mundane. Yet through close examination of the painting, we discover that love itself is be something paradoxical - a force to be worshiped and feared, that can both transform and destroy; unite and divide.

Details from Laus Veneris (I - VI):

I. The Queen

II. The Musicians

III. The Impatient Musician

IV. She who looks without...

Looking at the painting is like looking into multiple worlds - and each is representative of one of the states of love. The queen and her attendants occupy the foreground, and flame in brilliant colours; garbed in robes as tinted bright and hot as the anticipation of passion. They exist in a state of heightened reality inspired by love, wherein the subject sees all things brighter and more vividly because of love. But the women are also in a state of unrelieved tension - though the queen reclines in a languid posture, her air is one of a lover frustrated by long waiting; her gaze is introspective and her mien dissatisfied. The queen's attendants are watchful and expectant, their instruments poised as though they had just left off playing, and even now await the signal to resume. The two nearest to the queen appear to be sharing a glance - perhaps one of sympathy for the queen, or sharing the grief of their own long waiting. One lady, directly opposite the queen and garbed in crimson, sits toying with her instrument, her hands betraying the impatience that her tranquil face belies. But it is the fourth of the ladies that holds our gaze - seemingly staring out of the canvas, straight into the viewer's eyes. Through her  eyes we are drawn into the painting - and she transcends it. The borders between the dream-world and reality waver - and in trying to solve the enigma in her stare, we become aware of the second, sorrowful state of love.

V. The Knights

For outside the beautiful, vivid room where the ladies sit lies a cold land - bare and bleak as love that is forsaken.  Here can be seen five restless knights on horses white as driven clouds of snow, or wild sea-foam. These knights, we assume, are the lovers of the ladies - but for some reason they cannot enter and though some look inside the warm room and seem to grieve, the women appear unaware of their presence. This puzzling state of affairs leads the viewer to look around the painting to find clues to solve the mystery - and we see that on the wall hangs a sumptuous tapestry, portraying Venus the goddess of love in a chariot drawn by doves and surrounded with worshipers who offer their hearts to her and  her flame-winged son.

VI. The Tapestry: the Chariot of Venus

Thus Burne-Jones represents the ideal of love - the grandeur of passion and the worship of love itself. This third state - the world-within-a-world of the tapestry, hung between the knights and the ladies - provides the clue for which we have been searching. Perhaps it is the worship of love itself that separates them. The ladies are enclosed in an ideal of love, which blinds them to their lonely knights outside, yet they can perceive our world, the world outside the realm of love. The knights are held without because they too worship the ideal, but one looks through the painting even as does the green lady, joined to her and us through a shared gaze. And perhaps through them we are also linked to Burne-Jones himself, for it was he who said:

"I've lived inside the pictures, and from within looked out on a world less real than they".

But of course, Burne-Jones would never reveal plainly the secrets of his dream world, for if he did he would lose the chief power of his work; its mystery. So the painting Laus Veneris is glorious and ambiguous, and open to many interpretations. At the end of the journey I are left wondering: perhaps this explains the title of the painting, Laus Veneris; that both the knights and ladies have given their hearts to Venus and hence have none to give each-other.