Welsh Water Fairies
April 9th, 2008 at 4:13 pm (Kim)
Last September, I had the wild good luck to get into a workshop on mythic fiction taught by Charles de Lint up in Seattle at Richard Hugo House. One thing we had to do was take a myth or fairy tale or folk tale with us to work with, which was so much fun to research.
I chose the story of the gwragedd annwn. They are Welsh water fairies who live in cities beneath the waters of lakes and rivers. (I read that the Lady of the Lake might have been one of the gwragedd annwn. I actually found out about them while looking up Lady of the Lake stories.)
Long ago, the gwragedd annwn used to allow humans into their beautiful, magical garden on an island in the middle of one of their lakes. But, as usual, one human just had to do the one thing he was told not to, and he ruined it for all of us. The gwragedd annwn kicked him out, sealed the door in the rock, and their realm was closed to us forever. Maybe.
I’m poking through the research I did in the fall, thinking of turning the snippet I wrote in the workshop into an actual story. I’m not sure yet if it’s going to work out, but I’m making notes on it to see if I come up with anything I want to work with.
I’m trying to find stories about people who purposefully found their way into the otherworld. Does anyone know any stories like this? I need to figure out how my characters are going to get inside that rock!
Didn’t Tam Lin’s lover find a way to get into the fairy realm to rescue him? Or did she have to wait until they came out into our world? I’m going to have to find a good telling of that story and read it to refresh my memory. If I find anything good, you can probably guess what my next post will be about. Until then, I’m back to my work.
Laura said,
April 10, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Tam Lin and his lover (Janet, in one version I have) met–under a tree? By a spring?–and he told her when & how to rescue him. She then waited until they rode out, seized him from his horse, and held on to him through a series of shape changes.
Kim said,
April 14, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Janet? I don’t think I’ve read any versions where her name is Janet, though it’s been quite a while since I read any of the stories…The part I was trying to pin down was if she waited for Tam Lin and the fairies to come into the “real” world, or if she crossed over to rescue him. The rescue takes place in the “real” world, doesn’t it?
Laura said,
April 16, 2008 at 11:55 am
Yes, in the real world. The fairies are taking Tam Lin to pay a tithe to hell, as they prefer to sacrifice a human rather than one of their own. I’ll try to remember to haul out the poem. “Janet has kilted her green kirtle a little aboon her knee”–it’s in the Brian Froud/Alan Lee faery book. (Maybe it’s a ballad?) Last year I reread “Fire and Hemlock” by Diana Wynne Jones and “Winter Rose” by Patricia McKillip–both work from the Tam Lin theme.
Orpheus comes to mind, too. I need to pull out Bulfinch–I know Orpheus went to the underworld, but I don’t remember how he knew where to go. And in the Irish mythology there is at least one story of people who spend ages in the land of faery, arriving by accident; when they return to the “real world,” the ones who leave their ship fall to dust when their feet touch the shore. (It’s a well-known story, but the names escape me!) Rip Van Winkle interrupts/joins an otherworldly game of bowling (called something else which I don’t remember) which takes him into another timestream. I think in folklore that happens if you join a fairy dance or enter a fairy ring. Certain groupings of certain kinds of trees are usually indicative of fairy presence, too. And one last final thought as I stray further and further–sometimes there’s an ointment so that faery can be seen (basically it blocks the effect of glamour).