The Truth Behind True Thomas

 

               “True Thomas lay o’er yond grassy bank. . .”

“Thomas the Rhymer and the Queen of Faerie,” 1852, from The British Museum.

Thomas of Erceldoune was a 13th Century Scottish laird who, so the story goes—popularized by professor F.J. Child in his English and Scottish Popular Ballads—one day met the Fairie Queen, was captivated by her beauty, and consented to accompany her to the Fair Lands—to Faerie. (The Faerie Queen was not exactly forthcoming about her destination him at first, but what else would you expect from Themselves?) She gives him a geas, a prohibition against speaking, and he serves her for seven years. And before being returned to the mortal realm, she gifts him with the power of True Speech. Ever after, he can only speak the truth.

By Katharine Cameron (1874–1965) – MacGregor, Mary; Cameron, Katharine (1874–1965), illus. (1908) Stories from the Ballads Told to the Children (Project Gutenberg), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=8720495

The presence of the Faerie Queen would lead the average person to conclude that this tale is fiction, pure fabrication.  Not so fast. So many old tales have their origins in truth . . .

 

Thomas Learmonth of Erceldoune was a real historical person. He lived in Ercildoune, a town now called Earlston, halfway between Edinbourgh and the border of England. Documents from 1294 prove he existed; he is listed as “Thome Rymour de Ercildoun.” Still standing today, although in ruins, is Rhymer’s Tower, his supposed home, (possibly a later building constructed on his land).

“Rhymer’s Tower, Earlston” by Hector MacQueen, 2010. CC2.     https://www.flickr.com/photos/hectormacq/4414896196/in/album-72157623449249579/

 

The Faerie Queen’s gift of True Speech brings to mind school tales of George Washington’s mythical “I cannot tell a lie.” Delving deeper into Sir Walter Scott’s Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border reveals that Thomas’ truth is equated with prophetic vision. He is said to have predicted the death of King Alexander III, the Battle of Bannockburn, and the union of the English and Scottish crowns—this last did not occur until  1603.

 

I’ve written previously about Thomas the Rhymer and the Christian symbolism in this tale, and the intersections of history and folklore equally fascinate me.

 

I’m pleased to report that my short story “True Thomas” has been reprinted in Fae Wings and Hidden Things, an anthology about faeries.

 

 

Further Reading

F.J. Child’s ballad #37 “Thomas Rymer”

Look at this! There’s a Friends of Thomas the Rhymer local history group in Earlston!

The Legend of Thomas The Rhymer and the Queen of the Fairies

Sir Walter Scott’s Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border

“Thomas Learmonth of Ercildoune” from Scottish Literary Locations.

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A Tween and Teen Guide to Dystopian Societies

Mimi the Librarian’s Recommended Reading List

In Georgia Briggs’ book Icon, twelve-year old Euphrosyne has been renamed Hillary by the anti-religious government in the new “Era of Tolerance.” Her family has been killed, on Pascha (Easter) night, and she goes to live with her grandparents. Her teachers, psychologist, and even her grandfather want her to forget her past life and embrace the new secular tolerance. Euphrosyne struggles to hold onto her faith and identity in a new America hostile to religion. The one bright spot in her life is Mimi the Public Librarian, who provides thoughtful books which encourage Euphrosyne.  Of course, it’s only a matter of time before these books are censored by the new government . . .

Mimi doesn’t work at the Library anymore, but I offer you her Booklist, supplemented by a few titles of my own:

A Tween and Teen Guide to Dystopian Societies (and surviving our own, too)

Mimi’s picks:

Anderson, Laurie Halse. Speak.     High school is hard enough without being outcast, too. Freshman Melinda Sordino carries a dark secret. It is only when she learns to speak her truth that she can find true healing.

 

L’Engle, Madeleine. A Wrinkle In Time.   Meg Murray’s father has gone missing, and she and her brother Charles Wallace travel across space and time to find him. She battles the monstrous IT and saves her brother and father through the power of love. Chapters 9 and 12 are some of my favorite pages in all of literature.  (I sometimes use Meg’s technique from Chapter 9 to ward off intrusive thoughts.)

 

Lewis, C.S. The Chronicles of Narnia.       This beloved fantasy series is enjoyable on its own merits and is also well known for its Christian allegories. In Euphrosyne and Mimi’s world, it is outlawed. In his essay “On Three Ways of Writing For Children” C. S. Lewis wrote: “Since it is so likely that [children] will meet cruel enemies, let them at least have heard of brave knights and heroic courage.” He provides these brave child-heroes and child-heroines in his classic Narnia tales.

 

Lowry, Lois. The Giver.      In this society,  sameness is celebrated while pain and emotions are regulated out of existence.  Will Jonas be strong and brave enough to change things?

 

 

Lowry, Lois. Number the Stars.     In Nazi-occupied Denmark, 10 year-old Annemarie helps hide her Jewish friend Ellen and learns about the courage required to resist evil.

 

 

Cynthia’s picks:

Butler, Alban. Butler’s Lives of the Saints.  4 Volumes; arranged chronologically by saints’ days.    The classic reference book on Eastern and Western pre- and post-schism saints. Offers a saint (often more than one) for every day of the year. I wish Mimi had shown Euphrosyne this book. The life of St. Hilary of Poitier, although not Euphrosyne’s patron or true namesake, might still have encouraged her.  St. Hilary is best known for fighting heresy and enduring exile for the Christian faith. Available in many medium-to-large public libraries.  A close second is the Catholic Encyclopedia, originally available in print, but now available online at http://newadvent.org/cathen/

Grimm, Jacob and Wilhelm. Grimm’s Fairy Tales.          I especially want to get my hands on The Original Folk & Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm : the Complete First Edition translated & edited by Jack Zipes (2014) but really any edition will do. Stay away from sanitized, Disneyified versions.  C.S. Lewis wrote about the importance of fairy tales in order to teach children hope and justice: “let there be wicked kings and beheadings, battles and dungeons, and let villains be soundly killed at the end of the book.”

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World.    In this dystopian future, a character commonly known as “the Savage” argues that beauty, poetry, and belief in God trump safety and mandated happiness.

 

Shakespeare, William. The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.              Now available online at http://shakespeare.mit.edu/  All the Savage from Brave New World had to read on his reservation was William Shakespeare, and that’s good enough for me. One of my favorite Shakespeare quotations is from the play The Winter’s Tale: “It is an heretic that makes the fire, / Not she which burns in’t”

 

 

Go forth and read. Books, like Georgia Briggs’ Icon, have the power to inspire and transform. And give us courage to face our post-modern, dystopian lives.

St. Genevieve Defeats Attila

“St. Genevieve, St. Genevieve,
It’s Guenevere!
Remember me?
St. Genevieve, St. Genevieve,
I’m over here
Beneath this tree. . . .”

            For over thirty years, all I’ve known about St. Genevieve is that she was referenced in a song from the Broadway musical Camelot.  I was in Middle School, channel surfing, and one of the pay channels, probably HBO, featured a filmed version of the stage play on repeat all month. The first few times I’d bypassed it with a teenager’s disdain of musicals, but later I must have caught a scene with knights and decided it was cool.  Borrowed the album—yes, yinyl­­—from the public library. Learned all the songs. Never once wondered who St. Genevieve was.

In November 2015, St. Genevieve was all over my Facebook feed in the wake of the terrorism attacks in Paris; my religious friends prayed she would heal and protect her city. I still didn’t give her much thought.

            This is what I’ve learned recently:

St. Genevieve is the patron saint of Paris. She was born ~422 in Nanterre, a region a short distance outside of Paris. As a child she was blessed by a bishop, reportedly St. Germain of Auxerre who was traveling to Britain to refute the Pelagians; he encouraged Genevieve to pursue piety and a life dedicated to God. As a nun in Paris, St. Symeon the Stylite corresponded with her.  She was known for her teachings, for her charity and fasting, and for working miracles. Long after her death, in 1129, an outbreak of the Plague in Paris stopped after a procession was made in her honor.

St. Geneviève watching over the sleeping city of Paris / Sainte Geneviève veillant sur Paris endormi; Painting by Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, French, ~1824-1898

I certainly don’t hold negligent my public school education for failing to mention her; I understand the importance of teaching history without indoctrination.  In 7th Grade we learned that such a thing called the Byzantine Empire existed—barely—and were remotely introduced to the Holy Roman Empire and Charlemagne (although what exactly they did or why they were important wasn’t stressed.) We learned that generic “barbarians” sacked Rome. (What more detail do you need to offer pre-teens, practically barbarians themselves?) Somewhere along the way, outside of my history classes, I learned about history’s great baddies: Attilla the Hun, Vlad the Impaler, Genghis Khan. (A Listverse article ranks Attila as #2 and Genghis as #1 worst all-time ancient history villains.)

Medieval painting of Huns attacking a city.

So back in 451, Attila “the Scourge of God,” unable to conquer the thick walls of Constantinople, turns to the Western Roman Empire instead. (Sidenote: Emperor Theodosius II built his double walls of Constantinople specifically to keep out Attila—although first he paid Attila tribute.) Attila crosses then-Gaul, closes in on Paris, and St. Genevieve starts to pray.

Map courtesy of Wikipedia

In one version, St. Genevieve criticizes the cowardly men of Paris who had wanted to flee, and emboldens them to stay and fight. In another, she and her nun sisters pray and fast. Perhaps a little of both are true. Either way, Attila and his armies turn away. In June 451, Attila is defeated—the one defeat of his career—at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, somewhere in Gaul. (Wikipedia tells us that the Catalaunian Plains are near Champagne-Ardenne in the northeastern part of present-day France.)

The Epistle of James says that “the prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective” (James 5:16), a verse I’ve long believed, even when I didn’t understand it or know what righteousness is. This much I know:

St. Genevieve the unknown-to-me defeated Attila-the-effing-Hun!, the #2 villain and conqueror of the ancient world, and I was robbed of the inspiration of her example by an anti-hagiography Protestant upbringing.

Dearest well-meaning Protestants, sweet brothers and sisters, do you even know the legacy you’ve jettisoned?

“One [he] can no longer have God for his Father, who has not the Church for his mother.” — St. Cyprian of Carthage.

 

Evie Peoples at Giant’s Causeway, No. Ireland. Photo by Anna Love via Facebook. The Giant’s Causeway is one of my favorite places in the world. I didn’t know Evie personally, but this is how I would like to remember her.

This article is offered in remembrance of Evie Peoples, ~1997-2017. Memory Eternal. Rest in Peace.  

            St. Genevieve of Paris, pray for us, and for all who bear your name.

 

St. Genevieve; Painting ~1500-1599; from the Carnavalet Museum in the Netherlands

Resources / Further Reading

8 Things You Might Not Know About Attila the Hun from the History Channel /History.com

Attila the Hun from Ancient History Encyclopedia

Attila the Hun from Biography.com

Genevieve of Paris from Orthodox Wiki

St. Genevieve from The Catholic Encyclopedia

Venerable Genevieve of Paris from The Orthodox Church in America

 

 

 

Righteous Among the Nations: The Muslims of Paris

grand mosque paris

Over sixty years later, there is so little documentation. This important story needs to be told, especially in these days of European terrorism, Islamofascism, and Islamophobia.

“Jewish or Muslim,”–and so I’ve been told, also Christian–“the people of North Africa lived as neighbors and shared similar cultures. Through the centuries, they referred to each other as brothers.”

The Grand Mosque of Paris: A Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During The Holocaust relates the little-known and barely-documented story of how Alegerian diplomat Si Kaddour Benghabrit and his Muslim colleagues sheltered numerous Jews from the Nazis in Vichy Paris. Authors Karen Gray Ruelle and Deborah Durland DeSaix draw heavily on the work of Derri Berkani, an Algerian-French filmmaker whose parents participated in the Kabyle Berber Resistance in France. His film “Une Resistance Oubliee: La  Mosquee” and other articles contribute to this important piece of lost history.

“Once warned, the people in hiding rushed into the secluded women’s section of the prayer room, where even Nazis and Vichy police dared not enter. [Si Benghabrit] delayed the search by demanding that the soldiers and police remove their boots. . . Taking off heavy military boots took time, giving everyone the opportunity to get out of sight.”

This book is beautifully illustrated, but do not be deceived: it is no true picture book. The long blocks of text are too complex both in terms of reading level and subject matter for an elementary-school reader.  Even I, who should know better! was at a lost where to place it until I remembered and chided myself for initially thinking that illustrated books are [only] for young children. This would work best in a multi-disciplinary lesson plan, perhaps for middle school, or for home-schoolers; for a venue with a knowledgeable, compassionate adult close at hand.

Details and statistics of how many rescued are scarce. In one registry from the Grand Mosque, over 400 unexpected children are listed, presumably Jews given a Muslim identity.  Over 1700 extra ration stubs were identified, another indicator of the number of people sheltered.

Glossary and extensive Bibliography.

A book everyone should read in these scary, troubling times of unrest.

Ruelle, Karen Gray and Deborah Durland DeSaix. The Grand Mosque of Paris: A Story of How Muslims Rescued Jews During the Holocaust. N.Y.: Holiday House, 2009.

ruelle girl

Additional Resources:

Among the Righteous: Lost Stories from the Holocaust’s Long Reach into Arab Lands. [book & DVD] from pbs.org

Among the Righteous on YouTube

The Righteous Among The Nations  — Yad Vashem World Holocaust Remembrance Center.

Educators’ Guide from the Publisher

 

Seeing Rightly: In Search of the Little Prince [Book Review]

I finally made time to read In Search of the Little Prince: The Story of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry and I’m glad I did. This picture book biography tells the life of Saint-Exupéry and his never-flagging passion for flying.  It also reveals some of the real-life inspiration for his beloved The Little Prince.

Tonio, as his family called him, delivered mail by plane in Morocco and Northern Africa, and it was on one of those stopovers that he tamed a desert fox.  He loved poetry at a young age and preferred flying to any other job. He called himself “a farmer of the stars.”

The flat, almost one-dimensional watercolor (?) illustrations were not to my personal liking, but delightful photographs of Saint-Exupéry line the front endpapers.

Antoine and his siblings, 1907. Antoine is second from right.

 

Antoine in France, 1921

The best part of the book was this quotation:

 

It’s a short read, intended for children, and the child in everyone will appreciate this book.

 Illustrated by the author.

 

Landmann, Bimba.  In Search of the Little Prince: The Story of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.  Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdman’s Books For Young Readers, 2014. Print.

You’re Never Too Old To Run Away and Join the Circus

When I was 28 years old, an older friend remarked that by the time you reach 35, you start to accept that some of your dreams will go unfulfilled; she realized she would likely never become a Carnegie Hall concert pianist.  It’s the primary reason I started taking my writing seriously the year I turned the mystical groundbreaking age of 40. I didn’t want to be on my deathbed moaning “I wish I had written my novel.”

It’s unpleasant to the realize that as we age, our bodies start to fail, and certain activities become more difficult. I’d always said that I wanted to be one of those 60-year-olds who could run a marathon. One day I realized I would actually have to start training, and do more than talk. It’s not impossible. Only harder.

I’m not opposed to the literary device of an older narrator reflecting on his/her youth. Lately I’ve read quite a few novels in which an end-of-life protagonist tells a present-day story while a younger self in alternating chapters reveals the main plot thread, each narrative informing the other. John Boyne uses this technique to great effect in his 2013 The House of Special Purpose. The title takes its name from the final prison and assassination site of Czar Nicholas and his Royal family. Character Georgy was bodyguard to young heir Alexei, but how Georgy spends the final days of the Russian Revolution, and what he does or doesn’t do at the titular prison is the secret the novel unravels.  It’s crafted beautifully, but it’s pure historical fantasy, and readers seeking accuracy should look elsewhere. Despite its fluidity with the truth, it’s a well-written novel about a history-defying love that long remains with the reader.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sara Gruen’s Water For Elephants had a less compelling narrative. Perhaps it’s because the Prologue reveals the “secret” before the story has even begun. A circus veterinarian and an animal-act showgirl fall in love with the remarkably sensitive and apparently stupid elephant. The tension driving this novel is not what happened but how such a drastic circus-tent murder came to be. Interspersed between the main plot relating Jacob’s flunking-out of veterinary college due to grief over his parents’ unexpected deaths and his subsequent hiring by the Benzini Brothers circus is the present-day narrative of ninety-year-old Jacob’s day-to-day existence in a nursing home.

The nursing home chapters are especially poignant, capturing the horror of an everyday existence with only invalids, incontinents, and screamers as neighbors.  (My mother-in-law recently spent three months in a short-term facility while she recovered from a broken ankle, and we can attest that such a facility is excruciating for one who still has their wits.) No wonder old Jacob prefers to dwell on his glamorous circus past.

Timothy Tegge, Tegge Circus Archives. Photo leading Chapter 18

Gruen’s details about life in a traveling circus are well-researched and fascinating, and heading each chapter are actual photographs of historical circuses. The developing romance between young Jacob and Marlena carries the plot along. Yet I was frustrated by the chapters set in the nursing home: angered by the way our society hides and forgets our elders and disturbed by this accurate fictional portrayal.

More: I was perturbed by the basic premise that once one reaches a certain age, all there is left to do is to wait to die. The “main plot,” the circus plot, was thrilling; the nursing home tale was as dull and mundane as the mushy peas served to the residents.

Until the ending: and the true surprise is not the fleshed-out expanse of the pre-indicated murder.

At the age of ninety-one—or is it ninety-three?—Jacob Jankowski runs away and joins the circus, proving it’s never too late to live a life that gives your great-great-grandchildren something to talk about.

 

For more information about the photos in Gruen’s book, see the article at Two Roads Books.

Tra-la! It’s May

It’s been a busy, successful Spring.

I have two exciting announcements:

My story, “The Good Neighbors” has been published in Wild Musette Journal. Wild Musette is a home for “Dancers, Dreamers, Drummers, [and] Readers.” They offer books, short stories, cards, coloring books, and poetry. They are organizing an Irish Dance Vacation to County Sligo, Ireland in July 2018. I’m so proud and happy to be a part of this community.

“The Good Neighbors” is a story about the fey disrupting a young marriage. Set in Boston, the young woman protagonist studies Library Science at Simmons College–where I myself studied and earned my MLS. The rest of the story is fiction. Purchase a copy of Wild Musette Journal Issue #1701 to read my story.

 

Issue 1701

My poem, “The Faerie Queen” has been published in the Beltane 2017 issue of Three Drops From A Cauldron. Read it online for free, or purchase a copy.

More good news coming soon. Stay tuned!