One of my all-time favourite books is Jorge Luis Borges’ The Book of Imaginary Beings. I’ve talked before about my love of bestiaries, and this one is perhaps the finest ever compiled. It takes a scattered, all-inclusive approach to the creatures it describes, with Borges hopping about from anecdote to anecdote and placing ‘classical’ beasts …
Medieval Europeans believed in many strange peoples inhabiting the uncharted lands beyond the edges of their maps. The medieval conception of the world would have been of a charted haven surrounded by boundless strangeness. Living in the far distance were all manner of wonderful civilizations: the one-legged people, the people whose faces looked out of …
Lady Gregory, she of W B Yeats fame, recorded the following passage in her book on Irish folklore (you can read an online version of it here). …and Eochaid was drowned with his children; and the water spread out into a great lake that has the name of Loch Neach to this day. But Liban …
For in his path he sees a monstrous birth, The Borametz arises from the earth Upon a stalk is fixed a living brute, A rooted plant bears quadruped for fruit, …It is an animal that sleeps by day And wakes at night, though rooted in the ground, To feed on grass within its reach around. …
Just wanted to share with you the good news that my hero of 2009, William Elliott Whitmore, has a new record coming out this month. Check it out here. I also wanted to share a little teaser of something I’m hoping to post next week. A new project for this blog. If you can …