Book review: What are fairies?

UK edition:
Troublesome Things
A History of Fairies and Fairy Stories by Diane Purkiss, published by Allan Lane, the Penguin Press.

US edition:
At the Bottom of the Garden: A Dark History of Fairies, Hobgoblins and other Troublesome Things, by Diane Purkiss, published by New York University Press.

The perception exists with some who attend my storytelling workshops that fairies are always tiny, female and mostly nice. I doubt that many storytellers would hold to this view. We have all heard and sometimes tell stories of baby stealing and other nasty activities of the fairy folk.

Diane Purkiss goes further with her study of fairy lore and literature. She sees the roots of fairies in some of the horrific characters of Greek and Roman myths. They didn’t call them fairies in those days but Purkiss points out the similarities shared by gorgons, Lamia, nymphs and Celtic fairies. She says:

Fairies come from outside, from outside the community, civilisation, even when they seem to share its values.

Fairies were either once people or are like people who have become trapped at a certain indeterminate phase of life.

Fairies have links with the dead, and some are the dead.

Young men, women in childbirth, and babies and children are particularly vulnerable to fairies.

Fairies are compelled to repeat their own circumstances in the lives of others; if they die prematurely, they cause the premature deaths of others; if they are trapped in eternal, storyless youth, they try to trap others in it too.

Fairies have bodies which reflect their anomalousness, subtly or directly.

Fairies are also particularised to the local situation, as the changing role of nymphs indicates.

Fairies are common to peasant cultures, cultures where the centre of life is the village and the space around it.

Why do fairies arise in the culture of diverse societies? Purkiss offers three possible explanations:

Firstly, common humanity: these are universal cultural archetypes produced by common psychic pressures in every culture.

Secondly, common structures: in societies with similar social structures, similar social solutions will be produced; so, for instance, all village societies will produce taciturnity as a norm, and will therefore develop a corpus of folk-beliefs about the disastrous results of loquacity.

Thirdly, direct transmission: the Celts learned these stories from their contacts with the Mediterranean peoples, just as the Mediterranean peoples learned these stories from each other.

The first explanation is questioned by Purkiss on the grounds that if it were so we would still all look to fairies as an explanation for the unexplainable. While I am sure some do, in the modern world most don’t.

Purkiss acknowledges some credibility in the second explanation but expresses a preference for the third:

... the ceaseless reshaping of old stories to fit new contexts. Sometimes this involves simple changes of geography, sometimes changes in point of view, sometimes more drastic changes in narrative. But in every case, the result is a blend of continuity and change.

But she goes on to say that she doesn’t really know. ‘As with all else in fairyland, this theory may be a glittering deception.’

While some good fairies existed in folklore they were not common. They belong more to literary tales and were perhaps popularised by Shakespeare. Still, Shakespeare’s fairies were often male and not necessarily small. The sweet female fairies came into their own in literature and on the stage of Victorian times and developed into the popular fairies of today mostly in the twentieth century.

The design of this book leaves a little to be desired. There is no longer a reason with modern technology to print illustrations in a section separate from the text. To present the illustrations next to the relevant part of the text would not turn this academic tome into a coffee table book. It would merely have made it easier for the reader to refer to them.

Many storytellers will consider this a welcome addition to their libraries. It’s main shortcoming is perhaps its strong bias to Europe. Fairy-like creatures from other cultures are barely touched on.

© copyright John Shield. First published on the John Shield storytelling website 2003.