The Mabinogion

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The three stories that end the collection are similar to Arthurian legends that people may be familiar with. Heroic knights seeing off those who oppose them in huge numbers whilst being admired for their exploits. I like mythological and I like medieval but this book is much more than that. There’s a dreaminess to these tales I find so surprising, seductive, and mysterious. They intoxicate me with dream and weird my imagination in wonderful ways. Full of magical creatures, legendary heroes, and tales of love, revenge, and political struggle, The Mabinogion is one of the essential masterpieces of world literature. For almost a millennium its stories have inspired and fascinated writers and artists – among them the great contemporary master of fantastic art, Alan Lee.

Guillermo del Toro Chats with TORN About The Hobbit Films!". TheOneRing.net. 25 April 2008 . Retrieved 26 April 2008. Pryderi and Rhiannon's imprisonment, by Albert Herter. From Thomas Wentworth Higginson's Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic A fascinating mixture of high drama, philosophy, romance, tragedy, fantasy, humor, and unique vision of ancient British history, the tales preserved in The Mabinogion represent a treasure of ancient Celtic myth as set down in the medieval age by unknown Welsh authors with groundbreaking literary skills. The ancient Welsh collection of Celtic myth and Arthurian Legend, illustrated by the great Alan Lee.

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Rhiannon characteristically rebukes him for not considering this course before, then explains she has sought him out to marry him, in preference to her current betrothed, Gwawl ap Clud. Pwyll gladly agrees, but at their wedding feast at her father's court, an unknown man requests Pwyll grant a request; which he does without asking what it is. The man is Gwawl, and he requests Rhiannon. David V. Barrett, "James, John" in St. James Guide To Fantasy Writers, edited by David Pringle. St. James Press, 1996, ISBN 9781558622050 (pp. 308-9) . The Mabinogion is a collection of medieval Welsh tales that makes up a rich mythological tradition. The tales themselves are only tangentially related - only one character, Pryderi, appears in all four branches. Nevertheless the tales are fascinating, rich and varied in their interpretation. This translation, Sioned Davies, was recommended to me as a good starting point so I happily took it. I'll likely try out other translations as the year goes on. This Penguin Classic translated by Jeffrey Gantz (not the same illustration as pictured here) is the third translation of The Mabinogion I have read, and it’s by far the best. The title is misleading, stemming from Lady Charlotte Guest’s use of it in her nineteenth century translation, but it’s now ”established and convenient”. In his introduction Gantz explains the misuse in detail. The stories vary in length. There are some bizarre-amusing etc. elements that stand out, like a Loki-like character, other dimensions of the same place just with no people, vanishing fortresses, people taking mice-forms, guarding virginity by keeping your feet in the maiden's lap, two men as an animal couple (and not just one kind of animal!), a dragon in Oxford, people like a person who

I enjoy spending time studying Lee's paintings, discovering new details that I hadn't noticed before and observing his watercolor techniques in general. Despite many of the surface similarities between Welsh and some Irish tales, they are just that: surface. The Welsh tales go in vastly different directions, have singular and unique progressions and ideas that set them apart from stories that might have shared similar origins long ago. Often there are deafening noises that come roaring out of nowhere and seem to cue some intrusion from the Otherworld. It’s not uncommon after such a noise to find the landscape completely devoid of people or to suddenly find oneself standing in front of a vast army of horses and men with banners whipping in the wind. Rhiannon appears in many retellings and performances of the Mabinogi (Mabinogion) today. There is also a vigorous culture of modern fantasy novels. [10] These include Not For All The Gold In Ireland (1968) by John James, where Rhiannon marries the Irish god Manannan. [11] Rhiannon also appears in The Song of Rhiannon (1972) by Evangeline Walton, which retells the Third Branch of the Mabinogion. [12] The people in these stories come from all over Celtic history and folklore, and some are pure products of the imagination of those sharing these tales. Others are more ambiguous, being possibly based on real people or the fusion of multiple legendary people into a single character. In the epic “Owein, or the Countess of the Fountain”, one of the members of Arthur’s court is Kynan, a man also mentioned in Y Gododdin, said to be at the Battle of Catraeth. In this same tale, Owein is said to be the son of Urien, historical king of Reghed, who appears as the subject of many old Welsh poems.The style of storytelling is very different from our common present day style. While the language and sentence construction is fairly basic, the narrative threads themselves are very compressed, with less emphasis on the slow rise and fall of dramatic tensions and more simply abrupt happenings and endings. In this regard I found similarities between it and many of the Old Testament tales. It’s as if much more was left up to the reader (or listener), more room given for the play of the receivers’ imaginations, less pre-digested if you will. It took just a little while for me to get accustomed to this, and once I did I was gripped and transported to another time, another mindset; a mindset shrouded in obscurity but definitely still vibrantly alive; a mindset where journeys to and from the Otherworld, talking owls, and ferocious giants come as naturally as meat and drink and a maiden's pale thigh. Accomplished linguist Lady Charlotte Guest translated medieval Welsh tales into English, and in doing helped to create the Mabinogion that exists today.

Many concepts not only in fantasy literature but in the broader realm of fiction that were popularized over the later centuries seem to have been introduced in these stories. One that first springs to mind is the mysterious wall of fog that Gereint meets toward the end of his saga. He knows something challenging awaits him on the other side, but is unsure what. Outside the fog wall poles are lined up with the heads of slain men who have come before. He enters the fog and is soon met with an enormous warrior he must defeat. Only after he is victorious does the fog disappear so that he may leave.The Red Book was written down in the late 14th century, and the White book in the middle of the same century, but like all Celtic lore and myth, the stories are from centuries earlier, developed through traditions of oral telling and legend-blending through the generations, performed by bards and storytellers. Lee worked as a conceptual designer on the films Legend, Erik the Viking, King Kong and the television mini-series Merlin. [5] The art book Faeries, produced in collaboration with Brian Froud, was the basis of a 1981 animated feature of the same name. [9] [10] One of my favorite illustrators is Alan Lee. I discovered his work during my teenage years when my then-boyfriend introduced me to the book 'Faeries,' which Alan Lee illustrated alongside another one of my favorite artists, Brian Froud. THE MABINOGION embraces much of ancient and early British culture, combining the numinous world of Celtic mythology, Arthurian legend and feudal Europe's Age of Chivalry. Indeed scholars have identified that it was out of THE MABINOGION that the Arthurian legends were born. Sullivan, Charles William III. "Conscientious Use: Welsh Celtic Myth and Legend in Fantastic Fiction.” Celtic Cultural Studies, 2004. See here