Reading Diary A: Welsh Fairy Tales (Emerson)

Welsh Fairy-Tales and Other Stories

READING A:

1.   The Fairies of Caragonan
2.     Three Short Tales of Fairies
3.     The Old Man and the Fairies
4.     The Story of Gelert
5.     Origin of the Welsh
6.     Crows
7.     The Fairy of the Dell

The first story of Emerson’s Welsh Fairy Tales unit was “The Fairies of Caragonan.”  I really enjoyed the story because it talked about fairies doing kind things for humans although this is far from the case in my story book. There were a lot of interesting details about fairy rings. The round table, scented perfume, and special flowers seem to play an important part in fairy magic. I think that I could include details such as these in my storybook to make it more detailed. I also like the fact that the witch and the fairies can turn themselves into animals.

But there are always two sides to a story and when I was reading this one I thought a lot about the witch and the miser. I thought it was tragic that the miser dropped dead at the news of the witch’s death. I think he must've loved her a lot. I think I would like to tell a story from the witch’s (Jezebel) perspective. It will be a love story with the miser and talk about how misunderstood they were.

The next several stories were also interesting. They all shared a common theme of the misuse of fairy money. This money was all discovered fortuitously by the individuals and then was squandered. In each of the cases the fairies took punishment for the squanders but rewarded the good doers. There also seems to be a taboo against telling anyone where the money was obtained. The money is often replaced with cockleshells.

“Kaddy’s Luck” was different from the other stories I've read so far. One thing that was similar, is the telling of the fairy visits was very bad luck. In Kaddy’s story telling her husband of the fairies that used to visit her resulted in the fairy stealing her child and replacing it with the changeling. The reason fairies are stealing children and my storybook have nothing to do with spite.

The story of Gelert didn't have any fairies in it but I enjoyed it very much. I came across this theme many times in my reading in the UnTextbook, where a master mistakenly slays some servant because of a tragic misunderstanding. In this case, the Kings slew his favorite hound because he thought that the dog had killed his child when in truth the dog had defended the child from a wolf. I like how the story has so many specific geographic details of the area. Details about the name of towns in the presence of gravestones lend some authenticity to the story. 

The origin of the Welsh is such a complex story. I was surprised to see the story of troy and the Trojan horse here in this unit. I was also captivated by the description of the Row birds. In my mind I immediately imagined some long dead dinosaur. How could the Welsh describe an animal that it did not coexist with human beings? Is it just an imaginative coincidence? Elaboration on large land birds like the ostrich?

I also really liked the last story and the description of the Queen of the Dell reminded me of one of HDJ illustrations.

(Howard David Johnson)