Dear Reader,

Welcome to the Autumn 2004 edition of the Journal of Mythic Arts. This time, we're traveling into the dark of the woods in fairy tales, poetry, and art, encountering wolves and witches, foxes and femmes sauvage along the way.

The forest plays an important role in the Western fairy tale tradition. It is the place where children go astray; where witches, wolves, and monsters lurk; where doves weep tears of blood and deer are princesses under enchantment. It's only natural that the woods loomed large in the folk stories of centuries past, for vast forests once stretched across Europe — a source of vital food and fuel yet also a home to outlaws and madmen, and reputedly haunted by worse. As late as the sixth century in Britain, the area north of Hadrian's Wall (that is to say the entire country of Scotland) was referred to by southern scribes as one great forest, populated only by the ghosts of the dead, which civilized men were warned to avoid at the peril of their mortal souls. Even the fairies of the wildwood (unlike their sweet, diminutive image today) were treacherous creatures whose touch could kill and whose kisses could drive a man mad. All woodlands were best kept out of by dark, when the very trees could be dangerous. As one old country saying warned, "The elm tree grieves, the oak tree hates, the willow walks if you travel late"; and those who dared chop down an ash tree were cursed for seven times seven years.

Centuries of agriculture and land management have tamed the European countryside and lessened our cultural fear of the forest…yet that fear still echoes in fairy tales like Hansel and Gretel, Brother and Sister, Mr. Fox, Little Red Riding Hood, and other stories that take us to the heart of the enchanted forest. In folklore, the journey into the woods is understood to be a dangerous one — a rite of passage leading either to transformation or destruction. The creatures encountered on woodland paths might be fearsome ones, like ogres and trolls, or timely sources of help and advice, like the feeble old crones who are really powerful fairies in disguise. And some are both — helpful in one breath, devious or malicious in the next, such as Baba Yaga in Russian stories and the capricious fairies of French salon tales. It is the task of the hero to see through illusion, to learn how to tell friend from foe, to see the devil behind a handsome face and the angel beneath a beggar's rags. Courtesy, compassion, and goodness of heart are what win salvation in some of these stories; in others, it takes cleverness, courage, and guile to make it back out of the woods. In both kinds of tales, the hero is generally changed by his or her encounter — a transformation made manifest by a change in physical station (from poverty to wealth, from adolescence to marriage, etc.), symbolizing the inner changes that come from surviving calamity.

When we turn to myth and medieval romance, the forest is also a place for transformations material, spiritual, and magical. Merlin, in the Arthurian mythos, goes mad after the Battle of Arderydd and retreats to the Forest of Calidon, where he sleeps on the ground like a beast of the woods and eats only roots and berries. It is during his seasons in Calidon that he learns the speech of animals and transmutes fits of madness into his famous prophetic powers. A parallel story is the Irish tale of Suibhne (or Sweeney), a warrior cursed in battle who flees into the wilderness. His season in the forest is also a time of anguish and madness, but, like Merlin, he gains magical knowledge drawn from the natural world as a result. These stories contain the seeds of shamanic rites, found in various cultures around the world, in which an initiate's physical body undergoes a period of sharp physical deprivation while his or her spirit travels to the spirit world to gain healing skills or mystical knowledge. In some rituals, the initiate's body is symbolically torn apart and then put back together again; he or she returns to the world as a brand new being, often with a new name. Such myths and rites are echoed in the ordeals described in our darkest fairy tales: young heroes with head or limbs cut off; or poisoned into a death-like sleep; or roaming the woods mutely trapped in the shape of a deer or a bird or a beast. When these heroes emerge from the forest at last, they are different men and women from when they entered, and they often take on new names or new roles in society as a result.

Jungian scholar Marie-Louise von Franz saw the fairy tale forest not only as a place of trials, but also as one of retreat, reflection, and healing. In a lecture presented to the C.G. Jung Institute in the winter of 1958-59, she looked at the role of the forest in the fairy tale The Girl With No Hands. In this story, a miller's daughter loses her hands as the result of a foolish bargain her father has made with the devil. She leaves home, makes her way through the forest, and ends up in the garden of a king — who falls in love, marries the girl, and has two silver hands fashioned for her. The Handless Maiden gives birth to a son — but this is not the expected happy ending to the story. The king is now away at war and the devil interferes once again, tricking the court into casting both mother and child back into the forest. "She is driven into nature," von Franz pointed out. "She has to go into deep introversion.... The forest [is] the place of unconventional inner life, in the deepest sense of the word."

The Handless Maiden then encounters an angel who leads her to a hut deep in the woods; she lives there in solitude, and her hands are magically restored. When her husband returns from the war, learns that she's gone, and comes to fetch her home, she insists that he court her all over again, as the new woman she is now. Her husband complies — and then, only then, does the tale conclude happily. The Handless Maiden's transformation is now complete: from wounded child to whole, healed woman; from miller's daughter to queen. Von Franz compared the Handless Maiden's time of solitude in the woods to that of religious mystics seeking communion with god through nature. "In the Middle Ages, there were many hermits," she noted, "and in Switzerland there were the so-called Wood Brothers and Sisters. People who did not want to live a monastic life but who wanted to live alone in the forest had both a closeness to nature and also a great experience of spiritual inner life. Such Wood Brothers and Sisters could be personalities on a high level who had a spiritual fate and had to renounce active life for a time and isolate themselves to find their own inner relationship to God. It is not very different from what the shaman does in the Polar tribes, or what the medicine men do all over the world, in order to seek immediate personal religious experience in isolation."

In contemporary fiction, a journey into the woods can still be one of danger and death, or transformation and enlightenment. The grieving young protagonist of Alice Hoffman's Green Angel, for instance, finds healing in solitude in the woods: "I carried the stones…in all my pockets. I took them far into the woods, out to where the oldest trees grew…Carefully, I made three piles: one for my mother, one for my father, one for my little sister. Everyday I carted stones and everyday I added to the growing stacks…Wherever I went, I carried stones in my pockets, my hands, my boots. It was my duty, my burden, my gift, my soul, the reason I woke in the morning and went to sleep at night. Now I had a purpose, to build the stone stacks. I had known the woods before, now I knew them nearly blind and in the dark. I could find my way by touch. My fingers could tell the difference between east and west. I could rub a clod of dirt under my thumb and gauge how close to the river I was. Before long, I could hold a fallen feather in the palm of my hand and tell whether it belonged to a sparrow or a jay."

But in the "The Erl-King," Angela Carter warns: "The woods enclose. You step between the fir trees and then you are no longer in the open air; the wood swallows you up. There is no way through the wood anymore; this wood has reverted to its original privacy. Once you are inside it, you must stay there until it lets you out again for there is no clue to guide you through in perfect safety; grass grew over the tracks years ago and now the rabbits and foxes make their own runs in the subtle labyrinth and nobody comes… A young girl would go into the woods as trustingly as Red Riding Hood to her granny's house but this light admits no ambiguities and, here, she will be trapped in her own illusion because everything in the wood is exactly as it seems." (The Bloody Chamber)

Myth comes to life in the shadows of the trees in Robert Holdstock's Lavondyss (the second volume of his Mythago Wood sequence): " 'Green Jack,' Tallis said to herself, and as if the sound of the fanciful name from folklore had attracted its attention it took a quick, awkward step forward, sinewy body cracking like old wood underfoot. It stared at her, bristling…rustling…It had stepped into a strange of light which played off the darkening face but caught remnants of the leafy green which swathed the skull, the shoulders, and upper torso. Its fingers were long, many-jointed; twig-like. What Tallis had mistaken for a forked beard she could see, now, were carved tusks of wood growing from each side of the round, wet mouth. The tusks branched, one limb reaching up to the leafy mass on the head, the other reaching down, becoming tendrillar, tendrils curling around the torso and the arms, then down the spindly legs, supplying lobate oak-leaves as a covering for the scored, scoured, bark-like flesh below."

The woods hold dark enchantment in Patricia A. McKillip's Winter Rose: "I stood in the wood. Now it was a grim and shadowy tangle of thick dark trees, dead vines, leafless branches that extended twig like fingers to point to the heartbeat of hooves. The buttermilk mare, eerily, eerily pale in that silent wood, galloped through the trees; tree boles turned toward it like faces. A woman in her wedding gown rode with a man in black; he held the reins with one hand and his smiling bride with the other. She wore lace from throat to heel; the roses in her chestnut hair glowed too bright a scarlet, mocking her bridal white…When they stopped, her expression began to change from a pleased, astonished smile, to confusion and growing terror. What twilight wood is this? she asked. What dead, forgotten place?"

In A.S. Byatt's "The Thing in the Forest", Charles de Lint's The Wild Wood, Molly Gloss's The Wild Life, The Green Man anthology, and numerous other works of mythic fiction, those who enter the forest encounter Mystery there, and are changed forever.

Contemporary poets have also followed the trail of breadcrumbs and stones into the enchanted forest. In Gwen Strauss's The Waiting Wolf (in Trail of Stones), the wolf of Little Red Riding Hood confesses, "I showed her flowers-white dead-nettle, nightshade, devil's bit, wood anemone. I might not have gone further, but then nothing ever remains innocent in the woods." But why did she follow him into the trees? Carol Ann Duffy answers in Little Red-Cap (in The World's Wife): "Here's why. Poetry. The wolf, I knew, would lead me deep into the woods, away from home, to a dark tangled thorny place lit by the light of owls." When Gretel walks into the woods, writes Andrea Hollander Budy in Gretel (in The House Without a Dreamer), "She means to lose everything she is. She empties her dark pockets, dropping enough crumbs to feed all the men who have touched her or wished." The Traveler Who Escaped in Lisel Mueller's Voices from the Forest (in Alive Together) warns, "No matter how exhausted you are, and though you think you will die of thirst, do not enter the house in the forest. Ignore the unlocked door, and the lamp in the window lit for you…."

In visual art, the fairy tale forest as a place of danger, glamour, and transformation has been explored by Victorian fairy artists and illustrators in the 19th century, and by artists such as Brian and Wendy Froud, Alan Lee, and Charles Dana Vess today. (See the Green Man and Green Woman article in our Gallery for examples of the latter work.) Other artists work in the woodlands themselves, such as Andy Goldsworthy, whose haunting, ephemeral art is made from natural materials, Peter Randall-Page, whose gorgeous woodland sculptures are inspired by natural forms; and photographer Stu Jenks, who captures mystery in the dark of the trees.

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In our Reading Room this month, Helen Pilinovsky journeys into the fairy tale woodlands of Russia to explore the complex figure of Baba Yaga as she appears in traditional stories and in modern mythic fiction. My own foray into the woods takes me on the paths of needles and pins to seek out the rich, dark history of Little Red Riding Hood. Our fiction offering this time is "How to Bring Someone Back from the Dead" by Veronica Schanoes, a tale that leads through tangled fairy tale briars deep into the Underworld. In our Gallery, we're honored to feature the exquisite paintings of Kinuko Craft, whose illustrations have graced numerous publications ranging from fairy tale books for children to mythic fiction for adult readers. In our Coffeehouse, you'll find poems by Holly Black, Johnny Clewell, Neil Gaiman, Theodora Goss, and Jane Yolen, full of wolves and other creatures who lurk in the dark of the fairy tale forest. I also recommend these poems from our archives, which are related to this issue's theme: Baba Yaga by Midori Snyder, Bubah Yagah by Taiko Haessler, Red Riding Hood by Karen Daly, Wolf by Carrie Miner, and Silver and Gold by Ellen Steiber. Biographical notes for all of the contributors to this issue of the Journal of Mythic Arts are listed below.

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Endicott Studio News

This autumn we welcome two new members to the Endicott Studio: Holly Black and Sharyn November. Holly is the enormously talented author of Tithe, The Spiderwick Chronicles, and other works rooted in folklore and myth. Her latest is a fabulous story, "The Night Market," published in The Faery Reel. Sharyn is a Senior Editor for Puffin and Viking Children's Books and the Editorial Director of Viking's Firebird Books imprint; she is also the editor of the terrific anthology Firebirds, which I highly recommend. She has edited many Young Adult books with mythic and folkloric themes, and has done a fine job of bringing out-of-print fantasy books back to life in handsome new editions. We'll keep you apprised of Holly and Sharyn's publications, and occasionally feature their work in our Journal--such as Holly's new poem in this issue, "Bone Mother". We've also added a new bio page for editor extraordinaire Ellen Datlow, who has long been part of the Endicott circle. Ellen and I have edited twenty-seven anthologies together (currently working on number twenty-eight); she is also the editor of many fine solo anthologies, and of the SciFiction section of SciFi.com.

If you haven't wandered around the Endicott web site lately, take a look at the Scuttlebutt section of the site, which has had a complete makeover: new art, new pages, and up-to-date information throughout. We've added Recommended Books pages, which will change with each new edition of the Journal of Mythic Arts. And you'll find six years worth of Previously Recommended Books, 1997-2003, on handsome, user-friendly new pages, listed alphabetically by author. The older articles and stories in the Reading Room archives are now re-designed and updated, as are the poems in the Coffeehouse archives. Re-design work has started on the Gallery archives, with more changes coming soon. Associate editor Midori Snyder is responsible for the transformation of the Scuttlebutt section, including its new pages and design. Munro Sickafoose worked on the Journal archive and Endicott Bio pages, with assistance from Midori. Paul Hinze provided invaluable help throughout, as did Carlotta Love of Homeboyz Interactive.

The support of our readers has made all this possible…and will allow us to expand the offerings on the Endicott site in the future. If you, too, would like to help, please visit our Friends of Endicott page.

Another way to help is to let librarians, booksellers, and teachers know about the Endicott site and our various Recommended Reading lists. The more we can get good mythic arts publications stocked on bookstore and library shelves, the better it is for all myth-loving readers. And if you have books to recommend yourself, be sure to let us know about them on the Endicott Bulletin Board.

Thank you, once again, for stopping by the Endicott Studio. We'll be back in December for the Winter edition of the Journal of Mythic Arts, focusing on myth and folklore in performance arts. Till then, please keep an eye on the Endicott Bulletin Board, frequently updated, and join us in the on-going conversation on the Surlalune Myths and Fairy Tales Discussion Board.

Cheers,

Terri Windling

Tucson, Arizona and Devon, UK.

Contributors Notes, Autumn 2004

Holly Black is the author of the five-volume The Spiderwick Chronicles, created with artist Tony DiTerlizzi, and the Young Adult "suburban fantasy" novel Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale. The Spiderwick books were N.Y. Times bestsellers, and Tithe was nominated for the Mythopoeic Award. It also appeared on the ALA Best Books for Young Adults list, and on the New York Public Library's 2002 list of Best Books for the Teenage. Holly lives in New Jersey with her husband, artist Theo Black.

Johnny Clewell is a poet, activist, and advocate for battered women and children. Her poetry has appeared in The Writing on the Wall, Biblioteque Bleue, The Armless Maiden, and other publications in the U.K., U.S. and France. Born in London, Johnny spent many years living and working in the south of France, and currently lives in Toronto, Canada, with her husband and son.

Kinuko Y. Craft has won more than one hundred graphic arts awards, including five gold medals from the Society of Illustrators. She has illustrated numerous children's books, such as Baba Yaga and Vasilia the Brave, and her paintings have appeared in Time, Newsweek, National Geographic, and on the covers of many fantasy novels. Her art has been exhibited at The Norman Rockwell Museum, The Discovery Museum, The Art Director's Club of New York, Musee de la Civilisation (Quebec, Canada), and in the touring exhibition "Brave Little Girls" curated by The National Museum of Women in the Arts. Kinuko lives with her husband, writer Mahlon F. Craft, in Connecticut.

Neil Gaiman is an award-winning author of fiction, poetry, screenplays, and comics. He is the author of internationally acclaimed novels such as American Gods, children's books such as The Day I Swapped My Dad for Two Goldfish, the Sandman comics series, the Neverwhere BBC television series, and many other magical works. Born and raised in Britian, Neil now lives with his wife and children in Minnesota.

Theodora Goss is a writer and scholar working on her Ph.D. at Boston University, focusing on the Victorian Gothic. Her fiction and poetry has appeared in Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet, Polyphony, Realms of Fantasy, Strange Horizons, The Year's Best Fantasy and Horror, and other publications. Her new chapbook, The Rose in Twelve Petels and Other Stories (available from Small Beer Press), is highly recommended to fans of mythic and fairy tale literature. Born in Hungary, Theodora now lives with her husband and daughter in Boston, Massachusetts.

Helen Pilinovsky is pursuing a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University with the assistance of a Javits Fellowship, where she is working on the archetypal differences between the canons of Eastern and Western European fairy tales. Her articles and reviews have appeared in Marvels & Tales: the Journal of Fairy Tale Studies, Realms of Fantasy Magazine and The New York Review of Science Fiction. Born in Vienna, Helen now lives in New York City.

Veronica Schanoes is a fiction writer and a poet. Her work has appeared in Lady Churchill's Rosebud Wristlet and has won the William Carlos Williams Prize from the Academy of American Poets. She occasionally puts out a zine entitled Postcards from the Voodoo Sex Cult. Raised in New York City, she has been working on her English Ph.D. at the University of Pennsylvania, and is currently living in London.

Jane Yolen is the multi-award-winning author of over two hundred books for children, teenagers, and adults, including novels, story collections, poetry collections, and picture books. She has also edited acclaimed collections of folk tales from around the world. Among her many recent publications are Prince Across the Water, Fine Feathered Friends, The Radiation Sonnets, and Take Joy: A Book for Writers. Raised in New York City, Jane now divides her time between homes in western Massachusetts and St. Andrews, Scotland.