The Shadow Library: Myth Illogical Creatures

 

Mythological Creatures: A Pictorial Dictionary (Hardcover – January 1, 1974) by Paulita Sedgwick

“This book has been valuable to me over the years when looking up a variety of mythological creatures from around the world (Especially when I needed a picture of said creature as well,) many of which I could not find anywhere else. Any dictionary of myth may list dragons, satyrs, and unicorns- This one also includes such oddities as Acephali, Empusae, Fuath, Gandayaks, Homunculi, Leontophontes, Pisachas, and Xnoumi.
“All of your traditional favorites are here, but Ms. Sedgwick also includes some more recent "myths," such as Gremlins and Robots. Even a few creatures from literature are here, like Frankenstein’s' Monster. Of course, there are plenty of creatures and characters from classic Greek and Roman mythology represented, but also Indian, Scandinavian, German, Native American, Cornish, Japanese, and many more. Most entries include interesting facts about the creature as well as a description.
“This, coupled with Ms. Sedgwick’s lovely, stylized pen and ink illustrations, make this little book a great big reference source in my library.” -Quillon D. Chavez, Amazon review.

This book was in the A. J. Briesemeister Middle School library, and I remember I was delighted to find it was the source used for several pictures in this magazine:

Wideo Wednesday: Sing Me a Song

 

An odd lot of bits. Mary Martin's cover of 'Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo' is responsible for one of my earliest nicknames; Mom called me Bip Bip Dee Bobbidy, or Bip for short, because of all the 'B's in my name. 'The Age of Magic' is exactly that compilation of movie magic I've wanted for years. Crazily enough the theme from 'Sigmund and the Sea Monsters' captures something of the feel of summer days from when I was little, and 'Nonno's Final Poem' from Night of the Iguana of summer nights now that I am old. I'm afraid I've had to put the entire 'You Can't Take It with You' here (it's all good and worth watching) because I couldn't find the snippet with Grampa's speech to Kolenkov (it appears at about 56 minutes in). 'Over the Sea to Skye' is the Robert Louis Stevenson song I thought I was putting in last week's post (though that one's pretty good too).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8G9dQsNJbeQ Bibbidi Bobbidi Boo, Mary Martin

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsOeHuevNMk The Age of Magic

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=au3DBVo1EqM Sigmund and the Sea Monsters

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45hM7iAkjk8 The Tiger and the Strawberry

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEKBRi9ofHc Nonno’s Final Poem

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56IGjR63fjM You Can’t Take It With You, Full Play

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3CAXCXZFyn8 Over the Sea to Skye

Into the Archive: Acquisitions Abounding

 

Cromwell is a 1970 British historical drama film written and directed by Ken Hughes. It is based on the life of Oliver Cromwell, who rose to lead the Parliamentary forces during the later years of the English Civil War and, as Lord Protector, ruled Great Britain and Ireland in the 1650s. It features an ensemble cast, led by Richard Harris as Cromwell and Alec Guinness as King Charles I, with Robert Morley as Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester and Timothy Dalton as Prince Rupert of the Rhine. The film received negative reviews for its many historical inaccuracies; however, much praise went to the acting. – Wikipedia.

One of the main inaccuracies was the portrayal of Oliver Cromwell as sort of a hero of the common man, when he became little more than a bloody tyrant.

“He was a cadet of one of those millionaire families who had gained their enormous wealth out of the wreck of the monasteries during the period of the Reformation. His father, of whom he was the only surviving son, was himself the only son of the enormously wealthy Sir Henry Cromwell, and Henry was the son of Richard Cromwell, nephew of Thomas Cromwell, the man who dissolved the monasteries under Henry VIII. Richard Cromwell's real name was Richard Williams. He was nephew to Thomas because his mother had been Thomas Cromwell's sister, his mother having married a tavern-keeper in Putney, near London, whose name was Williams. Richard took on his important relative's name, but both he and those who succeeded him had to use the name Williams for legal purposes, and when his great-grandson, Oliver, lay in state, the title "Oliver Cromwell, alias Williams," was embroidered on the half- royal hangings which draped the bed.

“When his father died, Oliver Williams, alias Cromwell, inherited an income of what we should call to-day something rather more than 363,000 a year. But though his fortune was moderate, compared with many of his rank, what marked him out was the immense fortune of those to whom he belonged. The Reformation has been called "a rising of the rich against the poor." This does not apply to it in the remote valleys of Switzerland and the Scandinavian fells, but it is an epigram more than half true of its progress in England, and the fact that Oliver belonged to one of those millionaire families recently founded on the loot of religious endowments is highly characteristic of the whole time. The House of Commons to which he was returned as a young man was composed almost entirely of rich people like himself—great land-owners and their relatives, with here and there a prominent lawyer, or, quite exceptionally, a prominent merchant. 

"The English House of Commons was in those days a body only called together as a rule for brief periods. It was always summoned on the accession of a monarch, and whenever there was important and solemn law-making to be done it was summoned to confirm the King's will and to subscribe to what he and his Council and the great lords had decided. The Crown had become so poor in Cromwell's time that government could not be carried on without special voluntary grants by the owners of property, and for making these grants there was no one but the House of Commons. It took advantage of its position to attack the powers of the King and the quarrel ultimately ended in a civil war. 

"Of the Parliament, the Lords for the most part hesitated to rise in armed rebellion; of their relatives and fellow landowners, the Commons, rather more than half or about half, were prepared to levy a regular war against the King. But even those of the richer classes who were reluctant to attack the Crown physically, were nearly all at heart opposed to the old claims of the Crown in government and they nearly all wanted at heart to supplant government by a king whose duty and function it was to protect the poor against the rich, the weak against the strong. They desired to supplant him and take over the government themselves. That in effect is what they did. They won their war, they put the King to death, and among them was the amateur soldier who so rapidly became the best professional soldier of his time: Cromwell. 

"He was installed the head of the victorious army by the time that he was forty-eight, and in his fiftieth year it was he who plotted for and achieved the death of King Charles. He proceeded to the conquest of Ireland, a task which he accomplished with horrible cruelty and as a result of which he dispossessed nineteen-twentieths of the Irish nation, confiscating their land wholesale. He intended to destroy the Catholic Church altogether in that country. He thought that he had achieved that end before he died; but there he was mistaken. - Hilaire Belloc, Characters of the Reformation.

The Water of the Wondrous Isles, by William Morris (1897, Ballantine Edition 1971)

“The novel was initially printed in 1897 by Morris' own Kelmscott Press on vellum and artisanal paper in a blackletter type of his own design. For the wider reading public, a hardcover trade edition was published later that year by Longmans, Green and Co. It was republished by Ballantine Books as the thirty-eighth volume of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy series in November, 1971. The Ballantine edition includes an introduction by Lin Carter.

“Stolen as a child and raised in the wood of Evilshaw as servant to a witch, Birdalone ultimately escapes in her captress's magical boat, in which she travels to a succession of strange and wonderful islands. Among these is the Isle of Increase Unsought, an island cursed with boundless production, which Morris intended as a parable of contemporary Britain and a vehicle for his socialistic beliefs. Equally radical, during much of the first quarter of the novel, Birdalone is naked, a highly unusual detail in Victorian fiction. She is occasionally assisted out of jams by Habundia, her lookalike fairy godmother. She encounters three maidens who are held prisoner by another witch. They await deliverance by their lovers, the three paladins of the Castle of the Quest. Birdalone is clad by the maidens and seeks out their heroes, and the story goes into high gear as they set out to rescue the women. Ultimately, one lady is reunited with her knight, another finds a new love when her knight is killed, and the last is left to mourn as her champion throws her over for Birdalone.” – Wikipedia.

Well. It was the only one of the Ballantine Adult Fantasy’s William Morris books I did not have. I know I have not read the BAF William Morris books I do have and may not read this one, but it matters not. The compulsion was on me, and it now sits snugly with its brothers. It is in remarkably good condition for a 50+ year old paperback, which is probably a testament to its unread, almost unreadable, nature. I did go over a little section in it while I was cooking supper, though, and I think it is approachable, with the right mental squint and a certain amount of reader’s readjustment. Another Gervasio Gallardo cover!

 

I now, in fact, have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to reading matter. Besides still attempting the monumental The Gulag Archipelago, I have at least five new books of varying complexity in my queue, four of which arrived in the last two days. I was trying to stretch my book acquisitions over at least a couple of weeks, but Amazon proved too efficient for my purposes. These two arrived by truck this afternoon. No more new ‘presents’ for a while yet, no happy anticipation. But lots of diversion.

Into the Archive: Arriving Yesterday ... and Today

 

The Everlasting Man: A Guide to G.K. Chesterton’s Masterpiece (Hardcover – March 18, 2024)

by G.K. Chesterton (Author), Dale Ahlquist (Commentary)

Among the many masterpieces of G.K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man is his crowning achievement. It was the book that set a young atheist named C.S. Lewis on the path toward Christianity. Evelyn Waugh called it “a permanent monument” that “needs no elucidation.” And its lively prose and compelling defense of Christianity have dazzled readers ever since.

But a little elucidation, it turns out, is needed. Chesterton’s presentation of the story of humanity and religion is filled with obscure literary, historical, mythological, philosophical, and theological references—most of which are largely lost on today’s readers. And Chesterton’s paradoxical and apparently wandering style proves, at times, disorienting to newcomers.

In this groundbreaking guide—the first of its kind—one of the world’s leading authorities on Chesterton walks readers through the entirety of this great apologist’s text. Complete with an introduction, footnotes, and running commentary, Dale Ahlquist’s tour through Chesterton’s classic will draw new readers into his literary world—and old readers even deeper into his literary genius.  – Amazon.

Written in 1925 as a response  to H. G. Wells’ The Outline of History. I have a copy of the text included in one of the rather unwieldy Ignatius editions, along with two others, but this (including the new explications and commentary) will be a much easier reading copy. Physically, it’s one of those books where the sleeve and the actual cover are the same. Includes a red ribbon book marker.

 

El Blanco, The Legend of the White Stallion (Scholastic, 1961)

When a legendary white colt is born, he seems to fulfill an ancient prophecy and brings rain to a sun-parched valley. But can El Blanco survive both the dangers of the wild and the horse hunters who seek to capture and tame his wild spirit? Charcoal illustrations by Gloria Stevens. "The Legend of El Blanco" is an episode of Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color. It aired on September 25, 1966. 

While researching another Scholastic book, I ran across this one, and remembered it in a flash. It was ubiquitous during the McQueeney years, ran as a show now and then on Disney, and somehow or other (my theory inclines to a garage sale) we got a copy of it. I don’t think we ever much read it, at least not assiduously; in my youth, ‘horse books’ were deemed more appropriate literature for girls. Don’t know when it disappeared from our archive. I fear that I am entering that peculiar stage of senility where you develop a fondness for something you never particularly liked but which reminds you of your childhood, and so I had to get it. That almost heraldic cover of white cream on sky blue is giving me Rohirric vibes. An unconscious influence?

Rutherford Montgomery (April 12, 1894 – July 3, 1985). While still at school, Montgomery began writing stories about the wild animals that lived around his family's farm. He went on to write books about aviation and the people, landscapes, and animals of the American West, particularly horses. In all, he wrote more than 100 books. He seemed to favor ‘color’ titles, including Big Red, the Golden Stallion, Little Black, and Big Brownie.

From 1941 to 1946, Montgomery was a writer for Dick Tracy. He worked as a creative writing teacher 1955–57 and as a scriptwriter for Walt Disney Studios 1958–1962. Some of the more intriguing (to me) titles he produced are:

• A Kinkajou on the Town
• The Living Wilderness
• Walt Disney's Cougar: A Fact-Fiction Nature Story
• Weecha The Racoon

But my brothers might also remember this little paperback:

Update: Arrived today!

Misty of Chincoteague (Paperback; first published 1947) by Marguerite Henry (Author), Wesley Dennis (Illustrator)

On the island of Chincoteague, off the coasts of Virginia and Maryland, lives a centuries-old band of wild ponies. Among them is the most mysterious of all, Phantom, a rarely-seen mare that eludes all efforts to capture her—that is, until a young boy and girl lay eyes on her and determine that they can’t live without her.
The frenzied roundup that follows on the next Pony Penning Day does indeed bring Phantom into their lives, in a way they never would have suspected. Phantom would forever be a creature of the wild. But her gentle, loyal colt Misty is another story altogether... (-Amazon)

Marguerite Henry (1902 - 1997) was the writer of many ‘horsey’ books like Stormy: Misty’s Foal (among others set on Chincoteague), Brighty of the Grand Canyon, and Justin Morgan Had a Horse. Her legacy extends beyond that sort of thing, of course; look her up on Wikipedia! Mrs. Harris read Misty to us in 5^th Grade, and we got a copy of it which pretty much suffered the same fate as El Blanco. I thought I was getting the nostalgic cover (well, that was the picture offered) but I got this:

At least it has the original interior illustrations. Misty herself still survives as a stuffed museum exhibit. Isn’t that special! And somehow … horrifying.  

The Lord of the Rings: Shelob’s Lair (Part Two)

The Tale

Frodo’s hand moves to his chest, draws out the Phial of Galadriel, and holds it up. At first it merely glimmers like a star struggling above mist, but as Frodo’s hope grows, so does its light; it fills the dark tunnel until it is the center of a ‘globe of light,’ and Frodo’s hand sparkles with ‘white fire.’ Frodo marvels at the wonderous thing he’s carried so long but has feared to use lest it reveal his location to unfriendly eyes. As if inspired, he cries out words he does not understand: ‘Aiya Earendil Elenion Alcalima!’ (’Hail Earendil Brightest of Stars!)

But ‘She that walked in the darkness had heard the Elves cry that cry far back in the deeps of time, and she had not heeded it, and it did not daunt her now.’ Frodo feels a great malice bearing down upon him, and in the tunnel which they’ve come down, he sees eyes growing visible, ‘two great clusters of many-windowed eyes.’ They reflect the light of the Phial, broken in their thousand facets, but starting to glitter with their own ‘pale deadly fire’, kindled in a ‘pit of deadly thought.’ They are bestial but filled with purpose, gloating over the trapped hobbits.

Frodo and Sam try to back away, but the eyes advance on them as they move. Frodo lowers the Phial, daunted, and suddenly, as if to let its prey run a little in sport, the malice that has held them paralyzed relaxes. They try to run, but the eyes come leaping after them. The stench of death fills the tunnel like a cloud. ‘Stand, stand!’ [Frodo] cried desperately. ‘Running is no use.’

The eyes creep closer. Frodo gathers his courage and lifts the Phial higher, invoking the name Galadriel, and the eyes relax, ‘as if some hint of doubt troubled them.’ Frodo’s heart flames within him, and drawing the Elvish blade Sting, now burning bright blue, and holding the star-glass high in the other hand, whether ‘in folly or despair or courage,’ he advances on the horrible eyes.

And the eyes quail and draw back before him, filled with doubt in the deadly brightness suddenly afflicting them. ‘From sun and moon and star they had been safe underground, but now a star had descended into the very earth.’ The eyes grow dark and move away; the hobbits see ‘a huge bulk’ turning in the shadow behind the light of the eyes. Then they are gone.

‘Stars and glory!’ Sam exclaims. The Elves would make a song about that if they live to tell them about it. But Frodo mustn’t pursue the eyes down into that dark den; they’ve got to run while they have the chance. They flee back the way they had been headed, the hatred of watcher lurking undefeated behind them, but the path easier as it climbs higher above the stenches of the lair. They begin to revive as a cold, thin air comes down to meet them. They feel the tunnel’s end is before them and they pant forward, seeking open space, when they are suddenly flung backward.

They have hit a barrier, not stone, but soft and a little yielding, but impervious; air filters through it but no light. Frodo raises the star-glass to examine it. ‘Across the width and height of the tunnel a vast web was spun, orderly as the web of some huge spider, but denser woven and far greater, and each thread as thick as a rope.’

Cobwebs! Sam laughs grimly. ‘Is that all? Cobwebs! But what a spider!’ He tries to hack at them with his barrow-blade, but it just bounces rebounding off the web. After several blows he finally manages to sever one strand, which recoils and snaps his hand. At this rate it will take days to clear a way through, and they can still feel the eyes upon them, making plans.

‘Trapped in the end!’ said Sam bitterly.  ‘Gnats in a net.’ May Faramir’s curse bite Gollum quickly for his treachery. This was the purpose of his plan all along.  Frodo says that wouldn’t help them now. He gives Sam the Phial to hold up. He will try the blade of Sting on the webbing. ‘There were webs of horror in the dark ravines of Beleriand where it was forged.’

The keen edge of Sting slices through the webs, and Frodo slashes at them until the way is cleared as high as he can reach, the webbing blowing like a veil in the wind pouring in. ‘The trap was broken.’ Frodo is giddy with joy, ‘wild joy at their escape from the very mouth of despair suddenly filled all his mind.’ He springs forward, urging Sam on. He bursts out into the sullen gloom of dying day, but after the absolute darkness of the tunnel it seems like ‘a morning of sudden hope.’

The cleft of the pass of Cirith Ungol is before him, horns of rock on either side. A short race and they’ll be through into Mordor! Frodo calls shrilly to Sam to run, and they’ll be through before anyone can stop them. Sam follows quickly but uneasily, gazing behind them, fearing to see eyes, or worse, springing after them.

‘Too little did he or his master know of the craft of Shelob. She had many exits from her lair.’

Bits and Bobs

The Phial of Galdriel seems to be in some way psychoactive; as the bravery and confidence of the bearer grows, so does its light. In part of the first draft of the story Frodo says he hasn’t used it before for fear of frightening Gollum; its elven nature would have been sure to pain him and drive him away.

The Lord of the Rings: A Reader’s Companion points out that Shelob could not have heard Elves crying ‘Hail Earendil!’ until after the end of the First Age. This echoes the first line of the Anglo-Saxon poem ‘Crist’ which inspired the very first parts of Tolkien’s Legendarium. Where did that sudden inspiration to cry it come from? The Valar? Something worked into the Phial by Galadriel herself? Some special providence? At any rate, it seems to have no potency against Shelob’s ‘powers of night, old and strong.’

In some way this encounter can be seen as a duel between the light of Galadriel (invoked by Frodo) and Shelob’s darkness. Both are ancient female powers going back to the First Age. Beleriand (‘Balar-land’, named after the Bay of Balar, a prominent feature) was the area of Middle-earth where the main action of The Silmarillion took place. At the time of The Lord of the Rings, Beleriand lies mostly under the waves, a result of the Great Battle against Morgoth. Great spiders, spawn of Ungoliant, haunted the passes near Ered Gorgoroth and harried Beren on his flight toward Doriath.

Shelob’s eyes, faceted like an insect’s, show she is only ‘most like a spider’; while spiders have multiple eyes, they are not ‘compounded’, like a fly’s.  They ‘break’ the light that enters them. Her webs are ‘a greyness which the radiance of the star-glass did not pierce and did not illuminate, as if it were a shadow that being cast by no light, no light could dissipate.’ While her mother Ungoliant lusted to devour light, Shelob is pained and fearful of it.

At this point of the story, the only part of Shelob that has been seen are her eyes. That is soon to change.

Into the Archive: A Variety of Interests

 

(See that book on his knees? I happen to know that is a diagram of Shelob's Lair. At least forty years too early.)

Well! I didn’t really expect to get a delivery on Sunday, especially since I’d only made the order on Thursday. But there the Amazon box was at 11 AM this morning. I quickly brought it in and opened it up, and the first thing I did was that I read:

 Tolkien: Lighting Up the Darkness (Graphic Novel, Hardcover 2024)

by Willy Duraffourg (Author), Giancarlo Caracuzzo (Artist)

I said I was going to get it and I did. It only took about an hour or so to read, which I did with some attention. All in all, it seems a good production, though there are a few minor details that I find kind of annoying and which take me out of the narrative with a bit of a bump. For one thing, they use a variety of terms and phrases that don’t ring quite true for the times; for example, a school-fellow calls a young Tolkien a ‘newbie,’ a word that is only recorded from the 1970’s.

Another interesting development I find (it was dominant in the biographical movie Tolkien, 2019) is the growing tendency to try to ‘explain’ The Lord of the Rings by relating it largely to Tolkien’s experiences in WWI. Perhaps this whole trend was started in some way by John Garth’s Tolkien and the Great War (2003). The main body of the graphic novel is taken up with the story of his service, with a slim section on his childhood and courtship with Edith at the front, and an even slimmer summation of his writing success and final years. I can understand the easily produced dramatic potential of romance and adventure of the time; even Humphrey Carpenter in his authorized biography claims that ‘nothing much happened’ to him after the war years. Nothing much but lived his life and developed all the stories he became famous for. 

Duraffourg does a good job of the ‘enjambment’ of bits of the early ‘elven’ poems written at this period, though they seem to have little to do with the action around Tolkien as he writes them, save as a haven away from horrors. Tolkien himself has stated that neither World War had much to do with his tales, that the main inspiration for the Legendarium was language. But long difficult nights working in hours stolen from his waking days would be much more difficult to dramatize.

But, all in all, and in broad terms, it is a fair summation of an exciting phase in Tolkien’s life. The artwork is good if a little bland sometimes (faces tend not to be too characteristic). Although I enjoyed Lighting Up the Darkness for a brief hour, I’m not sure I can see myself coming back to it very often. But I had to read it.

The Classic of Mountains and Seas (Penguin Classics) Paperback – January 1, 2000

by Anonymous (Author), Anne Birrell (Editor, Translator, Introduction)

This major source of Chinese mythology (third century BC to second century AD) contains a treasure trove of rare data and colorful fiction about the mythical figures, rituals, medicine, natural history, and ethnic peoples of the ancient world.

The Classic of Mountains and Seas explores 204 mythical figures such as the gods Foremost, Fond Care, and Yellow, and goddesses Queen Mother of the West and Girl Lovely, as well as many other figures unknown outside this text. This eclectic Classic also contains crucial information on early medicine (with cures for impotence and infertility), omens to avert catastrophe, and rites of sacrifice, and familiar and unidentified plants and animals. It offers a guided tour of the known world in antiquity, moving outwards from the famous mountains of central China to the lands “beyond the seas.” – Amazon.

I remember seeing this book in our local Hastings, maybe 20 years ago, and being very intrigued. Now, with my renewed interest in Chinese tales, it seemed the time to finally get it. It may be a while before I finally get to it, but it awaits.

 

The third and final object in my haul was A Man for All Seasons (1966; DVD 2007). I first saw this film in an English class in middle school. The movie itself (based on a stage play) obviously doesn’t care for Saint Thomas More’s stand for his religion so much as his situation as a parable about Liberty of Conscience under pressure from the state. Still, a worthy stance. I am going far to having a string of historical movies covering Edward the III to Charles the II. I suppose I’ll have to get Anne of a Thousand Days and Cromwell next. Jam-packed with great actors.

• Director‏ : ‎ Fred Zinnemann
• Media Format: ‎ Multiple Formats, NTSC, Widescreen, AC-3, Subtitled, Color, Dolby, Closed-captioned, Dubbed, Special Edition
• Run time‏: ‎ 2 hours
• Release date ‏: ‎ February 20, 2007
• Actors ‏ : ‎ Paul Scofield, Wendy Hiller, Leo McKern, Robert Shaw, Orson Welles, John Hurt, Colin Blakely (Kent in Olivier’s King Lear)

Basic Reading: Sunday Penance

 

Torture Stake, Not a Cross

I hesitated a long while whether to include this part in Basic Reading, mostly because it wasn’t really reading in any sort of creative sense, and it was never meant to be. It was meant to be a mind-numbing, soul-crushing, bland food to be crammed down and spewed forth again by rote. For seven long years we were isolated from participating in anything social, political, cultural or historical, except for anything pertaining to the Jehovah’s Witnesses, and it made us odd. I don’t really want to blame Mom, although she was responsible for it (Pop certainly didn’t care about it but went along with things to be peaceful); she was just as duped as anyone and got out as soon as she realized a few things.

By a peculiar sort of paradox, we were encouraged to be as intelligent and as well-mannered as we could be, to prove how superior our way of life was to ‘the outside world.’ We were just forbidden to use that intelligence for anything but the propagation of the Ministry. ‘Art’, both literary and graphic, was discouraged, except for the simple, sanitized, bland offerings served up by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society. Among the children of the Kingdom Hall, there could be no other allowed subject of enthusiastic conversation, no cartoons, no TV shows, no music, no movies. That was all ‘worldly.’ Not that such things weren’t indulged in on the sly. You couldn’t help it.

Well. These days I try not to dwell on that period too much, to give it too much oxygen, as it were. It is too bitter. No birthdays, no holidays, no friends (‘worldly associates’), all cut out of the deepest heart of my childhood. I think that was the one aspect of the business that Pop appreciated: not having to buy presents for his swarming brood on any regular basis.

But out of such arid fare as the Kingdom Hall (not a Church; those were corrupt!) offered us, we still tried to squeeze some imaginative or even spiritual nourishment.  ‘Reading’ included all the candy-colored Watch Tower Society ‘study books’ we were expected to buy, and it was a bonus if they had any illustrations.

Off we would go every Sunday, each boy armed with a purple song book (not a hymnal!) and a bright green translation of the Scriptures (not a Bible, but a New World Translation of the Holy Scripture!), the famous ‘Green Ghost’ produced by no known translators or scholars but strictly vetted to adhere to JW doctrine. On the inside cover they did have a world map, showing the lands and peoples of the ancient world, including a friendly little dinosaur wandering the sandy wastes of Africa. What were we to make of that?

We did get some mileage poring over the map, the only ‘illustration’ allowed in the book. Perhaps my fascination with maps in other Fantasy books even stems from the JW version of their ‘Bible’.

But for reading (not at the Kingdom Hall, of course, that was given over to ‘talks’ and ‘studies’) we kids had the Paradise book (From Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained), a large, profusely illustrated volume following the retelling of ‘salvation history’ from the JW slant, for children. That was better, in a way, because it included fantastical drawings (wizards! dragons! miracles! slaughter! torture!) as did the magazines The Watchtower and Awake! These regularly featured sinners getting theirs (just getting killed, of course, Hell didn’t exist) and the saved enjoying a romp in Paradisal Earth. Fear, not love, was a big part of indoctrination. There was certainly no comfort.

Well. Like I said, I should leave it be; I’ve already gone on too long about it. It happened, and it can’t ‘unhappen’, although it was certainly unhappy. It still lurks in the dark corners of my memory, but at least it has been washed out of my spirit. I’m just glad it did not sour me on God.