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198 pages

English

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Selkie, wee people, elves, fauns, mogwai -- no matter what you call them, virtually every cultural tradition has created a type of being that is analogous to the Western concept of the fairy. In this fascinating analysis, scholar Edwin Sidney Hartland delves into the inner workings of the ubiquitous fairy myth and traces its impact across many cultures.

Sujets

Sociologie, société et politique

Folclore

Folklore

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Publié par	The Floating Press
Date de parution	01 juin 2012
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781775458425
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0164€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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THE SCIENCE OF FAIRY TALES
AN INQUIRY INTO FAIRY MYTHOLOGY
* * *
EDWIN SIDNEY HARTLAND

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The Science of Fairy Tales An Inquiry into Fairy Mythology First published in 1891 ISBN 978-1-77545-842-5 © 2012 The Floating Press and its licensors. All rights reserved. While every effort has been used to ensure the accuracy and reliability of the information contained in The Floating Press edition of this book, The Floating Press does not assume liability or responsibility for any errors or omissions in this book. The Floating Press does not accept responsibility for loss suffered as a result of reliance upon the accuracy or currency of information contained in this book. Do not use while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment. Many suitcases look alike. Visit www.thefloatingpress.com
Contents
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Preface Chapter I - The Art of Story-Telling Chapter II - Savage Ideas Chapter III - Fairy Births and Human Midwives Chapter IV - Fairy Births and Human Midwives (Continued) Chapter V - Changelings Chapter VI - Robberies from Fairyland Chapter VII - The Supernatural Lapse of Time in Fairyland Chapter VIII - The Supernatural Lapse of Time in Fairyland(Continued) Chapter IX - The Supernatural Lapse of Time in Fairyland(Continued) Chapter X - Swan-Maidens Chapter XI - Swan-Maidens (Continued) Chapter XII - Conclusion Appendix Endnotes
Preface
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The chief object of this volume is to exhibit, in a manner acceptable toreaders who are not specialists, the application of the principles andmethods which guide investigations into popular traditions to a few ofthe most remarkable stories embodying the Fairy superstitions of theCeltic and Teutonic peoples. Some of the subjects discussed have alreadybeen dealt with by more competent inquirers. But even in these cases Ihave sometimes been able to supply additional illustrations of theconclusions previously arrived at, and occasionally, I hope, to carrythe argument a step or two further than had been done before. I havethus tried to render the following pages not wholly valueless tostudents.
A portion of the book incorporates the substance of some articles whichI contributed to "The Archaeological Review" and "Folk-Lore." But thesehave been to a considerable extent re-written; and it is hoped that inthe process wider and more accurate generalizations have been attained.
My hearty thanks are due to the various friends whose generousassistance has been recorded in the footnotes, and especially toProfessor Dr. George Stephens, the veteran antiquary of the North, andMr. W. G. Fretton, who have not measured their pains on behalf of onewhose only claim on them was a common desire to pry into the recesses ofthe past. I am under still deeper obligations to Mr. G. L. Gomme,F.S.A., who has so readily acceded to my request that he would read theproof-sheets, and whose suggestions have repeatedly been of the greatestvalue; and to Mr. Havelock Ellis for the counsel and suggestions whichhis experience has more than once enabled him to give as the book waspassing through the press.
I have been anxious to enable the reader who cares to do so to verifyevery statement made; but some of them no doubt have escaped reference.Many books are cited again and again, and in similar cases the reader'stime is frequently wasted in searching for the first mention of a book,so as to ascertain its title and other particulars. To avoid the troubleI have so many times experienced in this way, I have put together in anAppendix a list of the principal authorities made use of, indicatingthem by the short title by which they are cited in the footnotes, andgiving sufficient bibliographical details to enable them to beidentified. Classics and works which are in every one's hands I have notthought it necessary to include in the list.
E. S. H.
BARNWOOD COURT, GLOUCESTER,
24th October, 1890.
Chapter I - The Art of Story-Telling
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The art of story-telling—Unity of human imagination—Definition of Fairy Tales—Variable value of Tradition—Story-telling and the story-teller among various peoples—The connection of folk-tales with folk-songs—Continuity of Tradition—Need of accuracy and good faith in reporting stories.
The art of story-telling has been cultivated in all ages and among allnations of which we have any record; it is the outcome of an instinctimplanted universally in the human mind. By means of a story the savagephilosopher accounts for his own existence and that of all the phenomenawhich surround him. With a story the mothers of the wildest tribes awetheir little ones into silence, or rouse them into delight. And theweary hunters beguile the long silence of a desert night with the mirthand wonders of a tale. The imagination is not less fruitful in thehigher races; and, passing through forms sometimes more, sometimes less,serious, the art of story-telling unites with the kindred arts of danceand song to form the epic or the drama, or develops under the complexinfluences of modern life into the prose romance and the novel. These intheir various ways are its ultimate expression; and the loftiest geniushas found no fitter vehicle to convey its lessons of truth and beauty.
But even in the most refined products of the imagination the samesubstances are found which compose the rudest. Something has, of course,been dropped in the process; and where we can examine the process stageby stage, we can discern the point whereat each successive portion hasbeen purged away. But much has also been gained. To change the figure,it is like the continuous development of living things, amorphous atfirst, by and by shooting out into monstrous growths, unwieldy andhalf-organized, anon settling into compact and beautiful shapes ofsubtlest power and most divine suggestion. But the last state containsnothing more than was either obvious or latent in the first. Man'simagination, like every other known power, works by fixed laws, theexistence and operation of which it is possible to trace; and it worksupon the same material,—the external universe, the mental and moralconstitution of man and his social relations. Hence, diverse as may seemat first sight the results among the cultured Europeans and the debasedHottentots, the philosophical Hindoos and the Red Indians of the FarWest, they present, on a close examination, features absolutelyidentical. The outlines of a story-plot among savage races are wilderand more unconfined; they are often a vast unhidebound corpse, but onethat bears no distant resemblance to forms we think more reasonable onlybecause we find it difficult to let ourselves down to the level ofsavage ignorance, and to lay aside the data of thought which have beenwon for us by the painful efforts of civilization. The incidents, makingall due allowance for these differences and those of climate andphysical surroundings, are not merely alike; they are oftenindistinguishable. It cannot, of course, be expected that the charactersof the actors in these stories will be drawn with skill, or indeed thatany attention will be paid to them. Character-study is a latedevelopment. True: we ought not to overlook the fact that we have to dowith barbarous ideals. In a rudimentary state of civilization thepassions, like the arts, are distinguished not by subtlety andcomplexity, but by simplicity and violence of contrast. This may accountto some extent for what seems to us repulsive, inconsistent orimpossible. But we must above all things beware of crediting thestory-teller with that degree of conscious art which is only possible inan advanced culture and under literary influences. Indeed, theresearches which are constantly extending the history of humancivilization into a remoter and remoter past, go everywhere to show thatstory-telling is an inevitable and wholly unconscious growth, probablyarising, as we shall see in the next chapter, out of narratives believedto record actual events.
I need not stop now to illustrate this position, which is no new one,and the main lines of which I hope will be rendered apparent in thecourse of this volume. But it is necessary, perhaps, to point out that,although these are the premises from which I start, the limitationsimposed by a work of the size and pretensions of this one will not allowme to traverse more than a very small corner of the field here opened toview. It is, therefore, not my intention to attempt any formal proof ofthe foregoing generalizations. Rather I hope that if any reader deem itproper to require the complete evidence on which they rest, he will beled to further investigations on his own behalf. His feet, I can promisehim, will wander along flowery paths, where every winding will bring himfresh surprises, and every step discover new sources of enjoyment.
The stories with which we shall deal in the following pages are vaguelycalled Fairy Tales. These we may define to be: Traditionary narrativesnot in their present form relating to beings held to be divine, nor tocosmological or national events, but in which the supernatural plays anessential part. It will be seen that literary tales, such as those ofHans Andersen and Lord Brabourne, based though they often are upontradition, are excluded from Fairy Tales as thus defined. Much no doubtmight be said both interesting and instructive concerning thesebrilliant works. But it would be literary criticism, a thing widelydifferent from the scientific treatment of Fairy Tales. The Science ofFairy Tales is concerned with tradition, and not with literature. Itfinds its subjects in the stories which have descended from mouth tomouth from an unknown past; and if reference be occasionally made toworks of conscious literary art, the value of such works is not in theart they display, but the evidence they yield of the existence of giventales in certain forms at periods and places approximately capable ofdetermination: evidence, in a word, which appropriates and fixes apre-existing tradition. But even in this they are inferior in importance