Giving Fairy Tales a Kick

        Continuing my series of posts about Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns, (my upcoming collection of short stories, poetry, and art) today I’m focussing on fairy tales.  Unlike the Greek and Roman mythology I wrote about in the last post, I have loved fairy tales since childhood.  I’ve been writing my own fairy tales since at least age the age of 7 (see one at my post Staples and Crayons), but it was when I was 9 years old that I really started to go crazy with fairy tales.  I read every single fairy tale book in the relatively small library I had access to in Galway, Ireland, and then the following year I continued to read all the fairy tale anthologies in the much larger and better-stocked library in my home town of Cleveland Heights, Ohio.  It’s true that fairy tales can be dark, full of violence, sexism, stereotypes, and often unsatisfactory characterization and motivations, so why do I love fairy tales while disliking classical mythology?  Well, I’ll start by stating the perhaps-obvious point that I don’t like every fairy tale, but on the whole fairy tales hold up visions of agency and initiative, justice (if not always mercy), virtue rewarded, and Happy Endings.  (Compare that with classical mythology’s inexorable fate, arbitrary and selfish gods acting with impunity, and an awful lot of ever-compounding tragedy.)

        In my voracious reading of fairy tales throughout my childhood (and to this day) I was consuming stories collected from all around the world, but for this section of my own book I’m specifically looking at the traditional European fairy tales, and here’s what I’ve got in the draft of the book so far:

The Princess and the Pea (art)

Snow White (short story, artwork just sketched)

Sleeping Beauty (2 poems, a series of 13 poems, short story, art)

Rumpelstiltskin (short story, art just sketched)

Rapunzel (poem, art)

Jack and the Beanstalk (short story)

Jorinde and Joringel (poem - forthcoming in Strange Horizons!)

Baba Yaga (art)

        The really fun thing about taking inspiration from these classic tales is that I get to catch hold of the sparks that enchant me even in the midst of story elements that may be unreasonable or objectionable.  Do you have any favorite songs that you love even though the lyrics are problematic?  You love the music, the voice, the vibe, even though logically you can’t agree with the message in the words?  There are fairy tales like that for me.  “Sleeping Beauty” has always been one of my favorites not for the plot, but for the strange and beautiful setting of the enchanted castle falling asleep behind its mysterious hedge of thorns.  The descriptions in the Grimms’ version are wonderfully evocative in their specificity.  I love the music of the tale.  So I’ve found four different sparks within the fairy tale "Sleeping Beauty," and blown on them until they caught fire, and let them lead me in four different directions, all inspired by the magic of the traditional tale, but all unrelated to each other.  So much fun!

        While I’m on the topic of fairy tales, I’ll go on a bit of a tangent to note that they’re generally not taken very seriously as literature, and are often assumed to be children’s fare, which is actually quite absurd.  I have a theory that in the entire history of humankind there has been a period of only about one hundred years in which fantasy was treated as the province of children (and perhaps even worse, women!)  Tales of fantasy were told by and for adults through all the millennia of Gilgamesh and the Odyssey, Beowulf and King Arthur, the Thousand and One Nights and wicked stepmothers.  These stories were shared with children, but they were not thought childish.  Then the Enlightenment turned sensible adult (manly) thoughts toward logic and science, and Victorians invented the modern concept of childhood as a time of innocence before rationality took over, and bingo - the idea of fantasy was assigned to the realm of childhood.  We’re working our way back out of that attitude again now, and authors, critics, and readers are all starting to take speculative fiction much more seriously.  Within that very broad field, fairy tales are just one small corner, but they were probably my first introduction to fantasy and they retain an enduring resonance for me.  I hope my explorations and re-imaginings will find a resonance in you, too.

        The Kickstarter campaign to bring this book to life was fully funded in just one week, which means I can spend the rest of the campaign (it runs until Sept. 29) with all the excitement and none of the stress!  I’m enormously grateful to the fans who have believed in this project and backed it.  THANK YOU!  If you haven’t backed Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns yet, but think it might be of interest, by all means head over to Kickstarter and peruse all the details about the book and other fun rewards I’ve got planned.  I’d love to have you join the team that’s making it possible to bring this project to life.

        As for fairy tales, which are your favorites?  Do you have favorite motifs that reappear in many tales?  I’d love to hear which fairy tale sparks are most magical to you!

[Images: Sleeping Beauty teaser, details of poem and rubber block print, 2017;

Illustration for Jorinde Remembers, collage from two rubber block prints (including the castle from Castle on a Bay, which you can see at NydamPrints.com).]

Giving Classical Mythology a Kick

         The Kickstarter campaign for my next book, Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns, is 74% funded, and it would be unreasonable for anyone to expect me to be able to think about anything else right now.  I’m so grateful to the backers who jumped right in to get me off to a strong start… but now we enter the knuckle-biting stage!  Yes, I’m optimistic that we’ll make it, but I won’t stop stressing until it’s 100%.  So until then, let me share some more teasers and tidbits.

        To recap, this book will be a collection of short stories, poems, and art, all of which are inspired by, riffing on, or jumping off from traditional fairy tales, myths, and folklore.  Today I’m digging a little deeper into the classical myths that have inspired pieces in my current draft.

        Here’s the funny thing about it: unlike fairy tales, I never really liked Greek and Roman mythology.  Primarily this was because all the gods and heroes just seem so unpleasant: always wrangling and jockeying to score status points, not to mention raping and murdering with impunity, while innocent humans are always the collateral damage.  How can you respect such a petty, vindictive bunch, let alone worshipping them?  But perhaps my dislike of these classical myths is precisely why I’ve ended up exploring and reimagining a number of them.  How would the stories change if I changed the way I thought of the characters and their motives?  How can I salvage a more interesting, meaningful message by holding the stories in a different light?  In the case of Persephone, for example, I’ve written both a story and a poem, but each one looks at a completely different angle of the myth, and takes it in a completely different direction to re-imagine it with a completely different message.

        Here’s what I’ve got so far:

Pandora’s Box (short story, art)

Persephone in the Underworld (short story, poem, art)

Medusa (poem, art)

Pygmalion and Galatea (short story)

The Theban Sphinx (poem, art)

Potnia Theron “Mistress of the Animals” (art)

Siren (short story)

Cyclops (art)

        That’s just where things stand as of today.  They’ll all have art eventually; the illustration for the siren’s story is sketched but not yet transferred to rubber and carved, and I haven’t started anything yet for Pygmalion.  Then there’s the weird sci fi idea I’ve been mulling for a while now about the Trojan Horse.  Perhaps that will get written in time for inclusion in the book — or perhaps there will be something else I haven’t thought of yet at all.  Who knows?

        How do you feel about these famous myths?  Do you have favorites — or least favorites?  They’re such a foundational part of European/Western culture that whether you like them or not, they’re in the air all around us.  Even though I don’t always care for the original myths, it turns out that I’ve really enjoyed reckoning with some of them, and allowing my imagination to see where they can take me, and where I can take them.  When Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns is finally completed and out in the world, I hope that my new twists will inspire you to rethink these myths and what they can tell us.

        To check out all the details about this project, please visit the Kickstarter campaign.  And if you should feel inspired to back this project, I’d be very grateful indeed!

[Pictures: Queen of the Underworld teaser, details of story and rubber block print with watercolor by AEGNydam, 2025 (See original at NydamPrints.com);

Apotropaic, rubber block print by AEGNydam, 2025 (Image from NydamPrints.com).]

Once Upon a Time There Was a Kickstarter...

         Here we go again!  I’ve launched another Kickstarter campaign for another book!  Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns will be the same format as my last book (Bittersweetness & Light), which means it’s a collection of my short stories, poems, and relief block print artwork.  All the stories in this book (and I consider poems and artwork as telling stories, too) are inspired by and riffing on traditional European fairy tales, classical mythology, and a smattering of other myths and folklore.  Sometimes I stay close to the traditional roots, and sometimes I use them as a jumping off point to head in a completely different direction.  But why start with these well-known stories?  Myths and fairy tales are popular, powerful, sticky stories that catch in our imaginations and stay with us for generation after generation.  Although they may not always be taken very seriously as literature these days, the fact is that folklore has always been one of the most important ways people have wrestled with what it means to be alive in the world.  They help us grapple with big issues and explain to ourselves why things are the way they are, and how things should be.  Folklore includes the way culture is embodied in stories, and the way stories express what it means to be human.

        I’ve always been fascinated by fairy tales (you can read some prior posts about Some Favorite Fairy Tales and Grimms’ Fairy Tale Collections) but there’s no denying that some of them are strange and dark and problematic.  There are stories I fell in love with that fill me with delight and fuel my imagination of wondrous things, but there are also stories that disturb and depress me with their oppressive, cynical, outdated messages.  In either case, though, they can get me thinking about the things I believe are true.  And they can get me questioning how a story that doesn’t seem right to me might be reimagined into something that does ring more true.  What else might be going on before, after, and around the edges?  How else might events be interpreted?  What if one little thing were changed - or a larger thing?  What if it were all set in a different time or place?  Why might these strange or disturbing things have happened?  Who else might be living in this world and watching events unfold?  How can I glean out the unexpected sparks of magic while overturning those elements that I reject?  After all, another reason these stories have stayed popular for so long is that they’re multi-layered and multi-faceted.  Every time you look at them from a different angle, you see something new.

        Want some examples of what will be appearing in Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns?  Here are a few teasers…

Pandora’s Box - What’s so bad about curiosity, anyway?

Baba Yaga - Maybe it takes a flock to raise a witch.

The Green Girl Thinks of Home

Scheherazade - Prayer for the first night.

        I’ve been responding to these magical stories for a long time, and now I’m pulling it all together and offering it as a collection of wonder and delight.  It’ll be printed in full color inside and out, a little larger than an ordinary paperback to give the artwork more room.  It won’t be as explicitly focused on hope and joy as my last book, but it’s still me here, so yes, I still try to hold up the power of kindness and look for ways to foster hope and joy.  Fairy tales can be dark and myths can be cruel, but these stories are ultimately how we remind ourselves that straw can be spun into gold, riddles can be answered, curses can be broken, and glass mountains can be climbed.

        If this sounds like something that might be of interest to you, nip on over to my Kickstarter campaign and find out all the details.  I’d love to have you join me in bringing these old stories to new life!

[Picture: Beyond Pomegranate & Thorns, working cover design by AEGNydam, 2025.]