You say 'Faeries' & I say 'Fairies'

[davem]

Firstly, I want to apologise for including two long quotes - though the second may be of interest to Downers, as it is from an essay by Tolkien on Smith of Wooton Major, which has just been published for the first time in a new edition of Smith edited by Verlyn Flieger.

The first quote is from ‘Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell’ by Susanna Clarke:

The camp was a dreary, silent place. A thick snow was falling and the strange soldiers lay, wrapped in their black cloaks, upon the snowy ground. At first the young women thought the soldiers must be dead - an impression which was strengthened by the great multitude of ravens and other black birds which had settled over the camp, and indeed upon the prostrate forms of the soldiers themselves - yet the soldiers were not dead; from time to time one would stir himself and go attend to his horse, or brush a bird away if it tried to peck at his face.
At the approach of the young women a soldier got to his feet. One of the women shook off her fears and went up to him and kissed him on the mouth.
His skin was very pale (it shone like moonlight) and entirely without blemish. His hair was long and straight like a fall of dark brown water. The bones of his face were unnaturally fine and strong. The expression of the face was solemn. His blue eyes were long and slanting and his brows were as fine and dark as pen strokes with a curious flourish at the end. None of this worried the girl in the least. For all she knew every Dane, Scot and Frenchman ever born is eerily beautiful.
He took well enough to the kiss and allowed her to kiss him again. Then he paid her back in kind. Another soldier rose from the ground and opened his mouth. Out of it came a sad, wailing sort ofrnusic. The first soldier- the one the girl had kissed - began to coax her to dance with him, pushing her this way and that with his long white fingers until she was dancing in a fashion to suit him.
This went on for some time until she became heated with the dance and paused for a moment to take off her cloak. Then her companions saw that drops of blood, like beads of sweat, were forming on her arms, face and legs, and falling on to the snow. This sight terrified them and so they ran away. The strange army never entered Allendale. It rode on in the night towards Carlisle. The next day the townspeople went cautiously up to the fields where the army had camped. There they found the girl, her body entirely white and drained of blood while the snow around her was stained bright red.
By these signs they recognised the Daoine Sidhe - the Fairy Host.

These are the Fairies of ‘British’ Tradition - English, Welsh, Scottish & Irish. These Fairies are dangerous, contemptuous of Man. They are called the ‘Good People’ in Ireland, not because they are good, but in order to placate them.

In ballads like Tam Lin a human is captured by the Fairies & made to serve them. Tam Lin is rescued by his love, the Fair Janet, & when the Fairy Queen discovers this she spits out angrily that if she had known of the lovers’ plan she would have removed Tam Lin’s eyes & heart & replaced them with stones.

In another Ballad, Thomas the Rhymer, Thomas is taken to Elfland by the Queen, where he serves her for seven years & is rewarded with a coat of velvet green & the gift of the ‘Tongue that cannot lie’ (ie prophecy). Interestingly this ballad is based on an actual Scottish prophet, Thomas of Erceldoune, who lived at the time of Robert the Bruce & William Wallace, & to whom are attributed many genuine prophecies. Thomas comes off well in comparison to Tam Lin, retaining access to Faerie - indeed it is said that he didn’t die, but passed into Faerie & dwells there still. Another example of such a real person who passed into Faerie rather than dying & still dwells there is the 17th century Reverend Robert Kirk, author of ‘The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns & Fairies’, a major work of fairy lore. Celtic myth & English folklore is replete with tales of dangerous Fairies, who threaten humans - even killing them with ‘elf-shot’. A few people are taken in by Fairies, but the majority of ordinary people kept a safe distance - if they could.

Now to Tolkien. As I said, this quote is from the Smith Essay:

It is plainly shown that Faery is a vast world in its own right, that does not depend for its existence upon Men, and which is not primarily nor indeed principally concerned with Men. The relationship must therefore be one of love: the Elven Folk, the chief and ruling inhabitants of Faery, have an ultimate kinship with Men and have a permanent love for them in general. Though they are not bound by any moral obligation to assist Men, and do not need their help (except in human affairs), they do from time to time try to assist them. avert evil from them and have relations with them, especially through certain men and women whom they find suitable. They, the Elvenfolk, are thus 'beneficent' with regard to Men, and are not wholly alien, though many things and creatures in Faery itself are alien to Men and even actively hostile. Their good will is seen mainly in attempting to keep or restore relationships betWeen the two worlds, since the Elves (and still some Men) realize that this love of Faery is essential to the full and proper human development. The love of Faery is the love of love: a relationship towards all things. animate and inanimate, which includes love and respect, and removes or modifies e spirit of possession and domination. Without it even plain 'Utility' will in fact become less useful; or will turn to ruthlessness and lead only to mere power, ultimately destructive. The Apprentice relation in the tale is thus interesting. Men in a large part of their activities are or should be in an apprentice status as regards the Elven folk. In an attempt to rescue Wootton from its decline, the Elves reverse the situation, and the King of faery himself COmes and serves as an apprentice in the village...

BUT Faery is not religious. It is fairly evident that it is not Heaven or Paradise. Certainly its inhabitants, Elves, are not angels or emlssares of God (direct). The tale does not deal with religion itself. The Elves are not busy with a plan to reawake religious devotion in Wootton. The Cooking allegory would not be suitable to any such import. Faery represents at its weakest a breaking out (at least in mind) from the iron ring of the familiar, stilI more from the adamantine ring of belief that it is known, possessed, controlled, and so (ultimately) all that is worth being considered - a constant awareness of a world beyond these rings. More strongly it represents love: that is, a love and respect for all things, 'inanimate' and 'animate', an unposessing love of them as 'other'. This 'love' will produce both ruth and delight. Things seen in its light will be respected, and they will also appear delightful, beautiful, wonderful - even glorious.

Of course, Tolkien stated (in ‘On Fairy Stories’) that Faerie is a perilous realm, with ‘dungeons for the overbold’. Yet, even in Smith, which the story of his most concerned with traditional Faerie & its inhabitants, there is none of the Fairy cruelty & malice which we see in the traditional tales (or in Clarke’s story). Tolkien’s Faeries in SoWM are compassionate beings concerned with human welfare, & who are willing to make sacrifices to aid humans. They are motivated by love & desire to liberate Men from ‘the adamantine ring of belief that it is known, possessed, controlled, and so (ultimately) all that is worth being considered ’. In short, Tolkien’s faeries are (just as his Elves) a unique creation. Of course, the Legendarium Elves are dangerous, but not in the traditional way. Tolkien stated in one of the Letters that they area an aspect of the ‘human’. They are dangerous in the way that human beings may be dangerous - proud, violent, conceited - but in a human way, not a traditional fairy way. They are human beings depicted in sharp relief, with human failings writ large. None of the Legendarium Elves would (or could) do what Clarke’s Fairies did.

That is not to say that the Faeries Smith meets are all ‘sweetness & light’ - the Elven mariners are terrifying figures who leave Smith cowering - but they are not malicious - malice is not part of their nature. They are either unconcerned with humanity or they are on the side of Man. In short, traditional Fairies are incapable of human emotions like love while Tolkien’s faeries are motivated by that emotion than any other.

Tolkien’s Faeries desire to awaken Men to the beauty & strangeness of the natural world (without, as Tolkien says, having any ‘religious’ motives - ‘The Elves are not busy with a plan to reawake religious devotion in Wootton.’ they are not ‘angels or emissaries of God’.

So, while Tolkien’s Faeries wish to re-awaken a love of, & sense of oneness with, the natural world, traditional Fairies are a manifestation of its wildness, terror & fearsomeness - they make the natural world a place of fear & are a constant threat to humans who stray there, & a terror to humans who go in fear of their intrusion. We may dream of meeting one of Tolkien’s Faeries in the woods, but meeting one of Clarke’s traditional Fairies is more the stuff of nightmare.

So, what was behind Tolkien’s changing of these traditional creatures from malicious to beneficent beings? SoWM was the last story Tolkien published, & I can’t help wondering about the evolution of Galadriel here - she became increasingly ‘sanctified’, increasingly ‘purged of the gross’ in the post LotR writings. Why? Why take traditional beings & alter them so radically? In Appendix F to LotR Tolkien states that he chose the traditional word ‘Elves’ to refer to his Eldar, as that was the closest word he could find in modern usage. He could not really claim this about his use of ‘Faeries’ in SoWM. Here he takes figures from legend & changes them totally.

Was he simply playing fast & loose with tradition, or was there more to it?