It is difficult to say whether a book published in 2014 based on the theory of survivals is refreshing, or simply naïve. The premise of Children into Swans is that much of the strangeness and wonder of European folk and fairy tales is due to their underlying themes rooted in ancient paganism. Elf kings, animal transformations, and witches’ spells, according to this paradigm, descend directly from pre-Christian beliefs that found their way into these secular tales through the magic of oral tradition, preserving earlier elements of thought despite the new religious orthodoxy. This idea is one of the oldest in the disciplines of folklore and literary studies; indeed, it played a fundamental role in the emergence of these disciplines in the nineteenth century, only to be heavily critiqued and rejected by the mid-twentieth century. Nonetheless, it appears the author is unfamiliar with this tradition of scholarly criticism—or perhaps knowingly chooses to ignore it.
The book is divided into four parts: History, Characters, Stories from the Pagan Year, and Storyteller’s Themes. Jan Beveridge begins Part I by considering the importance of oral narratives in early Celtic and Norse traditions, noting that even in the Middle Ages, the pre-Christian past continued to fascinate literary authors, who set many of their stories in this older time period. She identifies “Echtra Condla” (Connla’s Adventure) in the Irish Book of the Dun Cow as “the oldest ‘fairy’ tale” because one of the hero’s exploits involves a meeting with a sídhe, or fairy woman, who eventually takes him away into the otherworld. The author considers the social forces that led medieval monks to preserve some of these tales, the development of the European literary folktale, as well as the process by which European folktales came to be objects of scholarship in the nineteenth century, demonstrating her familiarity with nineteenth-century folktale scholarship and its focus on pagan survivals. However, her knowledge of that topic appears to be stuck in the late-nineteenth or early-twentieth century.
The rest of the book treats characters such as fairies, elves, and giants, significant dates in the year cycle, and themes such as wishes granted, omens and prophecies, and spells. Each chapter features both a discussion and a story that is meant to serve as an example of the theme. These tales are never presented in their original form, but are retold by the author in her own words. While this makes the book expeditious and more accessible to the general reader, the serious folklorist will shudder at this complete disrespect for the original text and omission of potentially significant contextual detail. Anyone seriously interested in these tales must read them in their original form and not rely on bowdlerized versions.
Since this information is neither new nor useful to folklorists and literary scholars, one wonders who the audience for this volume is presumed to be. Certainly there is no dearth of interest in this theme among general readers; especially with the emergence of modern Paganisms, movements that reclaim, revive and reinvent pre-Christian religious traditions, there is a whole readership primed to receive this work with great enthusiasm. For them, as perhaps for those involved in creating fiction or video games based on folktales and myths, this book could be a treasure.
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[Review length: 538 words • Review posted on September 18, 2015]