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haami's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
informative
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.0
dilan11's review
challenging
informative
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
4.0
This is a book of stories that Yeats collected from the Irish countryside about faeries and their doings. It is also taken from stories told around the turn of the 20th century. It also includes some of Yeats's thoughts. It is very intriguing, more just a retelling than any sort of documented historical analysis. So not a scholarly book by any means. Much more lyrical and beautiful than that. Having little to no background in Irish folklore this was probably not the book for me to start with but definitely one I will go back to.
bhaines's review
Enjoyable how seriously he takes this despite the very silly nature of some of the stories. As a collection of tales it might have been pleasant if not that interesting, but the meta sections on belief and art and the shifts between the plain language of the folktales "One day I was at the house of my friend the strong farmer..." and leaning into poetic images is good. ("When all is said and done, how do we not know but that our own unreason my be better than another's truth? For it has been warmed on our hearths and in our souls, and is ready for the wild bees of truth to hive in it, and make their sweet honey.)
I like this idea of artists as compilers. Very different context but https://taxxpayermoney.wordpress.com/2022/05/13/the-internet-makes-us-human/ ends with this idea as the model of how to live 'online', and I think more generally in a world that is too large and connected to understand.
One of the things I remembered from reading ~5 years ago. Reading Le Guin's Language of Night and there are similar points to her defense of 'genre' writing as art.
---
Fun parts:
The young artist who does
What are you talking about man.
The old countryman who, re: the hedgehog:
("I am not certain that he distinguishes between the natural and supernatural very clearly")
The afterlife:
I have desired, like every artist, to create a little world out of the beautiful, pleasant, and significant things of this marred and clumsy world
I like this idea of artists as compilers. Very different context but https://taxxpayermoney.wordpress.com/2022/05/13/the-internet-makes-us-human/ ends with this idea as the model of how to live 'online', and I think more generally in a world that is too large and connected to understand.
He was a great teller of tales, and unlike our common romancers, knew how to empty heaven, hell, and purgatory, faeryland and earth, to people his stories. He did not live in a shrunken world, but knew of no less ample circumstance than did Homer himself. Perhaps the Gaelic people shall by his like bring back again the ancient simplicity and amplitude of imagination. What is literature but the expression of moods by the vehicle of symbol and incident? And are there not moods which need heaven, hell, purgatory, and faeryland for their expression, no less than this dilapidated earth? Nay, are there not moods which shall find no expression unless there be men who dare to mix heaven, hell, purgatory, and faeryland together, or even to set the heads of beasts to the bodies of men, or to thrust the souls of men into the heart of rocks? Let us go forth, the tellers of tales, and seize whatever prey the heart long for, and have no fear. Everything exists, everything is true, and the earth is only a little dust under our feet.
One of the things I remembered from reading ~5 years ago. Reading Le Guin's Language of Night and there are similar points to her defense of 'genre' writing as art.
---
Fun parts:
The young artist who does
not think I could ever write or paint any more. I prepare myself for a ccycle of othe activities in some other life. I will make rigid my roots and branches. It is not now my turn to burst into leaves and flowers.
What are you talking about man.
Christ Himself was not only blessed, but perfect in all many proportions in her eyes, so much do beauty and holiness go together in her thoughts. He alone of all men was exactly six feet high, all others are a little more or a little less.
The old countryman who, re: the hedgehog:
is certain that he steals apples by rolling about under an apple tree until there is an apple sticking to every quill
("I am not certain that he distinguishes between the natural and supernatural very clearly")
a little fellow about as high as his knee, but having a head as big as a man's body, came beside him and led him out of the path an' round about
The afterlife:
They live out their passionate lives not far off, as I think, and we shall be among them when we die if we but keep our natures simple and passionate. May it not even be that death shall unite us to all romance, and that some day we shall fight dragons among blue hills
ellieabouttown's review
adventurous
hopeful
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
vanjr's review
2.0
This book is well named. It contains a number of short sketches that discuss fairies and associated ghost like beings from Irish mythology or perspective. This is not true myth but subtle glimpses like at twilight. I am unsure if these are all Keats creations or if they are built on an earlier tradition. This book is prose (last entry is poetic). I had a hard time really "getting it." Hard to give a Nobel prize winner two stars, but I will say he got his Nobel in poetry and not prose. My version was one of those bland cover free Kindle books.
mrobison576's review
funny
informative
mysterious
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? N/A
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
Accidentally an extremely timely read for me.
This short book is one I found on Project Gutenberg through Holly Black’s research bibliography, and was able to breeze through it whenever I had off time at work. It consists of W. B. Yeats’s notes from interviewing his neighbors and the residents of nearby towns about their faerie folklore, intercut with his own poetry and his recounting of any visions he had while compiling this research. Almost every time I told one of my colleagues about it, they’d start telling me their own best ghost story or family legend, which was a very charming element of this reading experience.
The stories here ranged from typical faerie lore like mushroom rings to some of the most spooky and spine-chilling stuff I’ve read in a while (not to give anything away, but the campfire story is going to stick with me until I DIE), along with a couple skeptics who made me laugh out loud (girl who got mistaken for the Virgin Mary and was therefore very disillusioned with paranormal sightings, to me you are perfect). Every so often Yeats would make a final call on a lore contradiction like ‘changelings switch the soul of a child with the soul of a demon’ vs ‘they take the child and leave an altogether different faery child behind’ by asking Queen Maeve in a vision, which I also found extremely charming. Just got off the phone with the queen of the faeries and she says they DO switch the bodies, so there!!!!
But underneath it all, this book is about missing your loved ones and reassuring yourself that they’re doing okay without you, even when you have a lingering suspicion that something horrible happened to them. I’ve been very melancholy lately with missing people, especially this week, since this week last year was when I had my trip to visit all my friends I hadn’t seen for two years. It’s been so hard to be like, this time last year I had just gotten to Rachel’s and we were eating the cookies I brought, now it’s when I was eating wings with Rachel and Skyler and watching Evil Dead the Musical, a year ago today Tierney and I were walking through a pop-up art gallery and I was telling her about the yōkai book I’d just read, a year ago today I was taking Anna to work and reading a different fairy book and waiting for her shift to end so we could make the dinner we were excited about. But this year today we’re so far apart. And these are people I talk to every day! I call them on the phone multiple times a week! And yet missing someone is miserable and overwhelming and it feels as huge for me as it did for these people who had to send letters across the ocean to hear from their loved ones. The boy who traveled to Glasgow to catch a magical glimpse of his mother playing cards with the faeries was something I felt so acutely, that need to know that the people who are apart from you are doing something and they’re okay and they’re in a place you can visualize when you think about them, and then it’s almost like you’re there with them when you do it.
I did not come away from this believing in faeries, but it did make me feel more intensely connected to the people I love and miss, and I am very grateful for that. Anna, Rachel, Skyler, Tierney, I have no idea if you read these or when you’ll get to it if you do but I looooove you, I miss you stupid lots
This short book is one I found on Project Gutenberg through Holly Black’s research bibliography, and was able to breeze through it whenever I had off time at work. It consists of W. B. Yeats’s notes from interviewing his neighbors and the residents of nearby towns about their faerie folklore, intercut with his own poetry and his recounting of any visions he had while compiling this research. Almost every time I told one of my colleagues about it, they’d start telling me their own best ghost story or family legend, which was a very charming element of this reading experience.
The stories here ranged from typical faerie lore like mushroom rings to some of the most spooky and spine-chilling stuff I’ve read in a while (not to give anything away, but the campfire story is going to stick with me until I DIE), along with a couple skeptics who made me laugh out loud (girl who got mistaken for the Virgin Mary and was therefore very disillusioned with paranormal sightings, to me you are perfect). Every so often Yeats would make a final call on a lore contradiction like ‘changelings switch the soul of a child with the soul of a demon’ vs ‘they take the child and leave an altogether different faery child behind’ by asking Queen Maeve in a vision, which I also found extremely charming. Just got off the phone with the queen of the faeries and she says they DO switch the bodies, so there!!!!
But underneath it all, this book is about missing your loved ones and reassuring yourself that they’re doing okay without you, even when you have a lingering suspicion that something horrible happened to them. I’ve been very melancholy lately with missing people, especially this week, since this week last year was when I had my trip to visit all my friends I hadn’t seen for two years. It’s been so hard to be like, this time last year I had just gotten to Rachel’s and we were eating the cookies I brought, now it’s when I was eating wings with Rachel and Skyler and watching Evil Dead the Musical, a year ago today Tierney and I were walking through a pop-up art gallery and I was telling her about the yōkai book I’d just read, a year ago today I was taking Anna to work and reading a different fairy book and waiting for her shift to end so we could make the dinner we were excited about. But this year today we’re so far apart. And these are people I talk to every day! I call them on the phone multiple times a week! And yet missing someone is miserable and overwhelming and it feels as huge for me as it did for these people who had to send letters across the ocean to hear from their loved ones. The boy who traveled to Glasgow to catch a magical glimpse of his mother playing cards with the faeries was something I felt so acutely, that need to know that the people who are apart from you are doing something and they’re okay and they’re in a place you can visualize when you think about them, and then it’s almost like you’re there with them when you do it.
I did not come away from this believing in faeries, but it did make me feel more intensely connected to the people I love and miss, and I am very grateful for that. Anna, Rachel, Skyler, Tierney, I have no idea if you read these or when you’ll get to it if you do but I looooove you, I miss you stupid lots
sangloup's review
2.0
Extreme Book Nerd Challenge 2021 - Category #8
Challenge Topic: A conjunction in the title.
Winter Reading Challenge 2020/2021
Challenge Topic: Read a book with a conjunction in the title.
This is the last book required for the Winter Reading Challenge!!
Ok.... to start off I had to keep reminding myself this was written in the very early 1900's. I really like Yeats as a poet, but this book was not at all what I was expecting. This was more of a research notebook. The ideas seemed scattered and the run on sentences were killing me. He never really finished the stories he was investigating. I did enjoy some of the stories that he shared, but he then end he seemed to always play them off.
Anyway... not one of my favorites for sure.
Challenge Topic: A conjunction in the title.
Winter Reading Challenge 2020/2021
Challenge Topic: Read a book with a conjunction in the title.
This is the last book required for the Winter Reading Challenge!!
Ok.... to start off I had to keep reminding myself this was written in the very early 1900's. I really like Yeats as a poet, but this book was not at all what I was expecting. This was more of a research notebook. The ideas seemed scattered and the run on sentences were killing me. He never really finished the stories he was investigating. I did enjoy some of the stories that he shared, but he then end he seemed to always play them off.
Anyway... not one of my favorites for sure.
nicnevin's review against another edition
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
The book is a series of folk legends and myths from Ireland. Whilst the tales are good, the language is very... Of its time which makes it a little harder to parse what is going on.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Death of parent, Kidnapping, Sexual violence, Xenophobia, Ableism, Abandonment, Addiction, Alcoholism, Animal death, Blood, Child abuse, Child death, Classism, Confinement, Alcohol, Body shaming, Bullying, Chronic illness, Domestic abuse, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Mental illness, Murder, and Violence