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alexllove-blog · 5 years

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Lit by early-morning sunshine, the country lane ahead of me is enchanting.

One side is hedge, sweetly fragrant with white hawthorn blossom, and the other, old dry-stone wall, covered in emerald moss, moist and springy to the touch. Every now and then a wren darts in and out of the wall, looking for the perfect space to nest-build. On the ground, life is also starting to fizz. Fresh, tender shoots are emerging. The broad dark-green leaves of foxgloves spread themselves out and a pair of golden brimstone butterflies flutter around the mauve petals of common dog violets.

A misty valley in Borrowdale in the Lake District National Park

I stop for a moment and take a slow, deep breath –thankful to be back in Lake District National Park in North West England. It’s not just me that finds these landscapes so irresistible. Just over 114 kilometres from the thriving metropolis of Manchester, Lake District National Park, at around 2,362km2, is England’s largest, and more than 19 million people from all the over globe visit it annually. Just like me, visitors here are thrilled not just by the region’s spectacular scenery, but also by the rare creatures that live in its ancient oakwoods and the birds of prey that majestically soar the skies.

At springtime, the Lakes – as the area is better known – are especially magical, but it’s a place that beguiles at any time of the year. The otherworldly beauty of its windswept mountaintops, dramatic valleys criss-crossed with idyllic country lanes, sparkling waterfalls and deep, clear lakes often haunts me long after I return home.

Path from Stonethwaite to Rosthwaite

But of all the region’s valleys, it’s Borrowdale that casts the strongest spell on me. The picturesque area, which is situated in the green heart of the Lake District, is a haven for some of Britain’s most endangered flora and fauna. It’s where I am now, and the country lane I’m passing through is in the small village of Rosthwaite, some nine kilometres south of Keswick, the valley’s main town. This is the start of one of my favourite walks, which will take me through a myriad of arresting landscapes, from craggy fells to wild moors, from mountain tarns to oakwoods and, finally, from river valley to lakeshore. It’s a beautiful microcosm of all that the Lake District has to offer.

Borrowdale has thrilled me since childhood. A huge, wild, living playground, it was the perfect antidote to the grey shades and straight lines of school and suburbia. With my parents, brother and sister – as well as our dogs, a young and exuberant Irish wolfhound and a sensible, much older border collie – many happy summer days were spent here. In the meadows, we searched for daisies, buttercups and forget-me-nots for my flower press. And, in the woods, with socks and shoes off , we chased each other around huge oak trees, picking up acorns, throwing them for the dogs to catch, always saving a few to play wonky marbles with later. Then we’d find a clear stream to cool down and clean our hot little feet before starting our adventures all over again.

A ram near Watendlath

Of course, some four decades on since playing in the woods here, it’s sturdy boots, rather than bare feet, for me on my walk today. Now reaching the end of the lane, the view opens out and my climb up Great Crag, a steep fell-side, begins. The colours are different here – less verdant, more of an autumnal palette of faded-purple heather, burnt-brown bracken and grey rocky knolls. The colour of storm clouds. Now, some 200 metres above sea level, I turn around and marvel at the classic Lakes view. The valley floor – which in the summer months is ablaze with wildflowers – is strikingly green, intersected by the shimmer of the River Derwent that snakes through Borrowdale like a silver ribbon.

Turning back towards Great Crag, I follow the bridleway until a large whitewashed farmhouse and a small cluster of stone cottages come into view. This is the secluded picturesque hamlet of Watendlath that nestles on the shores of the tarn here. Apart from a mewing buzzard above me, enjoying the warm thermals, and a gaggle of honking barnacle geese, it’s incredibly quiet.

A blackbird on a wall near Stonethwaite

I take the path around the water’s edge, passing a flock of free-roaming sheep. Huge moss-covered oaks, with branches outstretched like arms and twigs pointing like fingers, cast their shadows. As the terrain turns to moorland, damp and peaty in places, I spy the yellow-green heads of bog myrtle popping above the scrub.

I scan the sky, hoping for a sight of another buzzard or maybe a falcon. It is empty. If I’d been standing here three or four years ago, though, I might have seen England’s last golden eagle, known as Eddie, filling the void. Up until the early 1800s, golden eagles – Britain’s second-largest bird of prey with a wingspan of around 1.8 metres – were numerous in the Lakes. But regarded as a threat to new-born lambs, the birds’ eyries (nests) were systemically destroyed by local sheep farmers – causing such a catastrophic decline in their numbers that golden eagles became locally extinct by the 1850s.

A pair of keen ramblers taking in the scenery

Since then, only very occasional pairs have settled in the Lakes. The last known couple were Eddie and his mate. He is believed to have died in 2016, some 12 years after the female. Fortunately, conservation measures have been put in place to encourage the return of these iconic birds. It’s hoped that chicks from successful populations in southern Scotland will be introduced here soon, turning the Lakes’ skies golden once again.

“Rare creatures live in its ancient oakwoods and birds of prey majestically soar the skies”

After two and half kilometres or so, I see Dock Tarn, one of the Lake District’s most beautiful mountain lakes. Circled by a small ring of tor-topped hills, covered in heather and bilberry, the tarn is aglow in the sunshine. On the surface, some yet-to-flower waterlilies shiver slightly as a light breeze brushes over them. Come high summer, orchids can be found among the grasses, and when the heather blooms, the tarn will reflect their hazy-purple hues, as if in perpetual twilight. It’s not just Dock Tarn that mesmerises. From here, I can also admire the summit of Glaramara and enjoy take-your-breath-away views of other mighty fells, including Haystacks, Honister and Pillar.

An arresting view of Derwentwater as seen from Catbells fell

The Lake District’s natural beauty has quickened people’s hearts for centuries. During the 1800s, some of England’s best-known Romantic poets and writers – including William and Dorothy Wordsworth, Samuel Coleridge, Thomas de Quincey and John Ruskin – were particularly enamoured. They celebrated the Lake District’s sublime beauty in their writings, often elevating the region to a heaven on earth, a wild Eden where man could achieve spiritual harmony with nature. William Wordsworth – probably the most famous Lakes poet, and author of the love song to the Lakes “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” – in his great autobiographical work The Prelude, published in 1850, described the region as a place where:

“The solid Mountains were as bright as clouds, Grain-tinctured, drench’d in empyrean light; And, in the meadows and the lower grounds, Was all the sweetness of a common dawn, Dews, vapours, and the melody of birds, And Labourers going forth into the fields.”

A bridge in Rydal

Turning away from the “bright as clouds” view of the summits, I trace a stone-pitched track to the hanging oakwood at Lingy End and begin my descent. The climb down through the ancient wood is steep, and I’m kept company by the babbling Willygrass Gill stream. Originating at Dock Tarn, it cascades gently down the valley, eventually joining the River Derwent. Shoots of pungent wild garlic sprout between rocks and stones, joined by butter-yellow, star-shaped celandine flowers.

“A wonderland I first visited as a girl, I am lured back to the Lake District year after year”

I scan the trees for red squirrels, an endangered native species. Thanks to special conservation programmes, Borrowdale’s woods are one of the best places in England to spot this rare and elusive creature. I also look out for red and roe deer, but as with the squirrels, I am out of luck. I do, though, sight a great spotted woodpecker drilling into a tree, its distinctive black, white and red markings glimmering softly in the dappled light.

A cottage in Stonethwaite

Borrowdale’s oakwoods are the remnants of the temperate “rainforests” that once flourished on the western seaboard of Britain. They are the precious last habitat of disappearing moss and liverwort species and support an incredible variety of ferns and fungi, as well as butterflies, moths and other insects. That’s why Borrowdale’s oakwoods – over 500 hectares, home to more than a hundred bird species – are afforded the highest tier of protection available to habitats in Europe.

After an hour or so, the steepness of the slope eases and I’m back on level ground in the village of Stonethwaite, just next door to Rosthwaite. The wide walled and pretty path here runs parallel to the River Derwent, considered one of the purest rivers in Europe. Freshwater shrimp, lamprey and salmon thrive in its protected waters – even sleek-haired otters, once locally extinct, are back and can sometimes be spotted on the riverbanks with freshly caught fish in their paws.

Two people fishing at a reservoir in Watendlath

Back at Rosthwaite, I jump on a bus and less than 10 minutes later find myself on the shores of Derwentwater, one of the Lake District’s fi nest glacial lakes. In the afternoon light, the water reflects the shape of the mountains that circle it. A swan glides by, heading towards Lord’s Island, one of the lake’s four main islands. Once inhabited by the Earls of Derwentwater, the island is now a desirable residence for nesting birds and primroses only. During the winter months, the secluded bays and headlands here provide shelter for many wildfowl, including greylag geese, mallards and moorhens.

The Queen of the Lakes, as Derwentwater is also known, is the only place in England – apart from Bassenthwaite Lake about 16 kilometres further north – where vendace, a rare Arctic fi sh species dating back to the Ice Age, survives. Bassenthwaite Lake is also the place to see the Lake District’s only ospreys. These spectacular birds of prey, with a wingspan of almost 1.5 metres, returned to breed in 2001, after an absence of almost 150 years, and during the summer months can be seen diving for fish in Bassenthwaite’s pristine waters.

A river scene in Rydal

Two years ago, in 2017, the Lake District National Park was designated a Unesco World Heritage site. It became a National Park in 1951, one of the first established in Britain after the passing of the 1949 Act of Parliament. This year marks the 70th anniversary of that Act, without which the UK wouldn’t have its 15 glorious National Parks to explore and enjoy today.

That the Lake District is – and remains – a protected place is important to me. The Lake District is a gift. A green refuge where once-lost species have returned; a precious jewel of a place where I, and countless others before me, have felt at peace and been inspired, and found gentle reminders of a more natural past. A wonderland I first visited as a girl, I am lured back to the Lake District year after year. And each time I return, I fall back in love – bewitched all over again by the “empyrean light” of the Lakes that shines forever bright, captivates completely and re-wilds my heart.

SEE ALSO: Why Manchester is the UK’s next creative powerhouse

This article was originally published in the June 2019 issue of SilverKris magazine

The post Over vales and hills: The enchantment of the Lake District appeared first on SilverKris.

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swipestream · 6 years

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The Pulp Swordsmen: Leif Langdon

A. Merritt (1884-1943) occupied the position that J. R. R. Tolkien now has. From around 1925 through 19955-60, if you asked who was the most popular fantasy writer, A. Merritt would probably be the response.

Dwellers in the Mirage was originally serialized in six parts in the pages of Argosy magazine January 23, 1932 to February 27, 1932.

The only real piece of lit-crit I could find on Merritt is in Science Fiction Writers (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1982). I picked this book up at a library book sale maybe five years ago.

E. F. Bleiler edited the book and wrote the entry on A. Merritt. He had this to say about Merritt:

“Reputations come and reputations go, but in the fields of science fiction and fantasy there is probably no other great reputation of the past that has suffered as much as that of A. Merritt. During the 1930s and 1940’s he was widely considered the greatest science fiction writer of modern times. He even had the then-unique distinction of having a magazine, A. Merritt’s Fantasy Magazine, named in his honor. All this, of course, was in the precritical days, and today Merritt is seldom ranked among the more important the more important authors of the pulp era.”

Merritt has the reputation for a lush, ornate writing. Bleiler has this to say on his style:

“Merritt, like Marie Corelli, seemed to equate descriptions of beauty with beauty, and just as Corelli would rave vulgarly about roses, roses, roses, Merritt attempted to create a brilliant picture or sensuous mood by a frequent use of words describing color and sound. The result is sometimes a shower of terms, at best conveying a sense of the subject’s alieness, at worst almost constituting a parody of late nineteenth-century traditional verse. Yet behind all these odd mannerisms, it must be admitted, was a skilled verbalist who was well aware of what he was doing. His was not a sin of ignorance. . . His hobby was the study of mythology and religions, and he delighted in mythological syncretisms–raided, obviously, from popular works. . .For the most part this material lies heavily and inappropriately on the surface verbal texture. In a sense, one must admit, Merritt was only imitating the art forms of his formative period around the turn of the century, when, as with the British art nouveau lapidaries, a surface flash of decoration might be thrown upon an otherwise bare formalized surface.”

Robert E. Howard referred to Merritt’s verbal ornamentation as “tinsel” in a letter to H. P. Lovecraft.

Bleiler does consider Dwellers in the Mirage as “the most significant of Merritt’s science fiction novels.”

I had to laugh at Bleiler. He ridicules Merritt for identifying the Uighurs of Central Asia with the Tocharians. Bleiler excoriates Merrritt for postulating a

“Nordic, Indo-European drift, bearing with it elements of Norse religion and mythology. That he took this historical nonsense seriously is show by an unsigned article that he wrote for the American Weekly, presenting the same point of view.”

Bleiler is the one who is wrong and Merritt was correct. Jean Manco had this to say in Ancestral Journeys:

“The first Indo-European move east had all the boldness that would come to characterize the steppe nomads. A group set out from the Volga-Ural region to trek some 2,000 km (1,250 miles) to the high steppe of the Altai Mountains c. 3300-3000 B.C. “

Mummies found in the Tarim basin have red and blond hair. The clothing is plaid similar to Celtic designs. DNA analysis has confirmed a western origin. The males carry Y-DNA R1a1a, the classic Indo-European signature.

You hear of Genghis Khan having red hair. That is from these east bound Indo-Europeans before history who made it as far as Kansu, China. The Uighurs moved into the Tarim Basin after the Kirghiz destroyed their Khaganate in Mongolia. They absorbed the Tocharians and are known for often European appearance.

Tocharian Migration

Dwellers in the Mirage is subdivided into “books” which corresponds with the 6 serialized portions. The novel starts with Leif Langdon and his friend Jim, a Cherokee traveling in an out of the way portion of Alaska. They hear drums and that makes Leif think of an incident a few years before in the Gobi Desert.

Leif accompanied a scientific expedition to the Gobi. Merritt appears to have based this on Roy Chapman Andrews’ expeditions to Mongolia in the 1920s. A group of Uighurs take Leif, who is described as a tall, blond throwback to his mother’s Norwegian stock to their temple. They recognize the old blood. He is given a ring and summons a tentacular monstrosity through a large yellow stone that acts as a dimensional gate. A teenage girl is sacrificed to Khalk’ru the god. Leif flees in terror from the temple and ruined city of the Uighurs.

Leif and Jim find a valley that changes in appearance as they get closer. Entering through a heavy layer of humidity, they enter a lush, fairy forest. They discover two golden pygmies (Rrrllya) staked to the ground and tortured by moving, poisonous vines. They free the pygmies and find they speak a language related to Cherokee. In fact, they are the little people of Cherokee mythology.

There is a near escape across a river from a group of red-haired women warriors on horseback. In the land of the Rrrllya, the meet Evalie, who is a normal human. The Rrrllya appear to worship her. Eager to see the broken bridge of Nansur, Leif sees a group of the Ayjir across the river. Words ensue and Leif’s personality is taken over by Dwayanu, a former Ayjir leader in the homeland of the Gobi. Flashing the kraken ring, the Rrrllya rush him and push him into the river. Escaping the giant leeches that guard the river, Leif emerges on the other bank as Dwayanu. Lur and Tibur take him to the city of Karak.

The next portion of the novel is intrigue between Dwayanu, Lur the witch-woman, Yodin the priest of Khalk’ru. Dwayanu turns the table on Yodin in a ceremony summoning Khalk’ru.

There is a plot hole I noticed. In Leif’s first encounter with Lur in escaping across the river, he yells he does not take orders from the witch-woman. Tibur the Smith also speaks to Leif/Dwayanu as if they are old enemies. Dwayanu supposedly lived before the abomination, the desertification of the Gobi. How would he know Lur or Tibur? They know of Dwayanu through prophecy and legend but are not sure if it is Dwayanu or not.

Dwayanu has a fling with Lur who is both a warrior and controls some supernatural looking powers. He is a stunning red-head who leads a band of women warriors. Before Jirel, before Red Sonya and Red Sonja, there was Lur.

I noticed this interesting passage:

“By Zarda! But it was as it was of old–enemies to slay, a city to sack, a nation to war with and a woman’s soft arms around me. I was well content!”

Now compare this passage by Robert E. Howard from “Queen of the Black Coast” (1934):

“Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content.”

Dwayanu leads an attack on the city of Sirk, which is inhabited by dissident refugees from Karak. They have had enough of human sacrifice. Merritt has a good blood and thunder sequence of the taking of the city. Evalie and Jim are in Sirk brought by a false message believed sent by Leif. Tibur the Smith gives a killing blow to Jim. Jim’s death breaks Dwayanu’s hold over Leif’s mind.

Leif settles the score with Tibur:

“I lifted my sword to slash at Tibur’s throat. I gave him no warning. It was no time for chivalry. Twice he had tried treacherously to kill me. I would make quick end. . .Before he could clench me again, my hand had swept down into the girdle and clutched the dart. I brought it up and drove it into Tibur’s throat just beneath his jaw. I jerked the haft. The opened, razor-edge flanges sliced through arteries and muscles. The bellowing laughter of Tibur changed to a hideous gurgling. His hands sought the haft, dragged at it– tore it out. And the blood spurted from Tibur’s mangled throat.”

That is about a graphic a death as ever put on paper.

Leif takes the captive Evalie back with him to Karak trying to convince her that Dwayanu is submerged in his mind and not in control. That night, Lur abducts Evalie for sacrifice to Khalk’ru.

Leif arrives with his body-guard and smashes the yellow stone portal for Khalk’ru as it tries to enter this dimension. Lur manages to kill Evalie before being taken down herself with a javelin. The novel ends with a broken Leif vowing to leave the Shadow Land despite pleas from the Rrrllya and Ayjir to rule them.

I do have to say the character of Evalie has almost no personality outside as some sort of emblem of goodness. Lur is much more interesting.

My favorite cover

This is one of the great novels of American fantasy. Avon had two paperback editions in 1944 and 1952. There was a hardback omnibus in 1952 with Face in the Abyss. Paperback Library did two printings in 1962 and 1965. One with a very cool cover. Avon again reprinted the novel starting in 1967 through 1976 with three printings.

Collier Books reprinted the novel for the last time as a mass market paperback in 1991. That is the edition I have. I think I bought it at a Half-Price Books in Cleveland in the late 1990s. I don’t remember even really reading the novel in detail but sort of scanning it. I have corrected that.

Merritt kept up with the contents of Weird Tales. He even wrote some letters to “The Eyrie.” Khalk’ru is right out of H. P. Lovecraft as the tentacle horror from another dimension who dissolves its sacrifices. A case could be made that the Nordic barbarian angle is from Robert E. Howard. Merritt would have read King Kull and Bran Mak Morn. Turlogh O’Brien came along in fall 1931. Dwellers in the Mirage was probably already written and submitted to Argosy by the time the Dalcassian axe man was in print.

Right after Dwellers in the Mirage had finished serializing in Argosy, Robert E. Howard had made a trip to the Rio Grande region of Texas in March 1932. That is when the character of Conan and the Hyborian Age came about. Coincidence?

The Pulp Swordsmen: Leif Langdon published first on https://medium.com/@ReloadedPCGames

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