The work of the American science fiction and fantasy artist Frank Kelly Freas has been featured in a Defence Against the Dark Arts article.
One of his pictures appears in an article about two amusing stories, and another was selected for Halloween.
This post contains a few of his pictures that are suitable for the festive season.
Father Christmas is running late:
Carol singing is a very seasonal activity:
This beautiful cover picture has a magical atmosphere:
The Scottish writer, speaker and pastor George MacDonald was born on December 10th 1824, 200 years ago today. xx
His goblins are mentioned in the article about Michael de Larrabeiti's Borribles, and a spot-on comment he made is featured in a post about unsatisfactory politicians.
His name is in the list of of writers with Celtic connections; he also appears in the list of Sagittarian writers, where I said this:
“It is time to take another look at some of his work, which I last read when still at school.”
While the reader's dilemma of 'so many books, so little time' applies here, I have refreshed my memories of a few of his stories that I particularly liked; I have also learned a little about their author.
While the details of George MacDonald's life are very interesting and some of his fantasy stories are still enjoyable to read despite their being very dated, he and his many works do not on the whole inspire much in the way of commentary. However, two books that made a very big impression when I first discovered them deserve a mention here.
I thought that the goblins with their hard heads and soft toeless feet were both sinister and very funny. I loved the little poem that the miner's son Curdie makes to frighten off the goblins. It includes these lines:
Curdie and Princess Irene being pursued by a goblin:
I really liked the story when I first read it, but I was too young to have got much from the philosophical statements that the book contains.
This is another article in the series about Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's little volume of essays on books, reading and associated topics Through the Magic Door.
This post was inspired by the following passage, which appears just after the invitation to enter the magic world of books:
“No matter what mood a man may be in, when once he has passed through the magic door he can summon the world’s greatest to sympathize with him in it. If he be thoughtful, here are the kings of thought. If he be dreamy, here are the masters of fancy. Or is it amusement that he lacks? He can signal to any one of the world’s great story-tellers, and out comes the dead man and holds him enthralled by the hour.
The dead are such good company that one may come to think too little of the living. It is a real and a pressing danger with many of us, that we should never find our own thoughts and our own souls, but be ever obsessed by the dead. Yet second-hand romance and second-hand emotion are surely better than the dull, soul-killing monotony which life brings to most of the human race. But best of all when the dead man’s wisdom and the dead man’s example give us guidance and strength and in the living of our own strenuous days.“
Conan Doyle makes some good points here; they are best dealt with individually.
I have often asked myself what type of reading material I am in the mood for. Do I feel like reading something light and amusing? Do I want to be inspired, informed or entertained? Perhaps some familiar comfort food would be best – or maybe I should try something new for a change. Sometimes I read to lift my mood: I may select an uplifting book to counter-balance the effects of reading a very depressing one.
What we get from books may indeed seem more appealing and rewarding than what we are getting from real life. This applies to both the people in our lives and the life that we are leading.
Each article in the series inspired by Dion Fortune's five occult novels seemed like the last one at the time, but, even though the returns diminish, a further trawl always produces a little more material to comment on.
This article contains a few more particularly striking expressions and propositions, many of which speak for themselves.
This is a very neat way of describing a major internal disaster. It is spot on: people do sometimes feel as though they have been hit by a truck, and they may well need some assistance to get going again.
The crash victim is called Ursula. She is in a bad way because she has been in the power of an energy vampire. Dion Fortune comes up with some very good images here: Ursula is described as being like a run-down battery and a sucked-out orange, while her vampiric victimiser swells up like a bullfrog!
This cover picture by Bruce Pennington shows Ursula the psychological car crash victim and the breakdown lorry:
These very true words are from Moon Magic:
“...there are no anaesthetics in psychology.”
Dion Fortune got that one right. Some people will have no idea what she is talking about; they are the lucky ones. Others will know only too well how excruciatingly painful dealing with the inner world can be; they will have learned the hard way that there is no pain relief so their agony just has to be endured.
A recent article features a statement from the Scottish writer George MacDonald to the effect that as no good person would go into politics, anyone who is elected to power will not be a decent human being.
His words may be unwelcome and depressing, but there are many recent examples in both the UK and the US that support them.
Other people mentioned on here have said much the same thing.
This is from Benjamin Disraeli, who saw it all from the inside:
Taylor Caldwell, who had something to say about the causes of major wars, also said this in her historical novel Captains and the Kings:
“...politics and moral ethics never mix. Politics and ethics are a contradiction in terms. An honest politician is either a hypocrite—or he is doomed.”
Although Captains and the Kings is set in the United States and the story starts in the 1850s, much of the material has wider applications.
Some of cartoonist and illustrator Malcolm Bird's amusing witch pictures were featured earlier.
This post contains a few more examples of his work in the form of pictures with a Halloween theme.
This witch is proud of her pumpkins:
These pictures are from The Witch's Handbook:
Information about Malcolm Bird and his works can be found on his website:
A previous article has something to say about the pain of being interrupted while reading. It contains an extract from Frances Hodgson Burnett's Little Princess that describes very well how annoying such intrusions can be.
Being interrupted while immersed in a book is bad enough; being discouraged or even prevented from reading it in the first place is even worse!
"I am not in the least anxious about her education," Captain Crewe said, with his gay laugh, as he held Sara's hand and patted it. "The difficulty will be to keep her from learning too fast and too much. She is always sitting with her little nose burrowing into books. She doesn't read them, Miss Minchin; she gobbles them up as if she were a little wolf instead of a little girl. She is always starving for new books to gobble, and she wants grown-up books—great, big, fat ones—French and German as well as English—history and biography and poets, and all sorts of things. Drag her away from her books when she reads too much. Make her ride her pony in the Row or go out and buy a new doll. She ought to play more with dolls."
Captain Crewe buys a doll for his daughter Sara:
The head of the girls' school in Charlotte Brontë's Villette is concerned about the detrimental effect that the amount of reading Lucy Snowe does might have on her health:
“Madame Beck...often and solemnly used to warn me not to study too much, lest “the blood should all go to my head.”"
F or anyone who is looking for something suitable for the holiday season, here is a summary to date of the articles that feature Christmas ...
