Interview with a Leprechaun

Anyone close to me knows that I do a lot of research for my writing, and since I write about the supernatural I’ve visited a lot of “colorful” web sites. I’ve also joined some online groups filled with people who swear they have had firsthand encounters with the supernatural. 

Lately, my focus has been on Irish mythology and folklore. I’ve visited a few websites and chatted with a few interesting people. Nothing unusual. Then, the other day, I received a DM from someone claiming to be an actual leprechaun. 

I laughed out loud. I mean, who wouldn’t? On one hand, I do like to consider myself openminded, and that there are “more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt in our philosophies.” 

My new leprechaun friend also included a Zoom invite. I figured why not. This was in the morning, and the invite was for the afternoon, so I had a few hours to think about what I would want to ask a leprechaun. 

The time finally came. I clicked on my Zoom invite and got the audio and video ready. The next thing I knew, sure enough, I was face-to-face with an actual leprechaun. A smile on his wizened face, he greeted me and introduced himself as Declan Dromgool. 

Once the initial shock faded, I engaged in a bit of small talk and took a moment to examine what I saw on my screen. He sat at an antique wooden desk. He was short. I figured he was about two feet tall, because he was using an iPad the same way an average sized person might use a desktop computer. 

Behind me, I saw polished stone walls and floors, decorated with paintings and all sorts of artwork. We must have been in some sort of cave. My host confirmed this, saying that he lived in an underground burrow in the forest surrounding the Cooley Mountains in County Louth, Ireland. He assured me though that the WiFi connection was excellent, and we should have no interruptions during our interview. 

Me: I want to thank you again for sitting down and talking with me. This is an amazing opportunity. I really appreciate it.

Declan: My pleasure, lad. With everyone writing so much about the Greek and Norse quote-unquote mythologies, I’m glad to hear someone is ready to give the Irish their due.

Me: I want to point out to my readers first the way you’re dressed. You’ve got on a nice red jacket with seven rows of buttons with what looks like seven buttons in each row. 

Declan: You are correct, sir.

Me: You’re also wearing a white shirt with ruffles and frilly wrists, and a red tri-corner cap. 

Declan: (held up a leg) Don’t forget me red breeches and black stockings. 

Me: What many people don’t know is what you’re wearing is a traditional leprechaun outfit. Red is your color. Not green.

Declan: Tis true. I don’t know how, but at some point in history humans decided to put us all in green. I guess they thought red wasn’t a good color on us, perhaps because of our ruddy complexions. 

Me: That could be. Now the first leprechaun story came from medieval times, “The Adventure of Fergus Léti.” In it, Fergus, who’s the king of Ulster at the time, fell asleep on the beach and woke up to find three leprechauns dragging him into the ocean.

Declan: (Shakes his head and sighs) The folly of youth.

Me: No one has been able to pinpoint the year this story was supposed to take place. Would you know by any chance?

Declan: Let’s see, when was that Jesus fella born again? It was some time before that. Och, lovely lad that Jesus was. Shame was happened to him.

Me: So how long has your race been around then?

Declan: (Chuckles) Let’s just say I knew the Cooley Mountains outside my door when they were just bumps in the road.

Me: (Chuckles) That’s quite old. You look great for your age. 

Declan: Cheers, lad. 

Me: What’s your secret?

Declan: (Shrugs) Genetics.

Me: Fair enough. While we’re on the topic, can you tell my readers a bit more about the different faerie races?

Declan: I must say I’m impressed you already know faerie is more of a generic term. My kind fall under that category as do many others. 

Me: In other words, all faeries don’t look like Tinkerbell?

Declan: (Chuckles) Exactly. So anyway, there are three types of faeries. You’ve got your Domestics, like Brownies, who’ll take care of a person’s home for them. Then, there are your Solitaries, which include us Leprechauns among others. Then, you got your Trooping Faeries. They get that name because of the fancy parades they’re always having. They’re always followed by a big dance. Your kind would call them elves. They’re faeries royalty. I don’t have much use for them, except for their gold.

Me: Could you go into more detail about that?

Declan: Like all of my kind, I make shoes, and the faerie royalty with all the marching and dancing they do, they definitely wear out their footwear, that’s for sure. They pay well too. I have to give them that.

Me: So is that the source of the leprechaun’s legendary pot of gold?

Declan: We’re a frugal lot, saving our coin for a rainy day and all that.

Me: And do people try to catch you and make you give up your pot of gold?

Declan: (Chuckles) Oh, there have been many over the years, and each one of them dumber and greedier than the last. One of my favorite stories, this bloke catches me in the woods and makes me tell him where me gold is. 

Now when this happens, I am honor bound to take that human to my actual stash. After all, fair is fair. So I take this bloke deep into the forest to this oak grove and bring him to the tree that me gold is buried under. 

This bloke considers himself clever, and he ties a bit of rope around the oak and tells me not touch that tree. I promise I won’t. So the bloke runs home to fetch his tools. When he gets back (starts laughing), now I kept my word and didn’t touch that tree, but what I did instead (laughs) was tie the same kind of rope around every tree in the grove. 

Me: That’s great. I love it. On that note, I think we’re going to go ahead and wrap up our interview. I want to thank you again for your time, Mr. Dromgool.

Declan: Och. It’s Declan, lad. And it was a pleasure. 

Me: I don’t suppose you’d let me take a screenshot, will you, so people can see you?

Declan: (Shrugs) You can try.

I took a screenshot and thanked Declan again for his time. I exited Zoom, and although I was eager to see how screenshot came out, I shouldn’t have been surprised that the picture was completely black. 

Why that little …! 

Oh well, even though I wasn’t able to provide a picture of my guest, I still hope everyone enjoys my interview with a leprechaun.

Writers and Coffee

              “I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.”

                                                                     -  T.S. Eliot 

It came out of Africa centuries ago and has since established a foothold in every part of the world. For most people in the world, coffee is an elixir vitae. They are not the same unless they have had that first cup of rich, black stuff after they have gotten out of bed. They cannot start their day without it. Coffee is a social-thing too, a reason for friends and family to get together. However, for writers, famous and unknown, coffee takes on an even greater level of importance.

If you write on a timetable or a schedule, coffee helps get your primed and focused to fill up that blank computer screen. Yes, I sing the praises of that blessed caffeine-kick. However, at least for me, there is more to it than that. For me, coffee is a meditation. Drinking it is a multi-sensory experience. For starters, there is that heavenly scent. That’s often enough to wake you up on its own – especially if it’s freshly ground. 

As I raise my cup, I pay attention to the warmth of the cup and then take a moment to breathe in that rich scent. I pour it slowly toward my lips, well aware of its delicious heat and making sure I get just enough of it in each sip, so I don’t burn myself. Then, there’s the taste. I drink my coffee black, the way the gods meant for it to be consumed, so we’ll say the taste is – let’s call it jarring. With each sip, I start thinking about what I need to write. Halfway through the cup, I’m ready to begin, and I have the focus needed to see me through that round of writing.

There is this romanticized notion that writers and other artists need to wait to be inspired before they can create anything. Ha! Even the greats will laugh in the face of this. Jack London was famous for saying, “You can’t wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club.”

Well then, I say let coffee be your muse, your inspiration. Halfway through that first cup, you’re going to be alert and focused, and you’re already sitting at your computer so you might as well give it go. See what happens. You might be surprised.  

Let’s not forget, that without coffee, we wouldn’t have coffee houses. They bring writers, these mostly solitary creatures, out of their lairs and into the bright light of day. Coffee houses are great places to meet other writers, share your works in progress and give each other feedback. 

It’s also a great place to bear down and get some writing done. I can only speak for myself when I say that sometimes writing at home can get dull. There are also too many available distractions. When I write at a coffee house though, I’m definitely more focused. I’m there for a purpose, and I do not leave my seat until I’ve finished whatever writing I have planned on doing for that day.

While doing my research for this post, I read about some very famous coffee houses that legendary writers used to haunt. The Elephant House in Edinburgh, Scotland was a favorite spot for authors Ian Rankin and Alexander McCall-Smith. It’s also where a single mother named J.K. Rowling created a pop culture icon. Vesuvio Café in San Francisco was a gathering place for the poets of the Beat Generation, and Café La Rotande in Paris played host to the likes of Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot, and Ernest Hemingway. I’m tempted to pilgrimage to one of these sacred places with a pen and notebook and see if I catch any residual creative energy left behind by these great authors.

Also, while doing research for this post, I also came across what seems to be an anti-coffee conspiracy. There are heretics out there on the internet that actually believe coffee may actually inhibit creativity. I think those people were never creative to begin with. 

One of these blasphemers did bring up a good point that, often times, great ideas come when you’re not trying or when you’re the middle of another activity. I do agree. This has happened to me quite a bit. However, none of these moments would be possible without those coffee-driven rounds of writing. That is the soil from which these new ideas will later blossom when they are ready. 

Others preached that coffee was a health hazard, a poison that will take years off of your life. Well, tell that to Voltaire. He drank 30-40 cups of coffee a day and lived to be 83. 

DISCLAIMER: I do not recommend drinking 30-40 cups of coffee a day, even though it apparently worked for Voltaire. 

Cats and Authors

“You treat ideas like cats: you make them follow you.” 

-Ray Bradbury

Authors are drawn to complex characters. That could be why so many authors (famous and those waiting to be famous) love cats.

Ernest Hemingway (East of Eden and so many more) was said to have up to as many as 23 cats living with him at one point. He referred to them as “love sponges” and “purr factories.” Joyce Carol Oates’ (We Were the Mulvaneys)) cat would sit in her lap, keeping her pinned to her chair so she had no choice except to write. I can completely relate. I have had a number of “love sponges” and “purr factories” in my life, and it is indeed, oh so hard to move a cat that has snuggled deeply into your lap.

From a practical standpoint, the cat is an ideal companion for an author. They don’t require to be taken for walks and definitely not as needy or as time consuming as dogs, but it goes deeper than that. Some authors see cats as soulmates in a way. According to Robert Davies (Mindfulness), “Authors like cats because they are such quiet, loveable wise creatures, and cats like authors for the same reason.” That makes sense. Cats are pretty discerning about who they choose to hang out with (emphasis on choose). They do tend to steer clear of the loud blowhards out there, who talk constantly and at a very loud volume, and never manage to have anything substantial to say. Can’t say that I blame them. 

I want to take this moment to fly in the face of popular opinion and declare that cats are indeed smarter than dogs. The argument often used here is that you can train dogs to do all sorts of tricks and tasks – but not a cat. Well, let’s not forget that dogs are pack creatures and are instinctually inclined to want to please their alpha/owner. To that end, dogs “allow” themselves to be trained, where a cat would never suffer such an indignity. You can train cats to use a litter box and (if you’re lucky) not to scratch the furniture, but as far as fetching, shaking hands, or rolling over, a cat would never stoop so low. Going back to what I wrote earlier about how discerning cats are about the company they choose, dogs are conditioned to come when you call them. A cat will come to you if it wants to, and if you have earned the love and respect of a cat you have indeed earned it, and that is indeed something special.

I have never met two cats that have had identical or even similar personalities. Every cat has a style and a voice of their own. It’s no wonder so many authors have written about cats. Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Bukowski, and Joyce Carol Oates. So far, my favorite literary feline is the Cat in Neil Gaiman’s Coraline, who so brilliantly (and very catlike) states that, “Cats don’t need names. We know who we are.” So true. I want to take this moment to thank all the cats in my life for humoring me by allowing me to give them names, solely for my convenience.

Cats are artists in their own right. You know, if they could, they would write poems, draw and paint, or compose music. And maybe they do, in ways we’re just not aware of yet. Andre Norton (The Time Traders) stated that “Perhaps it is because cats do not live by human standards, do not fit themselves into prescribed behaviors, that they are so united to creative people.” They’re kindred spirits, for sure. 

The cat’s mysterious, complex nature often leads to talk of the supernatural. Think about how each cat is a little aloof to its surroundings, as if its mind is focused on higher realms of thought, or how their piercing eyes that seem to see right through whatever they’re focused on, as if they’re penetrating a magic veil that allows them to see the world and everything in it for what it truly is. No wonder they are so closely associated with witches and once worshipped as gods.

I know I’m not the first author to refer to my cat as a muse (Or is it “mews?”). As I sat down to write this blog post, my cat, Luna, decided to join me. In fact, every time I write, she has to join me and graciously allows me room to write at my desk. She may not pin me to my chair the way Oates’ cat does, but something about her presence and her proximity keeps me relaxed and allows ideas to freely flow, and all she ever asks for in return is a little scratching behind the ears. 

So here’s to our feline companions, our kindred spirits, our “mews-es.” We can only speculate upon your true motives about why you choose to love and inspire us as you do, but we will always be grateful for it and never take it for granted.

Dracula's Influences - part 2: Varney the Vampyre

Varney the Vampyre (or The Feast of Blood) was originally written in the mid 1840s in 109 weekly installments known as "penny dreadfuls." It would later by collected into a single 800+ page volume. The book was also published anonymously, and it wasn't until the 1970s that authorship (by James Malcom Rymer) was established.
 

story follows Sir. Francis Varney. It begins with his attack of a young woman named Flora Bannerworth in her bedroom. His sinks his fangs into her necks and drinks her blood. He's interrupted by members of Flora's family, shot, but is still able to escape.
 

Throughout the novel (or in each installment, as the story was originally written), more of Varney's history is revealed. He was originally from England under Cromwell during 1649, and during a heated exchange with his son accidentally killed him. After that, he recalls seeing a flash of light and being struck to the ground. He woke up next to a recently opened grave (his own?), and a disembodied voice told him that as a punishment for him killing his son he would have to walk the earth as a vampire.
 

Like Lord Ruthven, Varney had superhuman strength, could walk around freely in the sunlight (Yes, Dracula could do that too), and needed blood to survive. He could be wounded but would heal with exposure to moonlight.
 

In his story, Varney is first depicted as being completely evil but later reveals a sense of honor and even feelings of remorse for his actions. This is enough for the Bannerworth family to go from hunting Varney to actually protecting him from a mob that's out to destroy him.
 

After saying goodbye to the Bannerworths, Varney goes on to have brief encounters with other people. Each time he establishes himself in a new social setting, later tries to bite someone, is discovered, hunted, and then forced to flee -- proving that he apparently wasn't very good at being a vampire (unlike Ruthven and later, Dracula).
 

Barney the Vampyre was derided by modern critics as being poorly written, but it must be remembered that his story was originally a penny dreadful, a form of simple pulp fiction. Also, despite authorship eventually going to Rymer, there was still a strong chance that there was more than one author over the course of the 109 initial installments.
 

Still, in the end, Varney deserves credit for being one of the first literary vampires to precede Dracula.

Dracula's Influences - part 1: Lord Ruthven

While Dracula is accepted as the undisputed king of the vampires, he is not as original as most people think he is. There were three lesser known vampires who helped pave the way for him.

The first one is Lord Ruthven from "The Vampyre" by John Polidori. It was published in 1819 and was in fact the first vampire story. It would later become a play staged in London and Paris. The story was taken from a story written by Polidori's friend, the poet Lord Byron. In fact, Mr. "Mad, Bad, and Dangerous to Know" was the model for Ruthven. In the story, Ruthven is pale, aloof, loved by women, and enjoys corrupting people, especially gamblers.

The main character of "The Vampyre" is man named Aubrey who befriends Ruthven in London and accompanies him on a trip to Rome. While there, the two have a falling out when Ruthven tries to seduce the daughter of an acquaintance of Aubrey's.

Aubrey goes on to Greece, where he meets and falls in love with Ianthe, the daughter of the innkeeper where he is staying. She's the one who introduces him to the vampire legend. Ruthven arrives in Greece later. Shortly after that, Ianthe is killed by a vampire. Aubrey doesn't make the connection yet between Ruthven's arrival and the vampire attack and ends up traveling with him throughout Greece.

At one point, the two are attacked by bandits. Ruthven is killed, but before he dies he makes Aubrey swear to conceal the manner of his death and any crimes he might have committed for a year and a day. Aubrey agrees. He returns to London. On the way, he begins to realize just how destructive Ruthven was to the people in his life, especially the women he professed to love.

When Aubrey returns to London, Ruthven is waiting for him and promptly reminds him of his oath of silence. Aubrey has a nervous breakdown, and while he is recovering Ruthven becomes close with Aubrey's sister. The two get engaged, and because of his oath Aubrey feels unable to stop them. The marriage takes place the day his oath to Ruthven expires. However, Aubrey is too late. Ruthven kills his sister and then disappears.

As I already mentioned, the story of Lord Ruthven became a stage play in London and Paris. It would make its way to Germany in 1829 and would see its final performance in 1852. He would later be succeeded by Varney the Vampyre, Carmilla, and eventually, yes, Dracula.

Ruthven would be resdicvoered in 1945 and serve as the inspiration for the movie, The Vampire's Ghost. He would go on to make an appearance in Marvel comics Vampire Tales in 1973 and would later appear on BBC TV in 1992.

That's all for now. Next time -- Dracula's Influences - part 2: Varney the Vampyre.