The Bards of Bone Plain

I like finding what's lost...Or rather what's forgotten, since nothing I find is truly lost.  I like piecing people's lives together, knowing what they made, where they kept it.  It's like searching for the beginning of a story.  You keep going back and back, and the beginning keeps moving ahead of you, always older than what you hold in your hand, always pointing beyond what you know.

McKillip is back in full form.  I had some doubts in the beginning, wondering if this was just the same stuff I’ve seen before, but as the story went on, it found its feet, its voice, or maybe I just stopped worrying or caring.   Who knows.  I think this is her best in a long time.  McKillip lost me completely with Solstice Wood—I decided, for me at least, that it was a fluke—The Bell At Sealy Head was better, but still not up to work she has done previously, but this one, The Bards of Bone Plain…we’re back with classic McKillip.  Love.  It.

McKillip’s characters are good.  Phelan, who doesn’t understand his father, Jonah.  And whose lack of understanding suddenly makes sense and is understood by the end.   Zoe, the young bard with the powerful  voice, and of course Nairn, who you can’t help feel compassion for as he is drawn into something he doesn’t fully want to be a part of and yet can’t help himself due to his own insecurities and wants.`

Unlike some of her other words, Bards of Bone Plain is more plot driven than character driven.  We have two stories: one that occurs in the present day city of Caerau and one telling the story of Nairn, in fable form, who exists in the stories and legends of the land and whose tale we follow before Caerau is even founded.  We see the parallels of Zoe and Nairn as they find secrets in the Circle of Days and play the magic of the land in their wild voices.  Then, in the modern day tale, we see Beatrice and Jonah Cle digging up artifacts from Nairn’s day, trying to determine what secrets they hold, and what became of Nairn, who disappeared after the great bardic competition.  Then, of course, there is Phelan, Jonah’s son, who has chosen to research the mysterious Bone Plain for his research topic, a plain we see flashing again and in again in Nairn’s own tale.

The parallels become more and more apparent as the story progresses, finally tangling together at the end.

There is a common trope in folklore: stranger coming to a contest called by a king, of no family, of no wealth. He is usually the good guy and wins and finds glory, but what if he’s the bad guy?

Also folklore is riddled with challenges that the hero wins.  But what happens to those that lose?

I feel as if those were some of the questions that inspired this book.  They formed the first foundations and bones of it and then the flesh was built around it in the themes and words that McKillip is most comfortable with.  I saw bits from her other books: this was from The Riddle Master of Hed, that was from Alphabet of Thorn, and still all of this was found in most of her books and even some short stories.

If I could critique any part of this magical work, it would be that there were some abrupt character revelations at the end.  Beatrice’s and Phelan’s relationship seemed to almost sprout from nowhere to the point where I just didn’t buy it.  I understood why it was important to the plot, but beyond that I just didn’t buy it.  There were parts too, at the end, that seemed rushed in a way that I just can’t seem to put my finger on.

Of course, maybe this was because my eyes were glued to the page, trapped as they always are with McKillip, with words.

The Bards of Bone Plain, a must read and maybe another World Fantasy Award nomination.

Show and Tell isn’t all about Adjectives: A Show and Tell WIN

Last week, I talked about another form of the classic ‘show v. tell’ debate, i.e. telling your reader one thing, and showing characters do the opposite.  I also showed how this concept could result in a literary failure when you’re trying to convince your reader of a solid truth about your character.  For example, in The Crimson Sword we are told that Jarom is mature, elected to be his village defender, and takes the role seriously, however what we see is him goofing off, whining, and not doing any of the things that would back up the assertion that he was worthy of said position.

This is something to be wary of, if you want your reader to know something special about your character, you have to be sure your character actually lives up to what you say.

Today, I want to talk about the importance of show and tell when it comes to misdirection.  Yes, we want to mislead our readers sometimes if we want to hide a secret, establish a twist ending, or simply not have them figure out the entire plot of the story beforehand.  Misdirection can be an absolutely essential skill to have because if you want to surprise your reader, you can’t let them figure out the ending.  However, you also can’t have an ending come out of nowhere and you have to scatter clues throughout the book so the ending—or whatever you want to make a surprise-- makes sense.

To do this, you have to divert attention from what you are showing using your telling skills.

A lot of authors do this, but the example I am going to use is John Snow’s parentage from George R. R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire.  *SPOILER*  If you haven’t figured out John Snow’s parentage and don’t want to know, or don’t want to know in general, then you may not want to read this.   Now, I have to admit, it hasn’t been revealed for sure who the parents are, but to me, its freakishly obvious by this point that I really really really doubt I’m wrong.

Show and Tell Win:

Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin

For those of you unfamiliar with Martin’s series Song of Ice and Fire it’s a fantastic, albeit tragic, book series.  It is complex with multiple characters, but really well done and well written.  It follows the Stark family, one of whom is John Snow, who is told to us to be the bastard son of Eddard Stark.  John lives with the Stark children, however, and is treated by the family as if he is completely one of their own.

Now John Snow is introduced to us as Eddard’s bastard.  We are told that, and then we are immediately introduced to the back handed sniggering about Eddards affair, Eddards wife’s mixed feelings about the whole thing, and the rumors swirling over who John’s mother was because Eddard refuses to say.

This is the misdirection.  And it is very very well done.  Martin directs his reader’s mind to where he wants it to go: to try to figure out who the mother could be.  He even offers up names and possibilities so the reader focuses solely on trying to figure out his mother’s lineage.  It’s important he does this because if the reader’s mind strays away to the mother and questions Eddard Stark himself, then they’ll see the disconnect between what we’ve been told and what we’ve been shown and the reader can figure out John Snow’s lineage early on in the first book.

What’s this show and tell disconnect?  Well, if there is one thing the reader knows for certain about Eddard Stark through seeing his words and deeds in the book—aka what we’ve been shown—we can see that he is honorable to a fault.  With this in mind it makes no sense as to why he would cheat on his wife.  What we’ve been told makes no sense with what we’ve been shown with his character.  Therefore the logical explanation of this affair is that he didn’t have one.

Once the reader understands that, other clues we have been shown—and will be shown as the books continue—fall into place. 

For example, John Snow has white hair.  There is a woman who has white hair who was offered up in the beginning as having been Eddards mistress, but there is also the royal Targaryen family who had white hair, and were deposed in a coup before the book began.  Since we have dismissed the mistress idea, and it makes no sense for Eddard to harbor some random women who the author tells us really nothing about, it’s clear that one of John’s parents is a Targaryen.

But why would Eddard Stark harbor a Targaryen child?

The other thing we know about Eddard Stark is that he loved his sister Liana more than life itself, and according to what we were told Liana was raped and killed by Rhaegar, a Targaryen prince.  It makes sense then that Eddard is harboring his sister’s son as his own, and hiding it because John would be killed if it were known he was part of the Targaryen line.

What makes this conclusion even more compelling comes back, again, to show and tell.  We see in flashbacks when Eddard finds his sister dying.  And, honestly, it’s a very odd scene for a rape.  She’s surrounded by flowers, and there’s blood, and she makes Eddard promise her something.  The promise makes perfect sense to be taking care of John, giving another reason he’s harboring him.  But the scene, the flowers, the blood with no actual wound mentioned—and if you’ve read Martin you know he doesn’t skimp on details—doesn’t sound like a rape/murder scene.  Now, we’ve been told again that Rhaegar was a monster, hence him raping Liana, but when we meet Rhaegar in a flashback, he is rather gallant, and just as honorable as Eddard.  Plus he and Liana are flirting like whoa.  So again, what we’ve been shown does not match the vision of rapist/murderer.  Therefore, if we ignore what we’ve been told we can see that its very likely that Rhaegar did not rape Liana and its far more likely that Liana died in childbirth.  Which would account for the blood but no wound, and the flowers.

So you see, if we ignore what we’ve been told and look solely at what we’ve been shown, all the pieces really fall into place.  However, Martin’s skill of misdirection in the beginning completely leads people off track, and focus instead on who the mother could be, so, when John’s lineage is finally revealed—whenever that is—it will be much more of a surprise BUT everything will make sense because the proper clues, the proper showing was there.

Showing v. Telling Isn’t Just About Adjectives: A Show and Tell FAIL

I think any writer who has ever put pen to paper has heard about showing v. telling when writing a story. 

But there’s another kind of Showing and Telling that is often times unseen, unheard of, or neglected, which is sad because it can cause flaws in writing OR can serve as a very useful tool for writers if done properly.

So what sort of showing and telling am I talking about?  Well, it has to do more with characters and plot i.e. telling me one thing about your character, but having the character do the opposite (showing).

This can be detrimental in that if you, as a writer, are trying to make me like a character, or understand something about a character, but the character doesn’t back up that assertion, then the character becomes unbelievable and nonsensical.  It also seems almost as if the writer is begging me to believe them.  That I'm supposed to believe that there is something good about their unruly child, as if telling me certain things about them will completely hide them and their flaws from view.

Tee hee you can't see me!

I mentioned that this 'show and tell' can be a tool too.  If done well, and appropriately, a writer can shield truths and answers to mysteries by misleading a reader with what they are telling them.  What they are showing however is subtly different and hopefully subtle enough that the reader is too distracted by what is being told to them.  Thus, at the end, when all is revealed, the reader (hopefully) didn’t quite see a twist or an answer coming BUT it all makes sense with what’s been shown.

I’m going to give two examples, one where show/tell  of characters doesn’t work, and one where it does.  For where it doesn’t:  Jarom in the Crimson Sword, and where it does: John Snow’s parentage in George R. R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire.

SPOILER:  If you haven’t figured out John Snow’s parentage yet and don’t want to know, then don’t read the next entry on this subject—hopefully to be posted in the coming days!

This post though, will be concerning the fail.

Show and Tell FAIL:

The Crimson Sword by Eldon Thompson

When I snarked on the Crimson Sword before, I touched on this show/tell problem.  Eldon Thompson gives us paragraphs describing the wonders of his character, Jarom, and how noble and perfect he is.  To illustrate this, I took a section from the Crimson Sword.  It’s a smidge long but bear with me, and try not to vomit in your mouth:

More importantly, he and no other wore the mantle of Fason, the Village Shield, guardian of Diln.  It was up on his shoulders that the burden of safety of the village and its inhabitants rested…

Jarom smiled and said nothing.  Allion had indeed shot down three of the four marauders.  Then again, not even Allion could have brought them all down and prevented one of their band from slicing off the woman’s throat.  It was Jarom who had offered himself up as the distraction that had saved her life.  But Allion could tell the story as he saw fit.  Jarom was no more interest in the adoration of youngsters than he was in the praise of adults.  His pride was rooted not in the opinions of others, but in his own sense of fulfillment.  In this instance, he was satisfied with his efforts and Allion’s in a job well done.

…But Allion’s recitation was for Allion as well.  Whatever else, the hunter was here and now the center of attention, garnering recognition for his words and deeds, seeking approval for one half his age.

Jarom was more mature than that, or so he preferred to believe, a necessary side effect of his role as village peacekeeper.  Granted, the position as largely ceremonial…

Nevertheless it was his responsibility, entrusted to him more than a year ago at the age of eighteen—younger than any other who held the position before.  Jarom viewed therefore as a trust to be taken seriously.  He worked diligently to meet and exceed the expectations of those who had asked this of him, but mostly to meet and exceed the expectations he held for himself, which precluded the kind of grandiose behavior being displayed now  by his friend.

Okay first off, on a craft level, it’s clear that this is a chunk of telling.  Which is fine in some regards, and would work if the only thing you had read of this novel were these paragraphs.  Unfortunately for the author, I read up to this point and a little bit after and I felt annoyed and insulted that he tried to make me like his character who was clearly a whiny, immature, worthless, undeserving creature.

We are told, as this quoted section starts out, that Jarom is the defender and protector of the village and its made crystal clear that he takes his responsibility seriously (see last quoted paragraph).  Now none of this makes sense to me as the reader because in the chapter before this, when we were first introduced to Jarom he was dicking around in the woods somewhere shooting at targets.

That’s right.  Was the defender of the village scouting the perimeter?  No.  Was he checking up on the local militia or guards?  No.  Was he doing anything regarding the position that I am told he takes so super seriously?  No.  What was he doing instead?  Shooting at things somewhere in the forest no where near his village.  Just like a ten year old boy does when he sees something stuck in a tree.

Now, because of what I have been shown in this scene, I find it hard to believe that he was appointed to this defender position, and have no idea why someone would have appointed him to this position.  I also find it hard to believe he takes this role as seriously as the author claims, or even if he has any idea what taking a role seriously means.  As a result of that, I find it arrogant and hypocritical for the criticizing of his friend…as only a mature adult would do!  But more on that point in a moment.

Something that’s talked about in the example I pulled, is Jarom and Allion’s encounter with a gang of marauders.  As they were dicking around in the woods shooting at things like ten year olds with a new toy, they hear the sound of hoof beats and find a woman being chased down by four marauders.  They kill the marauders and bring the woman back to their village.

If you hadn’t actually read this event, it sounds as if Allion and Jarom did a sort of equal job and that Allion’s part my look larger and he himself is making it sound larger than it actually was—actually killing three of the four bandits.  It also sounds as if Jarom held a pretty important role, distraction, bait, etc, forming the second half of a perfectly orchestrated event.

Unfortunately, the author either forgets that I actually read what happened, because, oh, I don’t know, I’m THE READER?? or else he is hoping that if he RE-tells it in a way that makes his MC sound better, I’ll forget the previous battle.

What really happened was this:  Jarom and Allion get to the scene as the marauders catch up to the woman.  They hide in the brush while the marauders grab the woman and the woman bites her captors wrist causing him to scream and let go.

What does our serious, young village peacekeeper do?  For someone put into the role at such a young age, as we were told, we would think he would, oh, know what he was doing.  But no.  Instead of getting a weapon, or shooting from the brush, Jarom rushes into the middle of the group like an idiot and attacks the man the woman already bit.

That’s right.  He goes after the already wounded guy.  Who was wounded…by a woman.  While surrounded by other enemies.  With no weapon.

Why the hell is this guy village peace keeper?

So Jarom is wrestling on the ground with this guy when he suddenly realizes “Damn…probably should have gotten a weapon before I charged in here like a moron,” gets up—leaving his enemy on the ground, not even slightly more wounded than he was before, and realizes, oops, there are other soldiers surrounding me.

These other soldiers—remember there were a total of four, three are now surrounding him since Jarom tackled one—watched probably in shock wondering who this bockhead was, now realized that “oh just some idiot we can easily take care of.’

Of course Jarom just stands there while Allion, still in the bushes LIKE ANYONE WITH ANY SENSE WOULD DO picks them off.  As he would done whether Jarom was there or not.  So this nonsense as Jarom serving as a distraction—although yes he was a distraction—really is a moot point because Allion could have picked them off as easily whether Jarom was there or not.  In fact, Jarom just made things worse because now Allion had to save, not only this woman, but his friend.

Essentially, Allion then kills three with arrows, while the guy Jarom was wrestling with (who he turned his back on when he got up, as any good defender or protector would do!) gets up and tries to kill Jarom, but Jarom fights him off…with a tree branch.  A guy with a heavy sword v. a tree branch.  Yes, in that battle I’m sure a tree branch would win every time. *thumbs up* 

So, as you can see, this sudden assertion that Jarom played an essential role and that Allion was being over dramatic I find a little insulting.  "Offered himself up?"  Jarom did no more 'Offer himself up," to these guys, than a skunk offers himself up to a car when crossing the road. What we are now being told is not what we were shown and as the reader I don’t like being treated like I’m a fool.  When Jarom says ‘he was satisfied with his efforts and Allion’s in a job well done,’ yeah you had better be satisfied Jarom, Allion saved your worthless life and if that’s your best effort as the village peace keeper than I fear for your village.

Another thing I want to talk about are the inherent contradictions in what I’m told about Jarom’s character and that whole ‘Jarom is wonderful’ speech above.

We’re told how mature Jarom sees himself, and how seriously he takes things and how seriously he takes his job.  We’re led to believe he’s this low key, serious, hardworking good guy, yet the entire time he/the author is totally trashing Allion!  Allion is playing with kids and telling them stories, and being a healthy vital part of the village.  Jarom is sitting on the steps of a building moping.  If you’re so serious and mature than stop judging how others behave.  Maybe it’s not Jarom, maybe it’s the author doing the judging to make Jarom look good because one moment Jarom’s judging, and the next he’s going “but that’s okay!’  It’s as if the character has two personalities rather than the one that Eldon Thompson is trying to force on his readers.

Lastly, pages following this just show how inaccurate this whole explanation of Jarom’s character is.  We find out some nonsense about Jarom being a kings son.  What does mature, serious, doesn’t care about other’s opinion character do?  Instead of manning up, taking thing seriously, and asking questions like the man we’re lead to believe he is,  he acts like a whiney kid and then mopes around.  In fact, what does he say like an angsty teenager?  “My entire life is a hoax!”  Whaa waah waah, grow up and get out of puberty Jarom.

The thing is, I wouldn’t have been so hard on, or so disappointed in Jarom, if I had not been told who he was supposed to be.  If those paragraphs had just been left out and I was able to see the character than some of this would have made sense.  Instead, I’m left believing that the MC is an irritating moron, and that the author is trying to force me to see him as something he’s not.

I’m a scientist, I like to have evidence, and I do not appreciate this kind of apparent writing short-cut to make your character appear awesome when you have shown me he is not.

A Brief and Sudden Thought on Evil

Conflict, an antagonist, the presence of evil in your novel does not simply exist for the character to struggle against, and I think we do a disservice to a character and to a story if we, as writers, see evil in that light only.  No, I think we must see the importance of evil and evil events in the light transforming and shaping your character.  Evil isn’t a wall that your character throws him or herself against, beating and beating until they have conditioned their body, but rather something that is consumed, something that intwines throughout the hero until they are morphed and changed as a reaction to it.

Phantastes

'Thus I, who had set out to find my Ideal, came back rejoicing that I had lost my Shadow.' ~Phantastes

If I were to teach a class on Fantasy literature, George MacDonald’s Phantastes would be a definite read.  This book, in many ways, seemed to be like a linking element, joining together the myth and folklore of past eras to more modern day literature.  After reading it, I can see clearly why C.S. Lewis said that after reading this story he felt ‘as though his imagination had been baptized,’ and why it has been a source of inspiration for authors like Lewis, Tolkien, Carroll, Stevenson, and others.

Phantastes, written 1857/8, the story follows the tale of Anodos through the mystical realm of Faerie.  Through his travels he meets friends, enemies, sees wonders and comes upon a greater understanding of himself.  The book of full of layers, double meanings, symbols, and what I consider a completely delicious combination of imagination and folktale—and let me tell you I am a sucker for folktale.

Phantastes doesn’t have a concrete plot in the way we think of them.  There is no obvious antagonist to start out with and Anodos doesn’t seem to be going anywhere in Fairyland except for travelling East.  For what point and purpose, we don’t know, although there is religious symbolism in the choice of direction. However, while not having a concrete obvious plot made up of actions in hopes of coming to a distinct end point, the book has a subtle plot of character growth.  The antagonist and the hero is one and the same: Anodos himself. Only in searching, discovering, and conquering himself and his own failings and faults can he truly ‘win.’  Phantastes is, in fact, actually described, from the German as a Bildungsroman, or a story of personal development.

This story of personal development, or this Bildungsroman, I believe is what good stories should be at their root.  An author may forget that to their detriment.

One of the most amazing things while reading this work was seeing the obvious inspiration and parallels to other classic works of literary fiction. Fairy Land, for example, sort of forms itself around Anodos, so that he enters it in a passive way.  To me, this is very representative of how the children often entered C.S. Lewis’s  Narnia.  Additionally, the entire Narnia arc can be seen as having similar beginning and end points to Anodos adventures throughout Fairy Land, and many of the people Anodos meets have parallels in Narnia.  One can draw clear lines of inspiration from Phantastes to Lewis Carroll.  MacDonald saw mirrors as places that not only reflect, but hold a form of reality, an idea Carroll drew upon in Through the Looking Glass.  Additionally, the white rabbit of Carroll fame has one of his first appearances early on in Phantastes.

I spoke of folktale before, and that is really the part of the story that caught me.  I have a soft spot for folktale.  They always seem so wondrous to me, and how these stories and peoples almost seem to exist in the shadows of our own world, or even a shadow version of our own world.  MacDonald brings in dryads, witches, huts with four doors, knights, and even a modified Baba Yaga makes an appearance.  Those elements alone kept me reading and kept inspiring me with each page.

Phantastes, I feel, is a must read for any lover, reader, and/or writer of the fantasy genre.  Not only to gain a better understanding of the literature it inspired, but to inspiring your own imagination as well.

Back v. 2.0

I feel as if I’ve been dead for the last few months.  Not officially ‘heart stopped in the ground dead,’ but more ‘writing, reading normal self’ dead.  With the ending of the last year, I was able to clean up lots of loose ends and now I feel up to actually reading more, writing more, getting back to forums that I have ignored, and emails I just couldn’t respond to, although I hope some of those folks were too distracted by hockey to notice. 

I still have one more entry in my travel journal—which was taking up the place of actual entries that required my mind to work—before I get back to real entries on stories.  And this last entry, following this, is pretty short.  But before that you’ll notice a real sign that I’m back to my normal literary self.

I’ve rearranged my ‘Reading/Upcoming Reads’ list on the sidebar.  ‘The Crimson Sword’ is on the backburner because I wanted to read, well, good things.  ’Lord Foul’s Bane’ is pushed onto my mental list of books to read simply because I have other books I got that I want to read sooner. Now I’m working on George MacDonald’s Phantastes which is absolutely fantastic and I can’t wait to talk about it.

But before that, my last real post from my travel journal.

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This post is relatively short.  In fact the pages of my moleskin are pretty empty if you look at my last full day in Munich.  It was taken up mainly with a failed attempt to go to Salzburg, wandering around the city again, a visit to Starnberger See, and another short jaunt to Augsberg—this time in the daylight.  None of it is worth recording here.  The evening, however, really needs a spot of my time.

It was Thanksgiving.  Thanksgiving is, of course, an American holiday and it is not something the German’s celebrate.  When I studied in Munich in 2007, some of the host parents organized a Thanksgiving dinner for all the students, which at the time ,was awesome.  We had been in Germany for months and were all feeling a little homesick, and so getting together at a little café in Neubiberg was just the ticket.  We had all made American style thanksgiving dishes, some of which were a challenge.  I had a particular issue finding cheddar cheese and instead ended up with a suspicious substance known as Chester Cheese, which worked out fine but I still to this day don’t quite know what it was.  Another girl made sweet potato casserole and had to spend weeks looking for sweet potatoes.  When she finally made it, one of our German professors looked at the dish, and said to the person next to him “What is that monstrosity!”  :D  All in all it was really nice, but it illustrating not only outstanding cultural differences, but  how diet can make reenacting a favorite holiday pretty difficult.

That was 2007, and now it was 2010 and once again I was in Munich for Thanksgiving.  And, once again, my undergraduate program was studying abroad and the host parents had organized a dinner.  Although no longer a student, Traudl decided that we should go (naturally) and arranged for our presence at Café Zur Post on Hauptstrasse in Neubiberg.

At 5:45 we left the house.  It gets dark in Munich around 4:00pm so it was black by this time and very cold.  It had been snowing the whole time and by the time we got into the car, we couldn’t see out the window.  Apparently not being able to see when driving, doesn’t matter much for the German’s.  We peeled out of the drive way.

Okay, I’m sorry, we couldn’t completely not see.  There was a tiny strip at the bottom of the windshield that was clear, so Traudl hunched down in her seat as we hit the mainroad and peered out the tiny little bit of clear glass.  Problem solved I guess??

The Café was about 5 minutes from our house, and, as we pulled in, it was clear we were the first ones there.  Which, I think, was a good thing.  As we went in we were treated to an interesting scene.

For decorations, the people of the cafe had written “Happy Thanksgiving!” on pieces of construction paper and placed them randomly around the room.  On the center of each table was a poinsettia, a clump of party balloon’s hung from the ceiling, and, to top off the truly Thanksgiving like atmosphere, the song ‘Eye of the Tiger’ was blaring from the sound system.

Happy Thanksgiving Christmas Birthday Boxing Day maybe?  :)

It was cute and they really did try their hardest.  I suppose I can’t fault them for that.

The food was good.  Instead of a whole turkey, we just had the turkey legs, and the pumpkin pie, made by one of the American professors, was oddly lacking pumpkin.  She explained to us, sadly, that pumpkin was not only out of season, but almost impossible to find.  It was like the sweet potato experience all over again.

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That’s the last entry from my travel journal to Munich.  We left the next day, flying out in snow and ice, and leaving Bavaria behind us.  I love Munich, and I love Germany, and the secret hidden places in the Alps.  If you ever get a chance to go, do it!  It’s a magical country, with crazy inhabitants, and you won’t regret your trip.

Through the Alps

Through the Alps

Going through the Alps, I understand where fairy stories come from, and how so many of them came from this area of the world.  I understand it so well how tales of dragons and unicorns and fairies and orgres and mystical creatures can come out of places like this:

It reeks of fantasy in its simple existence and I can really understand by being here the true influence of this place on stories.  It’s in the little things too.  The delicately carved and scrolled woodwork on all of the houses in the villages, all so small in juxtaposition to the mountains.  The woodsmoke among the snow.  In the summer, there are window boxes of geraniums.  It is a place that seems so…lost in time.  Or rather so hidden away that all the dangers it has to contend with are the mountains and the stories hidden away within the knells.

Ahh Deutschland.  You inspire me so.

But to backtrack a little.  My friend’s biggest wish coming to Germany was to see Neuschwanstein Castle:

This one!

the big white castle that usually plasters most cards and images of Deutschland.  I told my host parents this and today we made the trip down towards Fussen.  This was awesome for me.  In the past, I had made the trip by train, but now, in the car we were able to drive all through the Alps. It was especially awesome because, well… I have a bit of a love affair with mountains.

And to make that load of awesome even more awesome, it was snowing.

We took a scenic route, possibly for a reason other than the scenery.  My host parents had been trying to convince us constantly to go to a different castle and it just so happened to be conveniently on our way when we took the scenic route.  Imagine that.

Honestly, it didn’t matter.  We benefited in the long run.

A road in an alpine valley

Church in the alps.  The onion dome is common in Bayern

Snowy trees

Farmhouse

Likely a restaurant or guest house in a village we passed through

I really like the look of German words

Going up one of the mountains, we came to a small village.  Peter asks from the front seat:

“There is a monastery here.  You want to in?”

Mackenzie and I look at each other, shrug, and respond.  “It doesn’t matter.  We don’t have to.”

“Okay, we will go.”

We really didn’t care, we were looking forward to getting to Neuschwanstein, but when we pulled off the road and walked under an archway, boy was I glad we stopped.

Deutschland, du bist Schoen

We made it to the castle an hour or two later.

It’s just outside the village of Fussen and apparently, the school day had just ended because little kids in square backpacks were running down the road.  Maybe it’s just me, but I think it would be just awesome to go to school in the shadow of a castle.  How cool and surreal!

Normally, busses run up the mountain taking tourists from the bottom to the top to visit the castle.  Unfortunately today, it was snowing, and because it was snowing and this is Alps—in other words, the slopes are steep—the busses weren’t running.

“No problem!” Traudl says, “we will hike!”

Now, I’m all for hiking in weird conditions.  It’s an adventure!  But I certainly wasn’t expecting to be hiking through the Alps in the snow in winter.  Traudl, however, acting like it was an everyday occurrence and set off at a brisk pace toward the top.

Peter, who has a form of rheumatism, stayed at the bottom.  Thus, we were a little surprised when, after a few minutes waiting in the entrance hall for our tour to start, we turn around and BAM there’s Peter, grinning at us.

“I decided,” he says, “I want to walk a little.  So I walk a little bit.  And then…I walk a little more.  And then I am here.”

We didn’t have to wait long before our tour, but before I talk briefly about the castle I have to recount a conversation I had while waiting to go inside.

First, to set the scene, we are waiting with about 30 other people, huddled in the entrance way of the castle waiting for the tour in English to begin.  So we are surrounded by English speakers.  And children.  Got that?  Remember English speakers and children.

Traudl and Peter are talking about something in German and I chuckle at it.

Peter: “Ah you like that?  What is that word in English?  B—bottom?”

Me: “Yes, bottom.  The slang term is ‘butt.’”

Peter: “Ah! Ah! I see!”

Traudl: “What else is it…?”

Peter: “Yes, yes, what is the…lower level?”

I kind of blink at them, thinking,’ do they really want me to teach them this’ and ‘oh god everyone around me understands this conversation!’  But Traudl and Peter keep insisting so I lower my voice and say: “Ass.”

Peter *at normal volume*: “Ass?”

Traudl: “Ass!”

Peter: “Ass!”

“Ass!”

“Ass!”

Me: *headsmack*

Luckily we went into the castle a few moments later.

Neuschwanstein—literally translated to mean New Swan Stone—was built by Ludwig II at the expense of the Bavarian people.  Meaning he bankrupt the country to build it and its sister castles, Linderhof and Herr Chiemsee.  Ludwig, to me at least, seemed like a little boy who never quite grew up and liked to involve himself in his own fantasies.  Many people thought him to be mad—and maybe he was.  But his castles reflected this want for fairy tale and fancy in my opinion.  Neuschwanstein is what you’d think of  a castle from the outside AND from the inside.  It would be completely useless for defense but it was still beautiful to look at.  Rich wood carvings, tapestries, architecture…lovely. However, only eight rooms in the castle are actually complete.  Ludwig was ousted from the throne before the castle could be completed.

After we completed the tour, we made the way back to Munich on a more direct route. When we reached home, we ate dinner and sat up for hours drinking wine, talking, and me trying to translate back and forth between my friends and my host parents.

Now when it comes to conversation…oh boy!  German’s don’t really have the same…restraint I guess is the right word that we do in the states.  Nothing really is off limits.  It’s common for some of the first questions to be asked by new German friends to be how much you make and what religion you are.

So its no surprise that our conversation ranged from man-boobs:

Peter quote: “When a man gets older, he gets…” *makes gestures in front of his chest* “Yes like a woman.  But I like much more on a woman.  You know what I mean.  When a woman wears a corset, everything drops…up.  I like it very much.”

To the Queen of England:

Peter Quote: “The Queen…she is never amused!”

To incontinence:

Traudl quote:  You know, when people get older…they cannot hold their pee pee.”

To English pronunciations:

Peter quote:  “When German’s speak, it is always with diz, and daz.  It is hard to make the ‘th’ sound.  The tongue…must look outside.”

To the pictures Mackenzie took that day:

Peter quote:  “Ah but that picture is too small!  It does not get any of my…special parts.”

Until it was finally time to go to bed.

Peter:  “I must go to bed.  I sleep like a Princess.  A Princess and the…bean?”

Oh boy.  And tomorrow is a new day.