Wild: Tales from Early Medieval Britain

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Jeffs’ writing shows the reader that the abstract notion of the Wild, ever present to the medieval mind, is still accessible in the modern day. While people may no longer view the ocean as the “restlessness” that the early medieval folk thought of it as, the wandering seafarer remains a familiar figure throughout literature to this day. Similarly, the contemporary climate crisis echoes the experience of Lindisfarne before the Vikings invaded. Most now see us as living on the precipice of Doomsday. Jeffs ventures to show the reader a way to live upon that cliff’s edge with grace and perhaps even joy, through the celebration of unity that the monks used to create some of the most beautiful art of all ages. As with Storyland Wood engravings (the authors own) imbue chapters with a haunting gothic edge; the silhouette of leafless trees, hunched figures in empty spaces, bursts of white life amidst the darkness....emotive juxatpositions of humanity

The mix of modern iterations, translated originals and modern commentary providing a smooth and engaging link betwixt past and present. I suppose with choosing to tell it through the eyes of Prince Leir – I was interested in what parental pride looks like through the eyes of a child because, of course, children trust and believe their parents, and so maybe there is a disjunct between what Leir sees and what the reader sees. I was also interested in how you might extrapolate from that something of his behaviour – thinking how that childhood trauma might have impacted his actions as an adult and his own approach to parenting.”`The book is put together in a brilliant way: each chapters starts with Amy Jeffs' re-imagining and retelling a story from this period, enriching them with very human emotions, timeless wisdom, historically accurate facts, she effortlessly weaves art and artifacts from the time into the story and gives them new meaning by doing so. After the retelling of each story, she gives a detailed explanation in a very informative and entertaining way. I believe this is exactly the right way to keep these stories, cultures, ideas and values alive. This is how we can make people care about these extremely valuable treasures of an era long past. Immersive . . . Her stories are arranged across seven chapters - Earth, Ocean, Forest, Beast, Fen, Catastrophe and Paradise. Jeffs, a medieval scholar with her own wild streak, introduces each in confident, forceful tones. She also sings six of her songs, accompanied by early musical instruments. Lucy Paterson, who has one of those warm, low, Jeffs is the narrator, providing a reading that is suffused with portent and otherworldliness. Listeners miss out on the author’s elegant wood engravings that adorn the print edition, though they gain a series of folksongs, written and performed by Jeffs, each of which adds a thrilling new dimension to these ancient fables. Set between the Creation and Noah’s Flood and embellished with a series of linocut illustrations, Storyland reimagines the myths of Britain through a modern lens. Remembering legends including Bladud of Bath, Merlin in Stonehenge and Joseph of Arimathea in Glastonbury, Amy pays close attention to the weight these characters once carried in our societies; how they still speak to the modern world; and through themes of belonging and homeland, how compellingly consistent we are as human beings in our fundamental desires. As I sat down with the author, printmaker and art historian this month, it was a delight to slip away through the mists of time.

The RLF fellow told me on Tuesday that enthusiasm and love for a subject seeps through writing- this book is a prime example of that. Amy Jeffs’ debut book, Storyland, has captivated the hearts of readers across the nation. Steeped in magic and mystery and grounded in meticulous research in manuscripts and our ancient landscape, Amy’s mythical world is movingly articulated. The seven chapters of the book each focus upon a theme: Earth, Ocean, Forest, Beast, Fen, Catastrophe, and Paradise. The chapters open with a reimagining of a poem or riddle from the Exeter Book, and end with the author’s reflections upon what was just written. While the writings are beautiful, they also add enough to the writing itself that I was tempted to reread and capture what I had missed the first time around.What is most remarkable about Amy’s reimagining of this particular story is that it is depicted through the eyes of Bladud’s son, Prince Leir – Shakespeare’s King Lear – which adds another layer of complexity to the narrative as we think about what and who ‘Leir’ became in later life. Once more Amy Jeffs supports these tales with beautiful ink prints at the start of each story, this time wood engravings, which tease the tale in graphic form.

One interesting thing about Bladud is the resemblance between the story of Icarus and Daedalus. Bladud commits the same crime of desiring to fly – to achieve the ultimate,” Amy hints. “And just as Daedalus is in some ways punished to achieve human flight, there is a punishment in store for Bladud.” I think when we forget the histories we once believed, we can’t appreciate the motivations that led to events and decisions that had a real material impact on the future. Just because we no longer believe in giants doesn’t mean we should dismiss them as whimsy.” Most listeners to The Folklore Podcast will be familiar with Dr. Amy Jeffs’ brilliance. Art historian, artist, and regular contributor to Country Life Magazine, Jeffs is a multifaceted individual, who pairs her linocut and wood-engraving artwork with her historically inspired writing. Her previous book Storyland, which focused upon the history and legends of the United Kingdom and Ireland as a whole, was covered in Season 7, Episode 108 of The Folklore Podcast. Wild: Tales From Early Medieval Britain, her new book published by Quercus Publishing, focuses not upon the history of the founding of Britain, but rather upon the life experience and mentality of those living there. Jeffs has a gift for breathing new life into ancient stories through her lyrical writing, deep research and evocative woodcuts. She connects our mythic history to the landscape with delicacy and humour. Reading Wild feels like being led by the hand through a gnarled, old growth forest, along empty shoreflats, and along the edge of windswept cliffs – and shown how to experience them through medieval eyes. It's a jewel of a book." A desire to share the stories and get people excited about them was the beginning of it all. I was fascinated by how the illustrations in the Brut legend followed the narrative action but they were very concise illustrations and communicated so many elements of an episode so efficiently. I really enjoyed that challenge of persuading people through pictures that these were stories to pay attention to and to enjoy.”Wild is one of the best books I've read lately, it absolutely surprised and stunned me. It is intelligent, entertaining, sophisticated, informative and thought-provoking. Reading it has sparked my imagination and my interest in the early medieval history of Britain, this fascinating and complex period in time, when Christian, Celtic, Roman and Germanic art, myths, ideas and languages swirled together and created a truly unique combination. I imagine this is the sort of book, Professor Tolkien would have enjoyed reading and I can't wait to read some of the original sources mentioned in it. With her musical creations equally as enchanting as her other work, there is no doubt that Amy is a multi-talented artist and author with plenty more to come.

During her PhD Amy co-convened a project researching medieval badges and pilgrim souvenirs at the British Museum. She then worked in the British Library's department of Ancient, Medieval and Early Modern manuscripts. My only real disappointment is that there weren’t more tales to read, another beautifully researched and produced book. Having studied Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at Cambridge University, before completing an MA at the Courtauld Institute of Art and gaining a PhD in Art History from Corpus Christi College, Amy has a wealth of knowledge in medieval art and literature; one that she is effortlessly able to access when reciting lines at length.

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A life-long lover of music, Amy turned to the medium in an attempt to help her complete the final stages of illustrating the book. Through song-writing, she hoped to find the emotion in each story so that her illustrations would become a motif, comprehensively depicting the overall plot line in one piece. “Coming to the end of illustrating Storyland I was feeling myself getting complacent in producing the images. When I started off, there was this adrenaline to it and it was fading as I got 45 illustrations in and having to do a lot of other things at the same time. And then one day I sat down at the piano and I thought, ‘well maybe I could think through some of the emotions in the scene that I’ve got to illustrate by coming up with songs about them’, so I wrote several songs – five of which we have put as an EP on Spotify – they’re called Songs for Albion.” This came into the shop early and didn’t even have time to hit the floor before I had bought it I was looking forward to it so much. Across seven themed chapters the Storyland author presents an inspiring excavation of the British countryside through diverse medieval texts." Jason Watkins reads this terrific portrait of London’s Soho between the wars, featuring a long cast of characters including Nellie Coker, a nightclub owner; Frobisher, a police inspector investigating Nellie’s business; and Gwendolen, a young librarian hired to search for some missing girls. What is most remarkable about Amy’s reimagining of this particular story is that it is depicted through the eyes of Bladud’s son, Prince Leir – Shakespeare’s King Lear – which adds another layer of complexity to the narrative as we think about what and who Leir became in later life.