A Strange Parable: GMac's "The Gray Wolf"

[alecforbes]

Just read your quotes from the The Princess and Curdie. I think you’re dead on in the parallels with The Gray Wolf. And of course, GMac was inspired by Johnny Cash’s cover of Nick Lowe’s “The Beast in Me”: youtube.com/watch?v=T8tGCVavS5s

Great song which I hadn’t heard before These lyrics:

Of the beast in me that everybody knows
They’ve seen him out dressed in my clothes
Patently unclear
If it’s New York or New Year
God help the beast in me

reminded me of Warren Zevon’s Werewolves of London for some reason…

I read Phantastes for the first time long ago and enjoyed it, but pick up something new each time I read it. Probably best not to try too hard to “figure it out” the first time you read it as it’s so chock full of symbolism, allegory, allusions to Biblical text and Greek myth…

[Cindy_Skillman]

Funny! I’ll bet that’s where I learned that, whether true or not. And here my memory had supplied more, shall we say, believable sources. I can hardly believe that’s the only place I ever saw that! I think you’re right. The Zoroastrian symbolism is more likely to be true. I never go back and look at those questions, so I’m glad you did. I also liked this one – perhaps better:

In the Kabalah, the rose is a symbol for Tiphareth; the heart. The fire would be spirit. A burning rose would be a heart aflame with spirit.

[alecforbes]

In the Kabalah, the rose is a symbol for Tiphareth; the heart. The fire would be spirit. A burning rose would be a heart aflame with spirit.

I do like that one better.

So, we’ve covered the “old woman”, the “Wolf-girl”, the “outer darkness” and the redemptive theme of the story with the “old woman” offering holy fare in the form of broiled fish and whisky.

whiskey (n.)
1715, from Gaelic uisge beatha “whisky,” literally "water of life," from Old Irish uisce “water” + bethu “life.” The Gaelic is probably a loan-translation of Medieval Latin aqua vitae, which had been applied to intoxicating drinks since early 14c. (cf. French eau de vie “brandy”). Other early spellings in English include usquebea (1706) and iskie bae (1580s). Distinction between Scotch whisky and Irish and American whiskey is a 19c. innovation. Whisky sour is recorded from 1889.

Why a “werewolf”? The “meaning” might be the same if her “inner beast” was a different animal, but a “were-pig” or “were-badger” just wouldn’t work with the gothic nature of the story, I’m afraid. There may be some sexual/seduction allusions as well from her being a werewolf. I don’t know if the term “man-eater” for a certain type of woman was used at the time, but it might apply.

I’ll give my thoughts on the “student” whose point of view we see the story from, later…

So, is the wolf-girl making any progress? Is she still completely in the “outer-darkness”? What are your thoughts?

Also, why does MacDonald hide the redemptive meaning of the story “in plain view” as he does?

[Cindy_Skillman]

I think (and this is just off the cuff) that the wolf girl does seem to be making progress. She is a human part of the time; she leads the student to her mother for shelter; she is ashamed to be seen for what she is; she howls in anguish as he leaves and yet doesn’t follow, either to attack him a second time or to attempt a seduction. She seemed to me, just in reading casually, to be longing for relationship as much as for food, and the two appetites – that for love and that for food to feed her belly, seem to be at war. This can only be a good sign, imo.

My guess on the student is that he is someone who is searching. He’s on a walking journey to see the country and this is a crisis point for him. That seems a bit mundane. I hope that you have something less lame than my poor stereotypical guesses, Steve!

As for why GMac disguises his story so well, I can only say that it seems to me that a well-disguised story sometimes finds access where something more obvious would be instantly dismissed and rejected by many. So the principle wiggles its way into the subconscious mind like a seed – a singularity. It will lie there dormant, niggling away barely perceptibly, until one day the right stimulus comes and releases it into explosive life.

[alecforbes]

I think (and this is just off the cuff) that the wolf girl does seem to be making progress. She is a human part of the time; she leads the student to her mother for shelter; she is ashamed to be seen for what she is; she howls in anguish as he leaves and yet doesn’t follow, either to attack him a second time or to attempt a seduction. She seemed to me, just in reading casually, to be longing for relationship as much as for food, and the two appetites – that for love and that for food to feed her belly, seem to be at war. This can only be a good sign, imo.

Good points, Cindy. I would agree with all of this. A couple other points that occur to me is the fact that there are only bones of small animals outside the cave. It may be that the wolf girl is in fact “quarantined” (to limit the harm she can cause) on an island with no “higher” animals to kill and eat, but I like to think that she’s changed somewhat and limiting herself to the smaller prey. I’m not sure if it was true when this story was written, but apparently red deer are common on at least some of the Shetland islands and of course you’d think there might be Shetland ponies around….

I think also it’s significant that the wolf girl at least tasted the whiskey and she didn’t spit it out. She’s making “baby steps”… (to quote Bill Murray in What About Bob?)

I’ll get to the student and the hiddenness of the meaning in a bit as I think they’re tied together, but good points there as well.

[alecforbes]

Okay, on to my concluding thoughts about this little gem of a story. (Interesting how brief, yet dense this story is compared to most of GMac’s work)

So I hope I’ve shown *a meaning *beneath the Gothic werewolf story from what I’ve posted before–the work of redemption in the wolf girl through the ministration of the old woman. This is something the “student” doesn’t see at all, of course. Having recognized this additional layer of meaning and recognized how this meaning was there in plain sight, I of course felt very silly… (Especially as I’d read this story multiple times over the years) The hiddenness of this layer of meaning is what struck me and thinking about it a bit, I realized that …

The HIDDENNESS of meaning IS THE MEANING! At least it’s the primary meaning GMac wants us to grasp. I think Cindy’s observation applies here:

As for why GMac disguises his story so well, I can only say that it seems to me that a well-disguised story sometimes finds access where something more obvious would be instantly dismissed and rejected by many. So the principle wiggles its way into the subconscious mind like a seed – a singularity. It will lie there dormant, niggling away barely perceptibly, until one day the right stimulus comes and releases it into explosive life.

This is not something new in his work. We see it everywhere in his writing and he addresses it both indirectly and directly.

At the beginning of his novel What’s Mine’s Mine, he describes his ideal reader as such:

…if he be such a one as I would have for a reader, might I choose—a reader whose heart, not merely his eye, mirrors what he sees—one who not merely beholds the outward shows of things, but catches a glimpse of the soul that looks out of them, whose garment and revelation they are…

In the Princess and the Goblin when Irene takes Curdie to meet her “Grandmother” he cannot see her being less spiritually mature:

‘I don’t see any grandmother,’ answered Curdie rather gruffly.

‘Don’t see my grandmother, when I’m sitting in her lap?’ exclaimed the princess.

‘No, I don’t,’ reiterated Curdie, in an offended tone.

‘Don’t you see the lovely fire of roses—white ones amongst them this time?’ asked Irene, almost as bewildered as he.

‘No, I don’t,’ answered Curdie, almost sulkily.

‘Nor the blue bed? Nor the rose-coloured counterpane?—Nor the beautiful light, like the moon, hanging from the roof?’

‘You’re making game of me, Your Royal Highness; and after what we have come through together this day, I don’t think it is kind of you,’ said Curdie, feeling very much hurt.

‘Then what do you see?’ asked Irene, who perceived at once that for her not to believe him was at least as bad as for him not to believe her.

‘I see a big, bare, garret-room—like the one in mother’s cottage, only big enough to take the cottage itself in, and leave a good margin all round,’ answered Curdie.

‘And what more do you see?’

‘I see a tub, and a heap of musty straw, and a withered apple, and a ray of sunlight coming through a hole in the middle of the roof and shining on your head, and making all the place look a curious dusky brown. I think you had better drop it, princess, and go down to the nursery, like a good girl.’

There is much more in The Princess and Curdie as well regarding seeing beneath appearances and the effect of what we would call “faith” in seeing these things, but I won’t get into that. Much of Phantastes has to do with seeing beneath appearances as well…

The meaning beneath the surface “story” does not mean this is not a gothic werewolf tale, just that there is more to it than that. Here’s a quote from Lillith:

He pointed right up into the air. A snow-white pigeon was mounting, with quick and yet quicker wing-flap, the unseen spiral of an ethereal stair. The sunshine flashed quivering from its wings.
“I see a pigeon!” I said.
“Of course you see a pigeon,” rejoined the raven, “for there is the pigeon! I see a prayer on its way.— I wonder now what heart is that dove’s mother! Some one may have come awake in my cemetery!”
“How can a pigeon be a prayer?” I said. “I understand, of course, how it should be a fit symbol or likeness for one; but a live pigeon to come out of a heart!”
“It MUST puzzle you! It cannot fail to do so!”
“A prayer is a thought, a thing spiritual!” I pursued.
“Very true! But if you understood any world besides your own, you would understand your own much better.— When a heart is really alive, then it is able to think live things. There is one heart all whose thoughts are strong, happy creatures, and whose very dreams are lives. When some pray, they lift heavy thoughts from the ground, only to drop them on it again; others send up their prayers in living shapes, this or that, the nearest likeness to each. All live things were thoughts to begin with, and are fit therefore to be used by those that think. When one says to the great Thinker:—‘Here is one of thy thoughts: I am thinking it now!’ that is a prayer — a word to the big heart from one of its own little hearts.— Look, there is another!”

What of the erstwhile protagonist? The “student”? I may be wrong here, but I think GMac’s protagonist is a bit of a send-up of the stock Victorian gothic protagonist with his “inborn chivalry” and his walking tour of the “barbaric” and remote wilds of Scotland. He is not especially perceptive–not recognizing the nature of the wolf girl until the handkerchief covering the throat bruises is dislodged and certainly sees no meaning beneath the surface appearances of things. He is nearly seduced by (or tries to seduce himself) the wolf girl and I wonder if when he is “attacked” and “darts from the house” he actually knocks over the old woman who he sees “lying motionless on the floor”? Of course after the emotional embrace by the wolf girl, he high-tails it over the cliff to the other side of the island. If nothing else, he is ,in MacDonald’s mind, spiritually undeveloped. He is one of those Christ spoke of saying, “Having eyes do you not see…?”

So… seeing beneath surface appearances and especially seeing the spiritual significance of things around us is the “meaning” I think GMac is trying to put across to us. So (though this is admittedly a bit trite), if we see an old woman in a store, a homeless man on a street-corner, a well-dressed couple out for dinner or even a thunderstorm on a mountain range, we need to look closer, look deeper, and look using “faith”. We may start to perceive spiritual truths we would not have “seen” before; see the sacred in the ordinary, and begin seeing the ongoing work of God.

[anon12438761]

Well thanks to all of your contributions, I’ve seen things in the story I would not have seen on my own. It’s been very enriching. Thank you.

[alecforbes]

Thanks, Dave!
I’ve learned a lot myself as I really didn’t understand the story at all until shortly after starting this thread. The themes I’ve mentioned in this thread are all throughout GMac’s writing, they were just especially well “hidden” in this story (at least for me)

[Cindy_Skillman]

That was amazing, Steve! What a feast. I hope we can do this again – maybe the Lost Princess (aka: the Wise Woman)? That’s such a great story and I’m not at all sure I understand it anything like so well as I ought to. mrrena.com/books/wise_woman/wise_woman1.php

[Kate]

And after that maybe “The Princess and the Goblin?” I just got a copy of that, complete with beautiful illustrations at the library.

I so regret I never got to take-part in this discussion, as I do love GMac judging from the bit I’ve read from him. But please, do count me in for the next one!

[Cindy_Skillman]

The Princess and the Goblin would be fine with me also.

[alecforbes]

Thanks Cindy!
And If we do another one, Kate, I’d love to hear your thoughts…

I do love The Wise Woman, Cindy. I think it’s my favorite of his fairy tales. I’m headed to Oz (Sydney) tomorrow for a week and a half with my family to pick up my daughter who’s been studying abroad, sightsee and visit some of my wife’s relatives–so maybe sometime after we get back. I don’t think the Wise Woman is as puzzling as this one was for me, but there’s a lot more in there to discuss (it’s quite a bit longer)and I’m sure some things those of us who’ve read it haven’t picked up on. Good choice!

Kate, I think The Princess and the Goblin would be a great one after that!

[anon12438761]

I’m in.

[lotharson]

I must confess I don’t like the writing style of Georce McDonald, even though he was undoubtedly a great man of God.

I find it bothering to always have to guess what he meant.

That said, his book Lilith introduced me to Christian universalism. I was first stunned to read that Adam and Eve had been forgiven and reconciled with God.

[Caleb_Fogg]

Steve,

Thanks again for all your insights on “The Gray Wolf.” Great stuff!

Caleb

[Kate]

I vote for first “The Wise Woman” and then “The Princess and the Goblin.” That way, in case finals week prevents me from reading both, I’ll at least be all caught up when we reach the second one.

Have a wonderful time in Australia, Steve!

Kate

[alecforbes]

Thanks, Caleb, and I hope you and your son continue to enjoy George MacDonald together.

Hi Lothar, George MacDonald is not for everyone, but if you started with Lilith…Yikes!!!, Noone understands that story completely. You might like to read his unspoken sermons which are pretty straightforward and easy to follow–not much guessing involved. His Unspoken Sermon “Justice” is a classic and “required reading” for anyone investigating universalism.

[alecforbes]

I just read a wonderful scholarly book regarding George MacDonald and the “parabolic” nature of much of his writing: Storied Revelations: Parables, Imagination, and George MacDonalds Christian Fiction by Gisela H. Krenglinger. Here’s the Amazon link:amazon.com/Storied-Revelations-Imagination-Distinguished-Dissertations/dp/1620325330/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1402254078&sr=1-1 I can’t recommend this book highly enough for those interested in George MacDonald and I believe she is truly a scholar who “gets” GMac. Having read the book I can see now that the story on this thread, “The Gray Wolf,” is indeed a*** parable***—and a wonderful little gem of a parable at that. Here’s a quote from the introduction to her book which I think is apropos and helps understand the “hiddenness” of the meaning in the story—the “parabolic” nature of this tale.

Parables—used by Jesus to reveal to us the Kingdom of God, used to move us from being bystanders to active recipients of God’s work of revelation–are constantly at risk of being buried into “mummies of prose” as George MacDonald puts it. We become so familiar with the language of Scripture and are so far removed from the context in which these parables had their meaning that Jesus’ parables no longer work on us in this revelatory and transforming way. Each new generation must recover the vibrant, often shocking dimension of Jesus’ parables and create a new context in which the gospel is able to recover its piercing truth about the nature of Christian discipleship.

George MacDonald, the Victorian poet and theologian, observed this very process at work in Victorian societ. It was a culture saturated with Christian jargon but often *void *of a profound understanding of the gospel for its own time and culture. The language of Scripture no longer penetrated people’s hearts, thoughts and attitudes; it no longer transformed peoples lives. MacDonald, called to be a pastor, turned to story and more specifically the “parabolic” as a means of spiritual awakening. He created fictive worlds in which the language of Jesus would find a new home and regain again its revelatory power for his particular Victorian audience. (My emphasis)

I could say much more about her book, the excellent discussion of metaphor, allegory and parables–the wonderful insight she has into the influence of Novalis on MacDonald (being a German speaker, she even uses some of her own translation of Novalis), as well as the excellent discussion of Coleridge and imagination, but I’ll leave it at that and, in recognition of this story being a parable, I’ll change the thread title.

Also, I’ll link to this thread where I discussed some of Tom Talbott’s philosophy in light of this story:evangelicaluniversalist.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=5395

[anon12438761]

Now that sounds very interesting, thank you for the tip.

[alecforbes]

No problem, Dave!

It really is an excellent book and as a GMac fan ( philosopher etc… ), I think you’ll enjoy it.