Giants Amongst Us

My focus, so far, has been largely on giants in mythology and world folklore, but today I will turn to the topic of human giants.
Larger – and far larger than normal – human beings have been noted as a remarkable feature stretching back at least several thousand years.  There are some fascinating examples of gargantuan humans.  Today, I’d like to take you to the eighteenth century, and to consider the case of Irishman Charles Byrne (1761-1783). 

Byrne’s dates make it clear that he only lived into his twenties.  By adulthood, he had reached the astounding height of 7 ft 7 in (2.31 m).  In his final years, he lived in London and was obviously of great interest.  He made money as an attraction in his own right.  Yet his time in London was blighted by drink and, when his life savings were stolen, he drank to excess and died in June 1783.

He wanted to be buried at sea but his corpse was purchased instead; his huge skeleton can be seen today at the Royal College of Surgeons in London.

Recently, the New York Times reported that a genetic mutation accounted for Byrne’s tremendous height.  Researchers believe that up to 300 people may share the mutation that caused his ‘gigantism’.

Charles Byrne’s tragic and evocative story has been covered by Irish and British television, and in a novel by Hilary Mantel (Man Booker Prize winner for ‘Wolf Hall’).

Byrne is not the tallest human on record, and I will look at more instances in history of giants amongst us in the future.

Finally, on a different note, I want to recommend the superb ‘Guide to Literary Agents’, which can be found at: http://www.guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog/.  I use it daily as I continue to search for agency representation.

A Giant in Cornwall

I recently wrote about the Cerne Abbas giant in southern England, and for my next post, I’m going to remain in Britain.  This time, we head southwest from the Cerne Abbas figure and continue until we get to the most westerly area of the British Isles: Cornwall.

Cornwall is a land saturated with mythology, and so, not surprisingly, it boasts at least one legend about a giant.  The tale’s first written source is from the pen (or should that be quill?) of medieval chronicler Geoffrey of Monmouth, who, in about 1136, wrote of the founding of Britain.   Following the city-state of Troy’s sacking by the Greeks and their giant wooden horse, a group of Trojan exiles make their way to the British Isles. 

Among the putative new Britons was a companion of Brutus known as Corineus.  He was strong and loved to wrestle.  One day, Corineus and his comrades were attacked by a twelve foot giant known as Gogmagog (or Geomagog/Geomagot), along with twenty other giants.  Many of the Trojans were killed; the survivors fought back and, in turn, slew all the giants – except Gogmagog.

A wrestling match was set up between Corineus and Gogmagog.  When the fearless warrior Corineus sustained three broken ribs at the hands of his mammoth adversary, he was understandably enraged, and he grabbed Gogmagog.  With remarkable strength, Corineus threw the remaining giant from the cliff and into the sea.

To this day, the area is known as the Giant’s Leap, although leap is rather an inaccurate designation for what happened to Gogmagog.

No less a luminary than John Milton wrote about the legend in his own ‘History of Britain’.  It is well to remind ourselves that up to the seventeenth century, myth and legend were woven into the fabric of historical narrative and accepted as ‘true’.

On a related note, the Lord Mayor’s parade in the City of London features two figures known as Gog and Magog: they are seen as protectors of the metropolis.  And the names Gog and Magog feature in ancient Jewish, Christian and Islamic texts.

Back in English West Country, the great hero Corineus had vanquished a giant foe, and gave his name to Cornwall.

The Fertility Giant

If you happen to travel in the beautiful county of Dorset in Southern England, you are likely to hear of the Cerne Abbas giant.

No less than 180 feet (55 metres) high, and thought to date from the seventeenth century, this giant is carved into the hillside from the chalk underneath, and is a compelling figure, not least because he wields two things: a huge club, and an astounding representation of his manhood!

Because of his remarkable endowment, young women who wished to conceive slept on his outline overnight, and couples wishing to have children made love on his contours.  Understandably, one of his nicknames was ‘the Rude Giant’.  Furthermore, in July 2010, the Daily Telegraph reported that the area around the giant was reporting around double the national birthrate!

There is speculation that the giant’s left arm once held some kind of cloak that has been eroded over time.  If so, then the figure’s identification with the Greek hero Heracles, who used a club to great effect, and who also sported a cloak, is given validation.  Alternatively, the Independent newspaper in 1994 cited a study that suggested that the giant’s free arm had in fact held a severed head; his cloak flew from his shoulders.

In contrast to the identification with Heracles, there is a legend that the outline was created by drawing around the dead body of an invading Danish giant.

The prudish Victorians did not like such a colossal and public display of genitalia, and so allowed shrubs to grow over the giant’s nether regions.  That foliage has certainly not endured.  Nevertheless, so distinct is the Cerne Abbas hillside giant that during World War 2, he was disguised from aerial view in order to hinder any German Luftwaffe planes from using him as a reference point in their navigation over England.

The story I find most intriguing in the explanations of the giant’s origins is that he was a living creator – the invader from Denmark – who met his fate on an English countryside, but was then re-created in chalk.  Giants can be fearsome and deadly, but as in the case of the Cerne Abbas figure, they can also be vital symbols of life.

Among the Barbarians

One of the great books in Western literature is ‘Gulliver’s Travels’ by Jonathan Swift.  Many know it from reading it during childhood, although most children will be unaware that the version they encounter is an abbreviation of Swift’s work.

Much is excised from the original.  Most significant, perhaps, is the omission of the superior, snobby horses in Book Four, titled ‘A Voyage to the Country of the Houyhnhnms’.  The horses are overlords of the uncouth Yahoos, whom, we realise, epitomise the true nature of mankind for Gulliver (although not necessarily for Swift).

What a child will remember are the travels in the lands of the Lilliputians – that tiny race who fascinate Lemuel Gulliver – and their literal and metaphorical counterparts in Book Two: the Brobdingnagians.  These folks are, of course, giants.

Not surprisingly, Gulliver is terrified by what he sees in Brobdingnag.  Upon first encountering the huge creatures, he reports: “as human creatures are observed to be more savage and cruel in proportion to their bulk, what could I expect but to be a morsel in the mouth of the first among these enormous barbarians that should happen to seize me?”

Happily, he is not eaten.  Indeed, the Brobdingnagians find him a novelty, and in time, Gulliver ends up in the royal court, and acts as a valiant defender of his mother country, England.

Being so dwarfed by the giants, Gulliver is certainly afforded unusual sights, and Swift uses his protagonist’s singular viewpoint to reflect satirically on his own eighteenth century society.  One example occurs as Gulliver watches a nursing mother.  The monstrous size of the mother’s breast, and the imperfections of her skin, lead our narrator to this conclusion: “This made me reflect upon the fair skins of our English ladies, who appear so beautiful to us, only because they are of our own size, and their defects not to be seen but through a magnifying glass...”

The giants of Brobdingnag are, in a way, crazy mirrors of our own civilisation.  The Brobdingnagians’ flaws are ours, but written large.

There’s a lovely set of illustrations from a nineteenth century edition of Swift’s masterpiece, and you can take a look here: http://special.lib.gla.ac.uk/exhibns/month/jan2006.html

The Legend of Finn Mac Cool

Some reading this piece will know of – and will have perhaps even visited – the Giant’s Causeway in Northern Ireland. 

The story is told that there was once an Irish giant called Fionn mac Cumhaill, anglicised to Finn Mac Cool (as well as Fingal, and variants of these names).  He had made enemies of some Scottish giants, and one day built a causeway from Ireland to Scotland to make a path to them and take battle into their heartland.  He used six-sided stones to build his passageway.

What Finn had not reckoned upon was that one of his foes, known as the Red Man, was much larger than he was, and when his Scots enemy approached on the Causeway, Finn fled back home to his wife!

The Red Man found Finn Mac Cool’s cottage; the Irish giant was hiding in the bath, covered with bed sheets.  Finn’s wife Oonagh kept her own ‘cool’ and invited the Red Man in, saying that her husband was out hunting.

Oonagh engaged the Red Man in conversation, showing her guest her husband’s things.  Then she offered to cook him Finn’s favourite meal, served with beer honey.  Oonagh said that she needed to feed the baby.

The baby was, in fact, Finn Mac Cool, swaddled in sheets.  Once the Red Man was outside, a little woozy from his drinking, Finn, his courage renewed, chased the Scot from Ireland, throwing clods of earth into the sea to form the Isle of Man. 

From either side of the Irish Sea, both giants tore up the Causeway, leaving the passageway across the waters impassable.  At least honour had been served.

Finn also appears in folk mythology in Scotland and the Isle of Man.  Fingal’s Cave, in Scotland, is so named because it shares the basalt rock features of the Causeway (and is, of course, the title of a celebrated piece by Felix Mendelsohn).

Sources: http://myths.e2bn.org/mythsandlegends/playstory5639-finn-maccool-and-the-giants-causeway.html and  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fionn_mac_Cumhaill

My old friend Russell Barash asked me recently about evidence for giants that aren’t just to be found in myths and legends.  I will explore the topics of giants in human beings at a future date, but given the Irish theme of this blog, follow this link to read about an eighteen century Irishman who was approximately 7 foot 10 inches.  He would have been a star on the basketball court!

http://www.aolnews.com/2011/02/20/legends-of-irish-giants-are-more-than-tall-tales/

Thanks to my mum, Anne Cohen, for suggesting the Giant’s Causeway as a topic.

"It feels like being a giant"

There's a 5 minute interview with Royal Shakespeare Company actor Patrick Stewart on the BBC website.  He's probably better known as Jean-Luc Picard from Star Trek: The Next Generation, but he has had a distinguished career playing Shakespeare.

To the question, "What's it feel like being on stage in front of an audience?", Stewart replies, "It feels like being a giant."  "Is that a good thing?" asks the interviewer.  "It's a fantastic thing, cause I don't feel like that in real life."

Fascinating that he analogises the experience of being on stage with the power of being a giant.  But not surprising, perhaps.  After all, the actor is in the spotlight, he or she projects the voice to reach the entire gathering, and the actor has power: he/she directs the forward motion of the moment with the lines to be delivered.

Here's the link to the interview: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-13160867

All About Giants

Welcome to my blog!

If you heard that the petrified remains of an ancient giant had been unearthed, wouldn’t you rush to see the find for yourself?

That question serves as a catalyst at the start of my newly completed novel, ‘Once There Were Giants’, for which I am now seeking representation by a literary agent.

The book’s title gives an indication of my fascination with these figures.  Indeed, another of my pieces of writing, a novel called ‘Tales of Freedom’, has embedded within its narrative the Golem of Prague story.  The Golem was a seven-foot tall man of clay created by a great sixteenth century rabbi to protect his community.  I shall return to that legend at a future date.

Although our world is complex, it is remarkable that so many stories found in folklore in countries as different as Ghana and China, Afghanistan and Spain present to us a parade of familiar types.  We can find kings and queens, princes and princesses, witches and wizards, wise men and buffoons, and an assortment of more esoteric figures.  One character to be found in such tales is the giant, and it is giants that this blog will highlight – and celebrate.

My aim for this blog is to share folklore about giants from around the world, and I propose to start with a tale drawn from the diverse Jewish tradition, not least because Jewish storytelling is something I cherish.

This story comes from Iraqi Kurdistan.  It’s possibly that many reading this will know nothing of Kurdish culture, especially its Jewish component.  Like the Jews (until very recently), the Kurds have long been a disempowered people.  They now enjoy some autonomy in northern Iraq, but not full independence.

I have drawn the tale from ‘Elijah’s Violin and Other Jewish Folktales’ by Howard Schwartz (Harper & Row, New York, 1983).  It is called ‘The Princess on the Glass Mountain’, and recounts how Sumeitra, a beautiful princess (is there any other kind in most folk tales?), is turned into a bird by a wicked witch, causing her parents to grieve for her as a lost child.  One day, a young man called Surash, who inherited his father’s magical hat that enables him to understand the language of birds, discovers that the creature who lives and sings near the palace is the missing princess.

Surash embarks on a quest to save Sumeitra, and manages to kill the witch in her cottage.  Yet the princess is not entirely free of the witch’s magic, and although she is turned back into a human, she is imprisoned in a palace atop a glass mountain.

Surash begins a journey to liberate her.  To aid him, he obtains a magic basket – one that always fills up with food.  It is at this point that we encounter the giant of this tale.  Surash knocks on the door of the giant’s house in the hope of shelter, only to find that his host has not eaten for three days, and so has Surash in his sights for his supper.

Happily, Surash is able to offer the magic basket, and this satisfies the giant.  Surash is canny enough to extract the giant’s help in return.  As the journey is long, across the desert, the giant’s enormous strides help Surash reach the glass mountain in no time at all.

Surash rescues the trapped princess, and, naturally, the two unite in marriage.  The giant has only enjoyed a walk-on part in this tale, but he does at least appear at the end.  First of all, he is a guest at the royal wedding, and no doubt eats far more than any other invitees.  More significantly, perhaps, is the fact that he sets up home near the palace, and uses his mighty strength to protect the kingdom.

In this story, the giant is transformed.  He appears, initially, as a fearsome presence who could eat the hero.  Placated by the magic basket, he joins forces with the soon to be prince, and plays a role not only in the princess’s rescue, but also in securing the peace as part of the happy ending.

Giants are remarkable creatures.