I have been thinking about yesterday's chapter from Wind in the Willows and have come to the conclusion that there is absolutely nothing wrong with anthropomorphism unless you have a guilty conscious about eating meat.
Certain tribes branded as 'primitive' by guilt-ridden colonials have been inhabiting the spirits of the animals they hunt for generations, so why not allow some of the animals to inhabit us? The brilliance of Kenneth Grahame was that he simply ignored all the anomalies for the sake of the story, and the story becomes a mirror which accurately reflects not just human life, but all nature too. Who bothers to wonder how a clothed rat and mole end up in a boat on a river carrying a hamper stuffed with potted meats and bottles of beer, or a toad becomes obsessed with driving motor cars? Children don't bother so why should we?
The meeting of the great god Pan by Ratty and Moley - or rather the audience granted - is pure, natural spirituality with none of the moralistic warnings and threats that run through Christian children's authors of the time, and when the animals storm Toad Hall to evict the weasels, stoats and ferrets, they decide not to use the swords and pistols from Badger's chest, preferring to simply hit them with sticks until they retreat back to the Wild Wood where they belong. 'They're friendly enough on the whole,' says the mild-mannered Ratty reluctantly, 'but they sometimes get out and you can't really trust them.'
Most of us have been in the presence of Pan at some point in our lives. For me it was in a cool and quiet glade of a large and ancient forest on a hot Summer afternoon. I had just wandered in by chance but instantly became as awestruck as if I had walked into a vast cathedral. The trees knew I was there. Every blade of grass knew its place and importance in the world and the birds fell silent.
I tried to repeat the experience once or twice, but you cannot just summon him at will.
Hoping to find an image similar to yesterday's post, I typed 'pan' into the search and found dozens of the above. He is out there in the countryside, having a laugh at my expense.
I enjoyed yesterday's story and see it has given you deeper thoughts. Wanting Pan to exist is of course part of the story. Or at least, how we tell the story and imagine the lives of the animals so beautifully depicted in Wind in the Willows. There is another story, packed away now, Weaver knows it, which was written in the same vein, travelling down a river in search of a lost creature.
ReplyDeleteWhat I was thinking is that Christianity was made for humans exclusively, and no animal could possibly find it of any use. The ancient demi-gods were for everything and everyone. Is your story going to be unpacked?
DeleteUnpacked from my memory which saw BBC and then remembered. The Little Grey Men written by BB. Written in 1942. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Grey_Men
ReplyDeleteI just looked it up. I have never heard of this book. I will try and find it.
DeleteThe Piper at the Gates of Dawn is divine in the true sense, although I do wonder if KW was on acid when he wrote it, it's such a departure from the rest of the book. I read it out loud when I'm running nature writing workshops, as an example of the sublime in art. Always makes me goosey.
ReplyDeleteLove that image too.
I too have experienced him, rarely though. It's a different feeling in Australia, methinks, with millennia of a similar spiritual and cultural references to Pan, and it depends where you are on the continent. In the southern forests there are said to be little people who can be wicked and/or protective.
Yes, that chapter is such a departure from the rest of the book that it is only obliquely referenced in all the adaptations that have been made, if at all.
DeleteThe other chapter which is just as brilliant but also could be seen as a distraction (which it isn't really) is the one where Ratty meets the wandering ship-rat and almost becomes overwhelmed by the urge to head South along with the rest of the migrants. I love the analogy of the countryside being like a vast hotel at the end of the season, with the remaining animals vainly trying to persuade the birds to stay behind for the Winter and watching them leave after all the excitement and bustle (packing suitcases etc.) of the preparations for departure.
Every country inhabited by humans has a supreme nature spirit I think, and always has. Its nature is formed by just that - the nature of the environment. Ours up here is out and about during three seasons only, but in places like Iran it is a djin which appears in the despised and avoided harshness of the midday sun as a spiralling column of fire which careers down streets, disappearing as quickly as it materialises.
The idea of little people who can be both wicked and protective is just a straight observation of nature. That's the way you teach children about the reality of everyday life in the natural world. Beautiful things can be mortally dangerous.
I also meant to say that monotheistic religion does have a place in the natural world (how could it not?) but the natural world has no place for moral structures and social codes of conduct. That's why he is called Pan.
DeleteAs far as pans go, it's an attractive one.
ReplyDeleteCadmium orange is so 1970s...
DeleteTry typing in "Greek God Pan Image"
ReplyDeleteWhat, and lose all the potential for a photo-based joke?
DeleteYour encounter with Pan is not unique Tom. I have experienced that too, but it becomes more difficult as one gets older. The poet Wordsworth was "pantheistic" and expresses it in much of his verse.
ReplyDeleteSo was Einstein, who once wrote in a letter: "This firm belief, a belief bound up with a deep feeling, in a superior mind that reveals itself in the world of experience, represents my conception of God. In common parlance this may be described as "pantheistic"
Yes, I did say that most of us have had that sort of experience. Many top level physicists say that the deeper they get into it, the more convinced they become of the existence of a larger single consciousness. Pan is earthbound and part of the dualistic pantheon.
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