GBD10: The Mystery of Folklore (with Ronald Hutton)
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- Опубліковано 18 вер 2024
- Over Christmas I spent a few weeks in Wales and England, and during my time there, I visited the University of Bristol to have a conversation with the eminent historian and author Dr. Ronald Hutton, whose work I’ve long admired. I wanted to talk with him partly because I’m fascinated by obscure British holidays and how they add color, meaning, enchantment, and fun to the calendar, a topic on which Professor Hutton is the world’s leading authority. If you happen to share this interest, I highly recommend his 1996 book, The Stations of the Sun: A History of the Ritual Year in Britain. You’ll hear me mention this book during our conversation. Professor Hutton and I also discuss his newest book, Queens of the Wild: Pagan Goddesses in Christian Europe: An Investigation. We met in his university office on Plough Monday (January 9, 2023), which happens to be one of those obscure British holidays that I love.
-the scholarly debate about whether pagan survivals or surviving paganism has obtained in Christian Europe, and Hutton’s recent intervention in this conversation (1:08)
-the tension in some thinkers’ claim that pagan manifestations in Christian Europe result simultaneously from cultural continuity and from the workings of the collective unconscious (4:10)
-Hutton’s emphasis on human creativity, his spirited opposition to some scholars’ patronizing view of country people, and his sense that illiterate communities are often more dynamically creative than highly literate ones (7:51)
-how Rupert Sheldrake’s ideas about morphic resonance might shed light on debates among folklorists about where folklore comes from (10:48)
-whether familiar or unfamiliar religious material more effectively inspires artistic expression / a brief discussion of the diversity and syncretism of Christianity (15:00)
-speculation about the meaning behind ghosts and the European goddess-like figures that Hutton’s new book is about (16:59)
-Hutton’s outlook on the family of scholars of which he is a member (21:53)
-What is it that fuels Hutton’s work? (25:14)
-an important and moving moment in Hutton’s academic career when he received encouragement from an instructor (28:51)
-Hutton’s fascinating idea that practices which seem pagan to many scholars are actually Catholic practices brought into the home after the Reformation (32:50)
-Larkin’s poem "Church Going," pilgrimage, and the recent revival of folk celebrations in Britain (13:30)
-the magic of carols (37:44)
-Hutton’s take on W. B. Yeats, his splendid poetry, his sometimes-unsplendid personal behavior, and his dim view of English fairies as opposed to Irish ones (39:45)
-the secret meaning of the fall / winter festival calendar (45:00)
Queens of the Wild, by Ronald Hutton:
www.amazon.com...
The Stations of the Sun, by Ronald Hutton:
www.amazon.com...
my website:
gregbrowndervi...
If you have questions for me about this episode or anything else, hit me up at greg@gregbrownderville.com. If I get some good questions, I might do a Q&A episode.
logo design by Julie Savasky at 508 Creative: 508creative.com
music by Beekeeper Spaceman
Greg Brownderville is the author of three books of poetry, the lead singer of Beekeeper Spaceman, the creator of Fire Bones, the editor-in-chief of Southwest Review, and a professor of English at SMU in Dallas.
I think when I die my only regret in life will be being unable to meet Dr. Hutton in person to thank him for all he does.
He is an incredibly generous public intellectual, going out of his way to share his knowledge and wisdom with all of us.
Dr Hutton is one of the few academics who are beloved. I love that he isn't a bomb thrower yet he is amazingly effective as a teacher.
I agree. And he is exceedingly generous with his knowledge and wisdom.
LOVE the smooth southern drawl juxtaposed with British academic received pronunciation.
& yes of course the folkways as well! Thank you.
Thank you, @Jumpoable! I’m so glad you enjoyed the episode.
Great interview thank you. The eminent Prof is a World treasure ❤
I agree: Hutton is amazing!
Fascinating and deeply educational. Thankyou both for the exploration of subject. I wholly welcome the growing community ritual, even here in Essex countryside
Thank you for the kind words, Sue!
Great interview.
Thank you!
Wonderful interview! Thank you for having Prof. Hutton on the show.
Thanks so much, Karl-I appreciate the kind words!
One of the best interviews I have heard with Hutton, thank you for your insightful and intriguing questions.
Thank you very much, @Brokout. This comment made my day!
You did have a wonderful conversation. Thank you@@gregbrowndervilledimension
@@GramaSagefeather Thank you!
Prof Hutton is so cool, I love his teaching style.
I wholly agree. He struck me as a very kind person, as well.
Thank you for watching!
A very good interview. You are a good questioner, very thoughtful, with a warm spirit. Thanks for sharing!
Many thanks for the kind words, weirwic!
Prof Hutton is a favorite lecturer in this house ever since we were introduced to him on Time Team. Thank you for conducting an interesting interview.
Thank you very much, Gilda!
He was on Time Team? Now I need to look that up.
Wonderful interview, thank you so much.
Thank you for the kind words, Mariangela!
Excellent interview! You expressed several interesting ideas, asked many relevant questions, and revealed a couple of new concepts. I will have to listen to your other interviews! Cheers!
Thanks very much, Nestor Sagitarrius! I'm so glad you enjoyed the interview. Hutton is fantastic. Since you liked this one, you might enjoy my conversations with Rupert Sheldrake, which address many of the same themes I explored with Hutton:
ua-cam.com/video/mAzm-v0BPOs/v-deo.html
ua-cam.com/video/HzbtJp0J-DU/v-deo.html
Hutton and Sheldrake are friends, but they see things differently. For example, Sheldrake thinks the terror of Halloween results from America's commercialization of the festival of the dead, whereas Hutton claims the terror component is very old (here I side with Hutton, though I find Sheldrake's take both interesting and valuable). Another example: Sheldrake emphasizes the importance of connecting with one's own ancestors' stories, beliefs, and practices, whereas Hutton lays greater emphasis on how culture can be transmitted successfully from population to population.
Also, I recommend this episode featuring poet Johnny Wink and musician Eric Brownderville:
ua-cam.com/video/PLGo4ExxCuY/v-deo.html
@Greg Brownderville Thank you so much not only for this interview, but also for directing us to those of similar themes! 😊
@@branwen8009 You're very welcome, Branwen! Thank you for following the channel.
The pair of you are full of insight and appreciation on this topic, nice one, great work
Many thanks for the kind words, J H, and for tuning in!
It's a fascinating interview, thank you
Thank you for listening, Nigel!
Wonderful and wondrous. Much gratitude, Professor Hutton 🙏
Thanks for listening and leaving some kind words, Jennifer!
AWESOME interview! I love Dr. Ronald Hutton...I've seen a lot of his work and never tire of listening to him! THANK YOU!
Thanks so much, Autumn! I’m glad you enjoyed it. Episodes 12 and 17 also feature Professor Hutton.
I greatly enjoyed this chat, it was a pleasure to listen to.
Many thanks for listening and commenting!
Greg I've just listened to the entire interview and it was utterly spellbinding. Thank you from Cape Town South Africa 🇿🇦😊
Heartfelt thanks for the kind words, Giuseppe RSA!
Great, enjoyable and thought provoking interview. Thank you. May I suggest the two of you embark on a series of interviews on more specific topics? You bridge cultural and generational gaps so beautifully together, and both convey a love of myth and story telling that is quite captivating. Also, you both genuinely listen to each other, which makes the interview especially absorbing for the listener.
What a lovely comment, Melissa. I truly appreciate these thoughts-and I like the idea you propose. Sincere thanks.
This was a wonderful listen, thank you both. A refreshingly intellectual and human discussion. ❤
Thank you very much for the kind words and for listening, Heather!
Great interview, tyvm ❤
Thanks for the kind words, yensid!
Fantastic interview! Really intelligent questions :)
Thanks for the kind words, Matthijs, and thanks for listening!
The interviewer complimented the Professor's chapter on the Green in the newest book. I agree
Another UA-camr just compared the Coronatuon Invutation issued by the latest Charles with the last few
The new one is printed in color. And decorated with flowers from various kingdoms but little imperialism
And a Green Man...
Thanks, k maher, for your (seasonally appropriate) thoughts on Hutton's "Green Man" chapter! I'm about to do an episode on the May, so stay tuned.
Many thanks to you both for this very interesting and inspiring discussion.
Thank you, @greatedges!
Marvellous, thank you for sharing this interview.
Glad you enjoyed it!
I love listening to Professor Hutton. He is fantastically intelligent and insightful. Being English I have been fortunate enough to hear him speak three times now in person.
Claire, I’m envious! I’ve never had the pleasure of hearing him give a lecture in person. I had admired his work from afar for a long time before meeting him, and, as is by no means always the case, I liked the human being as much as I like the work. He was very kind throughout. As I walked up to his building at the U of Bristol, he stepped outside and said, “Professor Brownderville! Come in.”
I have got a photo of me with him at Witchfest in Rugeley in the UK somewhere. His talk at the latest Witchfest that I was at on 26th May just gone, was amazing. About vampires! His delivery is so very English with a little twist of our humour. Where do you hail from? Your accent sounds southern?
@@clairevalentineartist Yes, I love his very English sense of humor. I grew up in Pumpkin Bend, Arkansas, which is a small hamlet in the Mississippi Delta (the Deep South region associated with blues music). I’ve also lived in Charleston, SC, and Oxford, MS, among other places. And I lived for a few months in England as an undergraduate. Nowadays I live in Dallas, TX. How about you?
Wow! I’ve lived in the UK all my life. I completed my first degree in science in Oxford. I’m a self taught artist… my sculptures are especially Pagan inspired.
@@clairevalentineartist That’s awesome-I think it’s so cool for artists to be interested in science and scientists to be interested in the arts. Makes me think of Goethe.
I love the UK. Wish I could spend more time there. I’ve been studying Welsh for a while and am fascinated by Welsh poetry and folklore.
GB, you mentioned the folk beliefs of Arkansas, from whence my people hail, (Carlisle, Lonoke). My mama grew up there and was very in touch with what we might today term "Pagan" practices of folk magic, divining, as well as boogars, haints and witches. But the whole passel was curiously tied to Southern Baptist and other deep-south Christian ideologies, and often involved scripture as a means to counteract dark spirits and to facilitate faith healing and snake charming. You make a great point about these connections being seen as obvious and expected by local folks in rural Arkansas.
Thanks, Tracy! I bet there is a lot of wonderful folklore to be gathered in your mother’s home area. I know that Carlisle / Lonoke area fairly well. My school used to play those teams in football.
@gregbrowndervilledimension Our people are of the Moss clan. Some still live in Lonoke today. Funny to think of little Lonoke as having a football team! Take care, Greg
@@tracyrupp4882 The mighty Jackrabbits!
Great Interview!
Thank you for the kind words.
What a great interview! I love Professor Hutton, he is such a brilliant, whitty and funny personality and scholar. I did not know your channel yet, but I like your thoughtful style of interviewing and I will surely look into more of your videos. Thanks for posting and greetings from Germany!
Vielen Dank, @ElinT13. Ich glaube, das ist mein erster Kommentar aus Deutschland! Da dir diese Folge gefallen hat, ich empfehle die Folgen 7, 8, 11, und 12.
@@gregbrowndervilledimension Herzlichen Dank! Die werde ich mir anschauen!
Good talk!
Many thanks, Sam! Thanks for checking it out.
A really interesting talk..would love to hear him in person.
@greatjohnnym thanks for checking out this episode! Episodes 12 and 14 on my channel also feature Hutton-you might enjoy those.
In the first Merrily Watkins novel by Phil Rickman, there’s an apple tree ceremony in Herefordshire, to encourage the cider apples to flourish.
Hi, @ClaraFla! Thank you very much for watching and commenting.
Yes, there is. However, my favourite character in the book Lucy Devenish, points to the fact that it is not a local custom at all. As the wonderful Professor Hutton explains, it appears communities adopted these traditions as there own. Phil Rickman books are fabulous, I don’t think I would have wanted to be present at this particular Wassailing though 😂
We have a regional, seasonal wasailing festival each year in apple growing Huon Valley in Tasmania, complete with giant Burning Man.
This is interesting, @wizardoftas7779. Thanks for watching and commenting!
Aim contrast to the ghoulish fear of death and scary hallowe’ens of puritanical America and British Isles, you owe it to yourselves to take a deep look at the traditional (pre and post-Colombian) Mexican Day of the Dead rituals and celebrations- Nov 1 for children who’ve died, and Nov 2 for adults.
It couldn’t be a more opposite approach to the nature of death in life. Incredible tenderness, wicked humor, beauty, creativity, community sharing, altars laden with rich symbols - candle light, tequila, purple red white and orange armloads of flowers, and the yearly return of the monarch butterfly migration. Best of all families party all night on the graves of their beloved’s welcoming them back or awhile.
Thanks for listening and commenting, Ellen! I agree with you that the Mesoamerican Día de los Muertos is a wondrous celebration. It is celebrated enthusiastically in Texas, where I live. My friends in Mexico and Guatemala also celebrate it. I quite like all of these traditions-the Mesoamerican, the British, and the American. I would absolutely love to be in Hinton St. George for Punkie Night one of these years!
Are you familiar with the books of George Ewart Evans , regarding pagan influences in East Anglia in the late 1800s / early 1900s farming communities ? "The Leaping Hare " and " The Horseman's Word " . A remarkable verbal history of the turning point between the Old Way and the New Scientific Industrial Age . All worth looking at .
Thanks for this recommendation, Victor! I have never read Evans.
@@gregbrowndervilledimension They are a wonderful example of how to conduct interviews with witnesses of historical events , letting their story unravel at its own unhurried speed , with minimal prompting to break the flow of memory . I am sure that you will find all his books illuminating of a past like a foreign land .and written with no artifice .
@@victorpearson1418 sounds like it’s right down my alley. Many thanks!
❤❤❤❤
Thanks for checking it out, ainhoa! Since you liked this one, you might enjoy episodes 7, 8, 11, and 12.
@@gregbrowndervilledimension Thank you Greg, I'll sure check them soon. Thoroughly enjoyable stuff.
♥️✨🍁☕️🎃📚🍂💫♥️
Vielen Dank fürs Zuhören, Zoe!
so interesting - mostly new territory for me. Is the photo above you or Hutton?
Thank you, @jaimejaimeChannel, for watching and commenting! I have two other episodes that feature Hutton (one of them was released just today!).
The picture on the thumbnail is of Hutton, not me.
This isn't an interview. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like it's (at least in part) a series of lengthy complex layered opinions and stories coalesced into questions that were probably emailed to RH, whereupon his responses were likely mulled over, composed, and emailed back to the host. Nothing wrong with that, but why present it as an interview in his office? Otherwise, fascinating. Anyway, curious as to whether I'm mistaken.
It was an in-person interview conducted in Bristol. In Ep. 12 there’s iPhone video footage from the same day (in Hutton’s office). What happened is that my camera’s SD cards were corrupted, so I was left with nothing but the audio and whatever footage my girlfriend happened to capture on her iPhone. Nevertheless, because of Hutton’s brilliance, the audio has proved sufficient, and Ep. 10 is my most popular video ever.
What part of Arkansas are you from (if you're willing to divulge that)? Your accent sounds exactly like my sister-in-law!
Interesting! Is she also from Arkansas? I’m from the Delta region.
@@gregbrowndervilledimension she’s from the Jonesboro area
@@plixypl0x Makes sense. Jonesboro is part of the same general region.
So many witches warlocks and wizards up there..Sickening to see grown men lost.
Hi, Fred-thanks for listening! Curious: What did you mean by “up there”?
I can not think of any aspect of Christianity that is not found in pagan religion, just as being people of the book make science possible, which is making spiritual science possible. Polarism between religions is the opposite of the reality of human evolution.
In order to live of the land took many times hearing them telling a local story at a local holiday before one finally got it. So many villages had holidays unique to them and their land so they could rest and gain insight needed to insure food from the land via deep understanding of that land. These elders who got it from the insight many holidays repeated where the decision makers.
Pagan originally meant beliefs of the countryside the opposite being the beliefs of the city.
Thanks very much for your thoughts, Andy.
@@gregbrowndervilledimension of course that is just one of many ways that folklore comes into being.
Christianity as practised today is not as it was practised in the past, try to see Christianity and Paganism the way Tolkien saw them and see what it yields
@@universalflamethrower6342 Thanks for joining the conversation!
It is pronounced diabolism though, just like it's spelled.
Thanks for watching GBD, Mad Monkee!
Who or what begins this talk? Is it a bot? Do skip forward to Ron, who rather devastatingly dismisses the bot's bolloxy "tension". Arrrrg, the bot is back! Sorry, have to go...
Maybe I can clarify what I meant by the question. Some folklorists say that the reason pagan beliefs, symbols, and practices endure is that rural people refuse to abandon their pre-Christian traditions. In other words, for these commentators, the preservation is a matter of continuous, conscious practice. Then again, it’s often alleged-by folklorists, comparative mythologists, and occultists-that the reason certain motifs endure in folklore is that they are deeply embedded in the human psyche. According to this view, we don’t even need a tradition of preservation. The idea is that certain patterns will endlessly reassert themselves in mythology, folklore, and religion, even after old traditions have been abandoned. These universal motifs-or so the argument goes-simply can’t be repressed: they are part and parcel of the human imagination, worldwide. Ronald’s answer was nuanced and helpful: basically, he said there’s a way in which both interpretations can be valid, so long as we are very careful in designating which motifs are universal and which are strictly local. This requires great care on the part of scholars. If we are not very careful in separating these two categories, then the tension I spoke of does indeed become a problem.
" Pagan Christianity" is an Oxymoron.
Refresh my memory, Debbie. Did Hutton mention Pagan Christianity? I don’t recall that, but I may well have forgotten.
He said ‘the Pagan - Christian terminology’ referring to them as two poles in scholarship, not pagan Christian as a single thing.
@@elliotvernon7971 Makes no difference. The term " Pagan Christianity" is a contradiction in terms. Period.
@@debbiesittard7653well there's a lot of pagan-christian synchetism out there in the world, it's a very common feature in societies that are nominally Christian. You might desire purity, but doesn't mean this synchetism doesn't exist 😊
Great interview.
Thank you, Jamie! Glad you enjoyed it.
Great interview!
Thanks for tuning in, Raymond-also for the kind words!