The Tangle-Coated Horse and Other Stories by Ella Young (published 1929) records the traditional Irish Fionna saga, which features the story of Fionn (pronounced “Finn”), a young son of a clan chief in ancient Ireland. In the forward, the author notes that this is one of the oldest sagas from Gaelic people, and yet so few remember it, so she wrote this book to keep the story alive. The story of magic and fairies is engaging and funny, so it is nice that this Newbery Honor book has recorded it for the future, and it’s too bad it’s not well known today.
About The Book and The Fionna Saga
Unlike the Wonder-Smith and His Son by the same author (reviewed a few months ago), this felt like a saga. It felt cohesive as a story of folktales and traditions. It begins as young boy Fionn learns about his destiny. He’s been in hiding since his father was killed, but now it is time to take charge of his clan. The style of writing and the connections between the stories felt a lot like reading a retelling of Greek myths: magical creatures (in this case, fairies instead of “gods”) help a young boy successfully complete his quest. Magical tools help him, he communicates with the wolves for help, and mysterious happenings lead him to the victory that is due him. All magic against him fails.
To my surprise, Ella Young actually references the sources she used to explain where she has found a written record of these traditions! This is not common for such an early book, at least the folktales collections I’ve read for the Newbery challenge. After I read the book, I had to look up more about this tradition. According to Wikipedia, the traditions were written down by the poet Oisin, Fionn’s son. I also see a few other retellings of these stories (which name our main character “Finn MacCool”), which I am now interested in reading.
Ella Young’s Tales
Fionn’s quest is not just to reclaim the clann leadership but to have adventures, as well as to gain more magical powers and achieve enlightenment (to some extent) in the magical salmon’s sliver pool. That sounds ridiculous, but I’ll bet that the Greek myths sound ridiculous to people that hadn’t been brought up on the stories as I have been.
Once his leadership is secured, he leads the warriors of Ireland on adventures. His wife Saba is mysteriously a silvery deer, who is only human within his palace walls. This means that after she has been lost in the woods in her deer form, they find Fionn’s child (Usheen, spelled in other versions of the myth as Oisin) playing in the forest, after having been raised by his deer-mother. Many stories include some of Fionn’s friends, including the old warrior Cunnaun and young warrior Diarmid. We get to know their personalities as they deal with overcoming their own selfish desires and interests as they develop into better warriors.
Some of these stories were really funny! The title story comes from one where an old sloppy man with his sloppy “tangle-coated horse” come to Fionn’s castle to join the warriors. The warriors are offended that he wants to be with the warriors because he is so obviously unfit. He insists he will only leave if they can get his horse to leave, which can only happen if enough people get on the horse’s back. Once 17 people have climbed on the horse’s back, he finally starts to move: he dashes off wildly on a crazy ride, making even these warrior-heros scream in fear!
The horse actually takes them to the land under the ocean. The horse and rider have become beautiful majestic beings of this undersea kingdom. The king of the land has wanted them to come and they had insisted they never would. Essentially, the King says “I had to get you here somehow!” This trick was done in the spirit of humor, not competition of conquering, so it is very funny. On the way home, the king of the land under the ocean lets them ride on beautiful horses and unicorns, an appropriate magical ending to that story!
Thoughts on the Traditions
Interesting, the last chapter is titled “300 years after” and it tells the story of an old man stumbling into town bewildered, almost Rip Van Winkle-ish. He transforms into a strong giant, who claims his Usheen, the son of Fionn. He believes he has only been gone for three years but had been under a spell and really missed 300 years. In this chapter, he is taken to Saint Patrick, who promises to write down the stories he tells in exchange for letting Patrick and the other monks teach him about the true God.
It is a 1929 book about a very non-christian traditions, so when I read it, I wondered if the author Ella young made it into a Christian text by adding this. Were people concerned if the children read folktales they would believe Christianity? But NO! Oisin talking to St. Patrick is part of the tradition. Supposedly, Oisin the storyteller/poet he never really appreciated the Christian doctrine and there were words between the two.
In the end, I enjoyed just about all of these stories. I like how even though it was series of tales, it also all fit together with the same characters, making it a cohesive whole.
The Tangle-Coated Horse and Other Stories by Ella Young was a runner-up for the Newbery award in 1930. It’s “PRETTY GOOD” and I say “READ IT IF YOU HAVE TIME.”
Newbery rating scale: FANTASTIC | REALLY GOOD | PRETTY GOOD | OKAY | BLAH
What to do with this Newbery: KEEP IT AND READ IT | MAYBE IF YOU HAVE TIME | DON’T BOTHER
