By these criteria, Dunsany, although doing his best work in prose, was a poet indeed.
Suggestions for Further Reading
PRIMARY
Mention has been made of Dunsany’s early short story collections, from The Gods of Pegaāna (1905) to Tales of Three Hemispheres (1919). Two early omnibuses from the Modern Library—The Book of Wonder (1918), containing The Book of Wonder and Time and the Gods, and A Dreamer’s Tales and Other Stories (1917), containing A Dreamer’s Tales and The Sword of Welleran—are noteworthy. My edition of The Complete Pegaāna (Chaosium, 1998) contains The Gods of Pegaāna, Time and the Gods, and a few other stories. Tales of War (1918) is a lackluster collection of war stories. Later collections include The Man Who Ate the Phoenix (1949) and The Little Tales of Smethers and Other Stories (1952), but many stories remain uncollected. Some of these are included in Darrell Schweitzer’s edition of The Ghosts of the Heaviside Layer and Other Fantasms (Owlswick Press, 1980). Lin Carter edited three selections of Dunsany’s early work as part of the Adult Fantasy Series published by Ballantine (1972-74), and E. F. Bleiler assembled a meritorious selection, Gods, Men and Ghosts (1972).
Dunsany’s Jorkens tales are collected in five volumes: The Travel Tales of Mr. Joseph Jorkens (1931), Jorkens Remembers Africa (1934), Jorkens Has a Large Whiskey (1940), The Fourth Book of Jorkens (1947), and Jorkens Borrows Another Whiskey (1954). Night Shade Books is preparing, under my editorship, a three-volume reprint of the complete Jorkens tales, which will include the sixth Jorkens volume, which did not appear in Dunsany’s lifetime.
Dunsany’s novels have all been cited in the introduction. His shorter plays are gathered in Five Plays (1914), Plays of Gods and Men (1917), Plays of Near and Far (1922), Alexander and Three Small Plays (1925), Seven Modern Comedies (1928), and Plays for Earth and Air (1937). Several plays appeared separately: If (1921), The Old Folk of the Centuries (1930), Lord Adrian (1933), and Mr. Faithful (1935).
Dunsany wrote many essays, but few have been collected. Some are gathered in The Ghosts of the Heaviside Layer. Of his three autobiographies, Patches of Sunlight (1938), While the Sirens Slept (1944), and The Sirens Wake (1945), the first is by far the best, being a poignant account of Dunsany’s early years; the latter tend to be rather monotonous chronicles of his travels. See also the volume My Ireland (1937). The Donnellan Lectures (1945) contains some significant passages on prose style and dramatic technique. A Glimpse from a Watch Tower (1946) is a trenchant series of essays on the prospects for civilization following the end of World War II.
Dunsany’s poetry—not a notable branch of his work—is collected in several volumes: Fifty Poems (1929), Mirage Water (1938), War Poems (1941), Wandering Songs (1943), A Journey (1944), The Year (1946), and To Awaken Pegasus (1949). His verse translation of The Odes of Horace (1947) is exemplary.
SECONDARY
The relative paucity of recent studies of Dunsany’s life and work stands in stark contrast to the wealth of criticism—chiefly in the form of book reviews and newspaper articles—that he received during his lifetime. Mark Amory’s Biography of Lord Dunsany (Collins, 1972) is a singularly undistinguished biography by a writer who seems to have had no sensitivity to or sympathy with Dunsany’s work. Hazel Littlefield’s Lord Dunsany: King of Dreams (Exposition Press, 1959) is a charming memoir by a Californian whom Dunsany visited several times late in life. Arthur C. Clarke and Lord Dunsany: A Correspondence, ed. Keith Allen Daniels (Anamnesis Press, 1998), prints a fascinating correspondence between Dunsany and the modern master of science fiction.
S. T. Joshi and Darrell Schweitzer’s Lord Dunsany: A Bibliography (Scarecrow Press, 1993) is the first comprehensive listing of works by and about Dunsany.
Of book-length critical studies, Edward Hale Bierstadt’s Dunsany the Dramatist (Little, Brown, 1917, rev. 1919) is the first, but is uninsightful. Darrell Schweitzer’s Pathways to Elfland: The Writings of Lord Dunsany (Owlswick Press, 1989) is enthusiastic and wide-ranging, and is useful as a preliminary overview. The most exhaustive study is S. T. Joshi’s Lord Dunsany: Master of the Anglo-Irish Imagination (Greenwood Press, 1995), which surveys the entirety of Dunsany’s work.
Among shorter critical essays, Ernest A. Boyd’s “Lord Dunsany—Fantaisiste,” in his Appreciations and Depreciations (John Lane, 1918), is still of value. Yeats’s introduction to Selections from the Writings of Lord Dunsany (1912) can now be found in his Prefaces and Introductions, ed. William H. O’Donnell (Macmillan, 1989). H. P. Lovecraft frequently wrote about Dunsany, but his lecture “Lord Dunsany and His Work” (1922) is not as illuminating as one might have wished. It can be found in his Miscellaneous Writings (Arkham House, 1995). Arthur C. Clarke wrote an enthusiastic appreciation of Dunsany in “Dunsany Lord of Dreams,” Rhodomagnetic Digest (November-December 1951). Ursula K. Le Guin addresses Dunsany in “From Elfland to Poughkeepsie,” in The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction (Putnam, 1979). S. T. Joshi’s “Lord Dunsany: The Career of a Fantaisiste,” in The Weird Tale (University of Texas Press, 1990), is an early version of his monograph.
Among recent critics of Irish literature, only John Foster Wilson, in the chapter “A Dreamer’s Tales: The Stories of Lord Dunsany,” in Fictions of the Irish Literary Revival (Syracuse University Press, 1987), has addressed Dunsany’s work significantly.
A Note on the Text
All works by Dunsany in this volume, with two exceptions, are taken from the first British or American editions of his short story collections, as specified in the explanatory notes. “Helping the Fairies” and “The Romance of His Life” are previously uncollected in book form and are derived from their first magazine appearances.
I have incurred many debts of gratitude over the years in regard to my work on Dunsany, most significantly to Darrell Schweitzer, Douglas A. Anderson, Dan Clore, and David E. Schultz. More recently, Mike Ashley has lent me valuable assistance. The support of Edward Plunkett, the twentieth Lord Dunsany; his wife, Marie Alice Plunkett; and his literary adviser, Joe Doyle, is greatly appreciated.
I.
PEGĀNA AND ENVIRONS
The Gods of Pegāna
PREFACE
There be islands in the Central Sea, whose waters are bounded by no shore and where no ships come—this is the faith of their people.
[PROLOGUE]
In the mists before the Beginning, Fate and Chance cast lots to decide whose the Game should be; and he that won strode through the mists to MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI and said: “Now make gods for Me, for I have won the cast and the Game is to be Mine.” Who it was that won the cast, and whether it was Fate or whether Chance that went through the mists before the Beginning to MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI—none knoweth.
THE GODS OF PEGĀNA
Before there stood gods upon Olympus, or ever Allah was Allah, had wrought and rested MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI.
There are in Pegāna—Mung and Sish and Kib, and the maker of all small gods, who is MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI. Moreover, we have a faith in Roon and Slid.
And it has been said of old that all things that have been were wrought by the small gods, excepting only MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI, who made the gods, and hath thereafter rested.
And none may pray to MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI but only to the gods whom he hath made.
But at the Last will MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI forget to rest, and will make again new gods and other worlds, and will destroy the gods whom he hath made.
And the gods and the worlds shall depart, and there shall be only MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI.
OF SKARL THE DRUMMER
When MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI had made the gods and Skarl, Skarl made a drum, and began to beat upon it that he might drum for ever. Then because he was weary after the making of the gods, and because of the drumming of Skarl, did MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI grow drowsy and fall asleep.
And there fell a hush upon the gods when they saw that MĀNA rested, and there was silence on Pegāna save for the drumming of Skarl. Skarl sitteth upon the mist before the feet of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI, above t
he gods of Pegāna, and there he beateth his drum. Some say that the Worlds and the Suns are but the echoes of the drumming of Skarl, and others say that they be dreams that arise in the mind of MĀNA because of the drumming of Skarl, as one may dream whose rest is troubled by sound of song, but none knoweth, for who hath heard the voice of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI, or who hath seen his drummer?
Whether the season be winter or whether it be summer, whether it be morning among the worlds or whether it be night, Skarl still beateth his drum, for the purposes of the gods are not yet fulfilled. Sometimes the arm of Skarl grows weary; but still he beateth his drum, that the gods may do the work of the gods, and the worlds go on, for if he cease for an instant then MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI will start awake, and there will be worlds nor gods no more.
But, when at the last the arm of Skarl shall cease to beat his drum, silence shall startle Pegāna like thunder in a cave, and MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI shall cease to rest.
Then shall Skarl put his drum upon his back and walk forth into the void beyond the worlds, because it is THE END, and the work of Skarl is over.
There there may arise some other god whom Skarl may serve, or it may be that he shall perish; but to Skarl it shall matter not, for he shall have done the work of Skarl.
OF THE MAKING OF THE WORLDS
When MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI had made the gods there were only the gods, and They sat in the middle of Time, for there was as much Time before them as behind them, which having no end had neither a beginning.
And Pegāna was without heat or light or sound, save for the drumming of Skarl; moreover Pegāna was The Middle of All, for there was below Pegāna what there was above it, and there lay before it that which lay beyond.
Then said the gods, making the signs of the gods and speaking with Their hands lest the silence of Pegāna should blush; then said the gods to one another, speaking with Their hands: “Let Us make worlds to amuse Ourselves while MĀNA rests. Let Us make worlds and Life and Death, and colours in the sky; only let Us not break the silence upon Pegāna.”
Then raising Their hands, each god according to his sign, They made the worlds and the suns, and put a light in the houses of the sky.
Then said the gods: “Let Us make one to seek, to seek and never to find out concerning the wherefore of the making of the gods.”
And They made by the lifting of Their hands, each god according to his sign, the Bright One with the flaring tail to seek from the end of the Worlds to the end of them again, to return again after a hundred years.
Man, when thou seest the comet, know that another seeketh besides thee nor ever findeth out.
Then said the gods, still speaking with Their hands: “Let there be now a Watcher to regard.”
And They made the Moon, with his face wrinkled with many mountains and worn with a thousand valleys, to regard with pale eyes the games of the small gods, and to watch throughout the resting time of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI; to watch, to regard all things, and be silent.
Then said the gods: “Let Us make one to rest. One not to move among the moving. One not to seek like the comet, nor to go round like the worlds; to rest while MĀNA rests.”
And They made the Star of the Abiding and set it in the North.1
Man, when thou seest the Star of the Abiding to the North, know that one resteth as doth MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI, and know that somewhere among the Worlds is rest.
Lastly the gods said: “We have made worlds and suns, and one to seek and another to regard, let Us now make one to wonder.”
And They made Earth to wonder, each god by the uplifting of his hand according to his sign.
And Earth Was.
OF THE GAME OF THE GODS
A million years passed over the first game of the gods. And MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI still rested, still in the middle of Time, and the gods still played with Worlds. The Moon regarded, and the Bright One sought, and returned again to his seeking.
Then Kib grew weary of the first game of the gods, and raised his hand in Pegāna, making the sign of Kib, and Earth became covered with beasts for Kib to play with.
And Kib played with beasts.
But the other gods said one to another, speaking with their hands: “What is it that Kib has done?”
And They said to Kib: “What are these things that move upon The Earth yet move not in circles like the Worlds, that regard like the Moon and yet they do not shine?”
And Kib said: “This is Life.”
But the gods said one to another: “If Kib has thus made beasts he will in time make Men, and will endanger the Secret of the gods.”
And Mung was jealous of the work of Kib, and sent down Death among the beasts, but could not stamp them out.
A million years passed over the second game of the gods, and still it was the Middle of Time.
And Kib grew weary of the second game, and raised his hand in The Middle of All, making the sign of Kib, and made Men: out of beasts he made them, and Earth was covered with Men.
Then the gods feared greatly for the Secret of the gods, and set a veil between Man and his ignorance that he might not understand. And Mung was busy among Men.
But when the other gods saw Kib playing his new game They came and played it too. And this They will play until MĀNA arise to rebuke Them, saying: “What do ye playing with Worlds and Suns and Men and Life and Death?” And They shall be ashamed of Their playing in the hour of the laughter of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI.
It was Kib who first broke the Silence of Pegāna, by speaking with his mouth like a man.
And all the other gods were angry with Kib that he had spoken with his mouth.
And there was no longer silence in Pegāna or the Worlds.
THE CHAUNT OF THE GODS
There came the voice of the gods singing the chaunt of the gods, singing: “We are the gods; We are the little games of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI that he hath played and hath forgotten.
“MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI hath made us, and We made the Worlds and the Suns.
“And We play with the Worlds and the Sun and Life and Death until MĀNA arise to rebuke us, saying: ‘What do ye playing with Worlds and Suns?’
“It is a very serious thing that there be Worlds and Suns, and yet most withering is the laughter of MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI.
“And when he arises from resting at the Last, and laughs at us for playing with Worlds and Suns, We will hastily put them behind us, and there shall be Worlds no more.”
THE SAYINGS OF KIB (Sender of Life in All the Worlds)
Kib said: “I am Kib. I am none other than Kib.”
Kib is Kib. Kib is he and no other. Believe!
Kib said: “When Time was early, when Time was very early indeed—there was only MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI. MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI was before the beginning of the gods, and shall be after their going.”
And Kib said: “After the going of the gods there will be no small worlds nor big.”
Kib said: “It will be lonely for MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI.”
Because this is written, believe! For is it not written, or are you greater than Kib? Kib is Kib.
CONCERNING SISH (The Destroyer of Hours)
Time is the hound of Sish.
At Sish’s bidding do the hours run before him as he goeth upon his way.
Never hath Sish stepped backward nor ever hath he tarried; never hath he relented to the things that once he knew nor turned to them again.
Before Sish is Kib, and behind him goeth Mung.
Very pleasant are all things before the face of Sish, but behind him they are withered and old.
And Sish goeth ceaselessly upon his way.
Once the gods walked upon the Earth as men walk and spake with their mouths like Men. That was in Wornath-Mavai. They walk not now.
And Wornath-Mavai was a garden fairer than all the gardens upon Earth.
Kib was propitious, and Mung raised not his hand against it, neither did Sish assail it with his hours.
Wornath-Mavai lieth in a valley and looketh towards the south, and on the slopes of it Sish res
ted among the flowers when Sish was young.
Thence Sish went forth into the world to destroy its cities, and to provoke his hours to assail all things, and to batter against them with the rust and with the dust.
And Time, which is the hound of Sish, devoured all things; and Sish sent up the ivy and fostered weeds, and dust fell from the hand of Sish and covered stately things. Only the valley where Sish rested when he and Time were young did Sish not provoke his hours to assail.
There he restrained his old hound Time, and at its borders Mung withheld his footsteps.
Wornath-Mavai still lieth looking towards the south, a garden among gardens, and still the flowers grow about its slopes as they grew when the gods were young; and even the butterflies live in Wornath-Mavai still. For the minds of the gods relent towards their earliest memories, who relent not otherwise at all.
Wornath-Mavai still lieth looking towards the south; but if thou shouldst ever find it thou art then more fortunate than the gods, because they walk not in Wornath-Mavai now.
Once did the prophet think that he discerned it in the distance beyond mountains, a garden exceeding fair with flowers; but Sish arose, and pointed with his hand, and set his hound to pursue him, who hath followed ever since.
Time is the hound of the gods; but it hath been said of old that he will one day turn upon his masters, and seek to slay the gods, excepting only MĀNA-YOOD-SUSHAI, whose dreams are the gods themselves—dreamed long ago.