The Hollowing
Encyclopedia
The Hollowing is the third fantasy novel of the Mythago Wood
series written by Robert Holdstock
. It was originally published in 1993. The title refers to a magical pathway, or hollowing, an archaic English term for a sunken lane or hollow-way
. The Hollowing was inspired by the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
.
Despite primarily featuring new characters, The Hollowing is a sequel to Lavondyss
because a handful of characters provide a link between the two novels. The events in the previous novel set into motion the events that drive the actions of the protagonist in The Hollowing. Reading the novels Mythago Wood and Lavondyss will illuminate The Hollowing for first time readers. Reading the Wikipedia article on Mythago Wood will help in understanding issues and terminology in this article.
with the rate of time outside the wood. The story's protagonist is Alex's father, Richard Bradley. Richard is on a quest to locate his lost son in the wood, a very dangerous task because Alex’s overactive imagination generates mythagos dangerous to both himself and others.
After six years Alex’s father, Richard Bradley, receives evidence that Alex may yet be alive in Ryhope wood. Richard joins a scientific expedition to locate his son in the wood, rendered all the more dangerous by the mythagos feeding off Alex’s imagination.
During his quest in the wood, Richard Bradley develops a romantic relationship with Helen Silverlock, a Native American
. In addition to introducing Native American culture into Ryhope wood, mythagos about Jack (as in Jack and the Beanstalk
), the Tower of Babel
and Jason
and the Argonauts
appear, the last two of which involve variations on myths that are uncharacteristically non-English in origin.
Alice Bradley : Alex Bradley's mother and the wife of Richard Bradley.
Richard Bradley : Main character of the story.
Elizabeth Haylock : A specialist in first millennium European history. She is partnered with Alan Wakeman.
Ilmari Heikonen : A male Finnish scientist partnered with Pirkko Sinisalo.
Dan Jacobi : Helen's Silverlock's parter and fellow scientist who has disappeared in Ryhope wood.
Arnauld Lacan : A tall Frenchman and excellent cook who is one of the scientists exploring Ryhope wood. Arnauld has had traumatic experiences with mythagos in Brocéliande
, a forest similar to Ryhope wood, but situated in Brittany
. Brocéliande is the location of the events in Merlin's Wood
.
Alexander Lytton : A Scottish scientist who possesses George Huxley's map of Ryhope wood and one of Huxley's two journals. He perceives Alex Bradley's effect on Ryhope wood as a threat to Huxley's nuanced and beautiful vision.
McCarthy : A small Irishman and specialist who is exploring Ryhope wood. He has a special power to mentally probe the wood.
Helen Silverlock : A Lakota Sioux woman from Nebraska
, she is one of the scientists exploring Ryhope wood.
Pirkko Sinisalo : A female Finnish scientist partnered with Ilmari Heikonen.
Alan Wakeman : A paleolinguist
and expert in glyphs and bronze age
culture. He is partnered with Elizabeth Haylock.
Giggler : An evil variant on Sir Gawain
from the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
The Green Knight : A good variant on the Green Knight
from the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
Hollyjack : A daurog or mythical variant on a Green Jack
, whose bodily form is holly branches and leaves. She has tusks and gives birth to birds. She communicates by chirping and has been sent by the Green Knight to care for Alex Bradley.
Jack : A dangerous shapechanging variant on Jack from Jack and the Beanstalk. This Trickster
also manifests himself as a canine foe of Helen Silverlock.
Jason : The tricky and travel-weary hero from Jason and the Argonauts.
The Long Man : A benevolent mythago who can create hollowings as needed.
Sarinpushtam : An abused captive of Jason, "Sarin" is a middle eastern woman who alone survived the collapse of the Tower of Babel. She understands all language
s, past, present and future.
Taaj : A kind boy from a mesolithic
society who befriends Richard.
in the category of Best Novel in 1995.
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Mythago Wood
Mythago Wood is a fantasy novel written by Robert Holdstock that was published in the United Kingdom in 1984. The conception began as a short story written for the 1979 Milford Writer's Workshop; next a novella of the same name appeared in the September 1981 edition of The Magazine of Fantasy &...
series written by Robert Holdstock
Robert Holdstock
Robert Paul Holdstock was an English novelist and author best known for his works of Celtic, Nordic, Gothic and Pictish fantasy literature, predominantly in the fantasy subgenre of mythic fiction....
. It was originally published in 1993. The title refers to a magical pathway, or hollowing, an archaic English term for a sunken lane or hollow-way
Sunken lane
A sunken lane is a road which has over time fallen significantly lower than the land on either side. They are created incrementally by erosion, by water and traffic...
. The Hollowing was inspired by the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th-century Middle English alliterative romance outlining an adventure of Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table. In the poem, Sir Gawain accepts a challenge from a mysterious warrior who is completely green, from his clothes and hair to his...
.
Despite primarily featuring new characters, The Hollowing is a sequel to Lavondyss
Lavondyss
Lavondyss also titled Lavondyss: Journey to an Unknown Region is the second fantasy novel of the Mythago Wood series written by Robert Holdstock. Lavondyss was originally published in 1988...
because a handful of characters provide a link between the two novels. The events in the previous novel set into motion the events that drive the actions of the protagonist in The Hollowing. Reading the novels Mythago Wood and Lavondyss will illuminate The Hollowing for first time readers. Reading the Wikipedia article on Mythago Wood will help in understanding issues and terminology in this article.
Plot introduction
The Hollowing shares the third person narrative viewpoint as does its predecessor, Lavondyss. The narrative begins in the 1950s, merely one year after the events that take place in Lavondyss, but the majority of the story takes place in 1968. Inside Ryhope wood, Tallis Keeton's young friend, Alex Bradley, remains an adolescent when he would otherwise be twenty years old. This is possible because the rate of time inside the wood is not synchronizedSynchronization
Synchronization is timekeeping which requires the coordination of events to operate a system in unison. The familiar conductor of an orchestra serves to keep the orchestra in time....
with the rate of time outside the wood. The story's protagonist is Alex's father, Richard Bradley. Richard is on a quest to locate his lost son in the wood, a very dangerous task because Alex’s overactive imagination generates mythagos dangerous to both himself and others.
Plot summary
The day Tallis Keeton disappears into Ryhope wood in Lavondyss, her father, James Keeton, disappears into the wood to locate her. While he spends only four days in Ryhope wood, over one year of time passes in the outside world. When he turns up, he is clutching Moondream, one of Tallis’ masks, and is placed in a mental hospital. He is kept close company by Alex Bradley, a young playmate of Tallis’, who alone can calm James. James Keeton has a number of episodes in which he appears to communicate with Tallis through the mask. In a dramatic scene, Richard Bradley sees James Keeton collapse and die. At the same time, his son Alex is physically traumatized by a mythic force. This compromises Alex’s mental faculties and he is confined to the same mental hospital. Alex escapes the mental hospital and his highly decayed remains are subsequently found, so he is presumed dead.After six years Alex’s father, Richard Bradley, receives evidence that Alex may yet be alive in Ryhope wood. Richard joins a scientific expedition to locate his son in the wood, rendered all the more dangerous by the mythagos feeding off Alex’s imagination.
During his quest in the wood, Richard Bradley develops a romantic relationship with Helen Silverlock, a Native American
Native Americans in the United States
Native Americans in the United States are the indigenous peoples in North America within the boundaries of the present-day continental United States, parts of Alaska, and the island state of Hawaii. They are composed of numerous, distinct tribes, states, and ethnic groups, many of which survive as...
. In addition to introducing Native American culture into Ryhope wood, mythagos about Jack (as in Jack and the Beanstalk
Jack and the Beanstalk
Jack and the Beanstalk is a folktale said by English historian Francis Palgrave to be an oral legend that arrived in England with the Vikings. The tale is closely associated with the tale of Jack the Giant-killer. It is known under a number of versions...
), the Tower of Babel
Tower of Babel
The Tower of Babel , according to the Book of Genesis, was an enormous tower built in the plain of Shinar .According to the biblical account, a united humanity of the generations following the Great Flood, speaking a single language and migrating from the east, came to the land of Shinar, where...
and Jason
Jason
Jason was a late ancient Greek mythological hero from the late 10th Century BC, famous as the leader of the Argonauts and their quest for the Golden Fleece. He was the son of Aeson, the rightful king of Iolcus...
and the Argonauts
Argonauts
The Argonauts ) were a band of heroes in Greek mythology who, in the years before the Trojan War, accompanied Jason to Colchis in his quest to find the Golden Fleece. Their name comes from their ship, the Argo, which was named after its builder, Argus. "Argonauts", therefore, literally means...
appear, the last two of which involve variations on myths that are uncharacteristically non-English in origin.
Human characters
Alex Bradley : The son of Richard Bradley and childhood friend of Tallis Keeton, the protagonist of Lavondyss.Alice Bradley : Alex Bradley's mother and the wife of Richard Bradley.
Richard Bradley : Main character of the story.
Elizabeth Haylock : A specialist in first millennium European history. She is partnered with Alan Wakeman.
Ilmari Heikonen : A male Finnish scientist partnered with Pirkko Sinisalo.
Dan Jacobi : Helen's Silverlock's parter and fellow scientist who has disappeared in Ryhope wood.
Arnauld Lacan : A tall Frenchman and excellent cook who is one of the scientists exploring Ryhope wood. Arnauld has had traumatic experiences with mythagos in Brocéliande
Brocéliande
Brocéliande is the name of a legendary forest that first appears in literature in 1160, in the Roman de Rou, a verse chronicle written by Wace....
, a forest similar to Ryhope wood, but situated in Brittany
Brittany
Brittany is a cultural and administrative region in the north-west of France. Previously a kingdom and then a duchy, Brittany was united to the Kingdom of France in 1532 as a province. Brittany has also been referred to as Less, Lesser or Little Britain...
. Brocéliande is the location of the events in Merlin's Wood
Merlin's Wood
Merlin's Wood; or, The Vision of Magic is a short novel written by Robert Holdstock and was first published in the UK in 1994. The novel is considered part of the Mythago Wood cycle, but takes place in Brittany, France instead of Herefordshire, England...
.
Alexander Lytton : A Scottish scientist who possesses George Huxley's map of Ryhope wood and one of Huxley's two journals. He perceives Alex Bradley's effect on Ryhope wood as a threat to Huxley's nuanced and beautiful vision.
McCarthy : A small Irishman and specialist who is exploring Ryhope wood. He has a special power to mentally probe the wood.
Helen Silverlock : A Lakota Sioux woman from Nebraska
Nebraska
Nebraska is a state on the Great Plains of the Midwestern United States. The state's capital is Lincoln and its largest city is Omaha, on the Missouri River....
, she is one of the scientists exploring Ryhope wood.
Pirkko Sinisalo : A female Finnish scientist partnered with Ilmari Heikonen.
Alan Wakeman : A paleolinguist
Paleolinguistics
Paleolinguistics is a term used by some linguists for the study of the distant human past by linguistic means. For most historical linguists there is no separate field of paleolinguistics...
and expert in glyphs and bronze age
Bronze Age
The Bronze Age is a period characterized by the use of copper and its alloy bronze as the chief hard materials in the manufacture of some implements and weapons. Chronologically, it stands between the Stone Age and Iron Age...
culture. He is partnered with Elizabeth Haylock.
Mythagos
Many mythagos, some minor, appear in The Hollowing. The major mythagos are listed below.Giggler : An evil variant on Sir Gawain
Gawain
Gawain is King Arthur's nephew and a Knight of the Round Table who appears very early in the Arthurian legend's development. He is one of a select number of Round Table members to be referred to as the greatest knight, most notably in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight...
from the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
The Green Knight : A good variant on the Green Knight
Green Knight
The Green Knight is a character in the 14th-century Arthurian poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and the related work The Greene Knight. His true name is revealed to be Bercilak de Hautdesert in Sir Gawain, while The Greene Knight names him "Bredbeddle"...
from the story Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.
Hollyjack : A daurog or mythical variant on a Green Jack
Jack in the green
A Jack in the Green is a participant in traditional English May Day parades and other May celebrations, who wears a large, foliage-covered, garland-like framework, usually pyramidal or conical in shape, which covers his body from head to foot...
, whose bodily form is holly branches and leaves. She has tusks and gives birth to birds. She communicates by chirping and has been sent by the Green Knight to care for Alex Bradley.
Jack : A dangerous shapechanging variant on Jack from Jack and the Beanstalk. This Trickster
Trickster
In mythology, and in the study of folklore and religion, a trickster is a god, goddess, spirit, man, woman, or anthropomorphic animal who plays tricks or otherwise disobeys normal rules and conventional behavior. It is suggested by Hansen that the term "Trickster" was probably first used in this...
also manifests himself as a canine foe of Helen Silverlock.
Jason : The tricky and travel-weary hero from Jason and the Argonauts.
The Long Man : A benevolent mythago who can create hollowings as needed.
Sarinpushtam : An abused captive of Jason, "Sarin" is a middle eastern woman who alone survived the collapse of the Tower of Babel. She understands all language
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...
s, past, present and future.
Taaj : A kind boy from a mesolithic
Mesolithic
The Mesolithic is an archaeological concept used to refer to certain groups of archaeological cultures defined as falling between the Paleolithic and the Neolithic....
society who befriends Richard.
Awards
The Hollowing was nominated for the Mythopoeic Fantasy Award for Adult LiteratureMythopoeic Awards
The Mythopoeic Awards for literature and literary studies are given by the Mythopoeic Society to authors of outstanding works in the fields of myth, fantasy, and the scholarly study of these areas; the full criteria and description can be read on the Mythopoeic Society's -Mythopoeic Fantasy...
in the category of Best Novel in 1995.
Chronology of works in the Mythago Wood cycle
The order in which the Mythago cycle works were written/published does not necessarily correspond to the order of events within the realm of the Mythago Wood cycle. For example, Gate of Ivory, Gate of Horn and the novella The Bone Forest are prequels to Mythago Wood even though they were published at a later date. The novel Merlin's Wood (1994) and short stories in The Bone Forest and Merlin's Wood have little bearing on the events in the Ryhope wood. See the table below for a chronology of events within Ryhope wood.!width="40%"|Followed by:
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|Lavondyss
Lavondyss
Lavondyss also titled Lavondyss: Journey to an Unknown Region is the second fantasy novel of the Mythago Wood series written by Robert Holdstock. Lavondyss was originally published in 1988...
|The Hollowing
|n/a
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