Maybe a Goddess. Maybe a Fairy. She's Human Either Way.
Regina de Burca's "The Curse of Flidais"
The Irish fairy woman had a taste for the mead.
At least, that’s what Regina said.
Flidais (pronounced something like Flee-ush, but I recommend you listen to the episode to hear it from the storyteller’s mouth) was exiled from the Otherworld for some unnamed transgression.
She found herself in this world, what we have come to call the “real” world, in a terrible union with a king named Oilill Fionn. He is unkind and dismissive and threatens the only being that Flidais truly loves - her mystical companion, a cow named Maol.
And so, Flidais strikes a bargain with another man who promises her salvation. He certainly couldn’t be as bad as her last partner, right?
Fergus swears he’ll free her from the binds of Oilill Fionn and his court, but his “ends justify the means” mentality and next level cruelty prove that things really could get so much worse for our fairy woman trapped in the snares of mortals.
This week’s KnotWork Storytelling podcast guest
of is such a gem, and so is her story of the little-known Flidais.
Is this a fairy story or a goddess tale?
Even after spending time with Regina and her story, as I sat down to write about it, I was still stymied when it came to describing the heroine of her tale.
Flidais came from the Celtic Otherworld, so she has all the divine cred a girl could want, but is it more correct (and polite, and respectful) to call her a goddess or a fairy?
I started to pull books off the shelf (which I will fail to reshelve and trip over for three weeks).
I started to lose myself in three Google rabbit holes at the same time (at some point, you’re going to get to read about my adventures in menopause brain and how I suddenly wonder if I need to also Google ADHD symptoms in grown ass women).
Then I remembered that I could (and should) email the source. And also, and Regina would be very happy to hear from me.
So, Irish soul sister, is our friend Flidais a goddess or a fairy?
REGINA: I think Flidais is both! I believe the origin story of the sídhe to be the one about the ancient gods and goddesses, the Tuatha De Danann, moving underground following a battle with the Milesians, and from there they became known as the sídhe. I believe Flidais originally belonged to the Tuatha De Danann. I feel like the notion of her being exiled (this is me filling in the gaps of the story, I haven't found a reference to this explicitly) divorced her from her magic as time went on. To confuse and conflate things further, I was exploring the concept of becoming 'more Irish than the Irish themselves', like they said about the Normans who invaded here.
A lot of artistic liberty for sure, but I trust my felt sense when I'm working on a story!
… And that, my friends, is how modern myth working and retelling is done, right?
Myth with Roots in Mortality, Not in Solemnity
I don’t usually call on my jokey, ”let’s tell it but with a wink and half smile” voice very often here on Myth Is Medicine, but there was no way to write this one with my usual thoughtful, measured tones.
Maybe it’s because Flidais, who doesn’t seem to have a kind word for anyone and who takes to the drink when she’s too full of fear and grief to cope, inspired me with her vulnerable humanness.
In our conversation, Regina describes how she is fascinated by how the gods become mortal, and vice versa. Flidais doesn’t necessarily do human “well,” but her story still gives us permission to relax into a different way of being (at least for a little while).
Maybe it’s because, as I mentioned above, I am in a new hormonal hinterland and the old rules just don’t apply. (Because when everything is seventeen times harder thanks to my distractible, exhausted mind, I simply must take the path of most ease and least resistance. And I must not take myself too seriously.)
And maybe, it’s something like what Blindboy says when he bemoans the habit of “solemnity,” which he describes as “an unflinching performed seriousness that hides a structural absurdity.”
The world in which Flidais finds herself, all full of patriarchal power-over and the erosive kind of distrust between women… it’s its own kind of absurd structure. No wonder our fairy-goddess heroine is so miserable in its clutches.
Much like we’re miserable in modernity’s clutches, of course. Much like we turn to addiction and turn on one another because the systems themselves are grinding us all to dust.
Though I am learning a whole lot about how little this mid-forties body of mine can drink and maintain any sort of health or equilibrium, I still raise a glass and say slainte to an Otherworldly being who comes to show us all the ways our world is out of joint.
May Flidais find healing when she makes it back to the sídhe, the sacred fairy mound.
May you find some healing as you explore her story.
When you tune into Regina’s episode, you’ll hear us talk a little bit about her process as a writer and storyteller.
If that got you thinking about your own process as a writer and storyteller, I invite you to join us in the Writers’ Knot, my global community of creatives. We begin a new session together on Lughnasa, August 1.
