This segment of Salon Saturday aired on the October 21 radio show. We are in October Country, which is one of my favorite Ray Bradbury novels and inspirations.
So while our art cannot, as we wish it could, save us from wars, privation, envy, greed, old age, or death, it can revitalize us amidst it all.” ― Ray Bradbury.
And all this month I’ve been focused on wine and all things that go bump in the night, which are better companions than you might realize. We previously covered the genesis of the horror novel, but here I’m narrowing the focus to the werewolf in book and film.
This was one of the scariest horror genres for me. Here we have extreme body horror and most of these guys didn’t look like they enjoyed the transformation any more than I did. This was one more myth from the mists of time that comes with a technical term; lycanthropy. And we do know when the full moon rises lots of guys turn into wolves, but most of them don’t get all hairy about it.
A lot of the following information came from Werewolf Legends on www.history.com and Wikipedia.
The werewolf is a mythological animal, but its influence far out-shadows that. The first surviving work about wolf-men was The Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest known Western prose, when Gilgamesh jilted a potential lover because she had turned her previous mate into a wolf. Yeah you need to stay away from women like that.
Many cultures have stories regarding werewolves and shape-shifters that have created quite a few nightmares. The werewolf transformation can be:
- A complete change into a wolf; at will or during a full moon
- A combination of man and beast in varying degrees
- Almost always, their appetites for flesh are voracious and unrelenting
There is evidence of widespread belief in werewolves in medieval Europe. This evidence spans much of the Continent and the British Isles. Werewolves were mentioned in Medieval law codes, such as that of King Cnut, whose Ecclesiastical Ordinances inform us that the codes aim to ensure that “…the madly audacious werewolf do not too widely devastate, nor bite too many of the spiritual flock.” So chomping on a few of them is OK? That’s pretty liberal. And then if they turn into werewolves you have an even bigger problem.
It’s unclear exactly when and where the werewolf legend originated, but one early appearance was in Greek mythology with the Legend of Lycaon. According to the legend, Lycaon, the son of Pelasgus, angered the god Zeus when he served him a meal made from the remains of a sacrificed boy. As punishment, the enraged Zeus turned Lycaon and his sons into wolves. I think a prime filet would have been a safer bet.
Werewolves also emerged in early Nordic folklore. The Saga of the Volsungs tells the story of a father and son who discovered wolf pelts that had the power to turn people into wolves for ten days. The father-son duo donned the pelts, transformed into wolves and went on a killing rampage in the forest. Boy, good thing it was only ten days!
Many so-called werewolves from previous centuries were in fact serial killers that ate rather than sliced up their victims. That was one way to get rid of the evidence. In 1521, Frenchmen Pierre Burgot and Michel Verdun allegedly swore allegiance to the devil and claimed to have an ointment that turned them into wolves. After confessing to brutally murdering several children, they were both burned to death at the stake. (Burning was thought to be one of the few ways to kill a werewolf.) The silver bullet came later.
Since the fear of werewolves and witches evolved almost simultaneously, it is not too surprising that werewolf-hunts were grouped into witch-hunts over the years. In some villages you didn’t want to grow a beard and if you were naturally hairy it was better to remain covered when going out in public.
Although the term is usually associated with males, female werewolves were in the Irish work Tales of the Elders, from the 12th century, and there were even earlier accounts suggesting werewolf is not gender-specific. Some vampires could also assume the shape of a wolf, which is found in the folklore of Central and Eastern Europe, including Hungary, Romania and the Balkans. Conversely, a werewolf-sorcerer is found in France, German-speaking Europe and in the Baltic.
Lifting the curse of a werewolf often meant the cure would be worse than the disease, but in some accounts it was relatively easy. In the German lowland of Schleswig-Holstein, a werewolf could be cured if one were to simply address it three times by its Christian name, while one Danish belief holds that merely scolding a werewolf will cure it. Bad dog, bad dog! Maybe a rolled up newspaper would help?
The Best Werewolf Novels
While there have been many written works about werewolves, one of the first modern work to describe them was the 1897 novel Dracula and the short story “Dracula’s Guest”, both written by Bram Stoker. In these he drew on earlier mythologies of werewolves and similar legendary demons. Dracula was able to assume the shape of a large white wolf.
“The White Wolf of the Hartz Mountains” is an episode in the novel The Phantom Ship (1839) by Marryat, featuring a demonic femme fatale who transforms from woman to wolf.
The fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood has often been interpreted as a werewolf story and that is made explicit in The Company of Wolves (1984) directed by Neil Jordan. The classic Beauty and the Beast (French: La Belle et la Bête) that was published in 1740 and revised in 1756 was often described as a wolf-like being. Jean Cocteau’s Beauty and the Beast (1946) is a ravishingly beautiful expression of that concept and one of the greatest films of all time.
A rapacious female werewolf who appears in the guise of a seductive femme fatale before transforming into lupine form to devour her hapless male victims is the protagonist of Clemence Housman’s acclaimed The Were-wolf published in 1896.
The most renowned werewolf novel of the 20th century was The Werewolf of Paris (1933) by American author Guy Endore. The novel has achieved cult status and is considered the foundation novel of werewolf literature. The Hammer film Curse of the Werewolf (1961) was based on that novel.
The pulp novels and later horror comics of the 50s made good use of the concept, and we now have many novels that feature a werewolf in mysteries, gothic, and horror/fantasy fiction.
Check out Werewolf Movies Paired To Wines & Spirits for some chilling combinations to keep the wolf at bay.
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