The Ring of Truth

About Fiddler’s Green Peculiar Parish

Fiddler’s Green Peculiar Parish Magazine was born of a languid afternoon of conversation on a sunny tavern lawn. Taking its name from the pleasant afterlife dreamed into being by sailors, cavalrymen, and other adventurous spirits, Fiddler’s Green gathers friends, good cheer, and a bit of magic to create a better world not someday, but now.

In ecclesiastical terms, the word “peculiar” refers to a district outside the jurisdiction of the Church. It’s also a good word for describing my own view of reality, and likely yours as well. And so here is a “peculiar parish magazine” for anyone who doesn’t feel the need to have their inner life directed by others. If it is peculiar that we wish to govern our bodies and souls ourselves, then let us be peculiar.

The conversation continues, and there is room for you in it. Each of us is on our own journey, both in this world and whatever lies beyond it. Sometimes the path is well lit; at other times it is obscured. Your wanderings have brought you here, and I hope you’ll stray for a while with me and the other souls gathered at Fiddler’s Green.

Clint Marsh [Publisher]

Description

To Court the Miraculous

“The treasure I’m after isn’t silver or gold. I don’t want to know how to turn invisible, and I’m not in search of my one true love. I’m making the circle because I want to open a window between this world and the magical one, the place where elves and dreams of flight are born.”

Haunted by fascination, a teenage boy undertakes an ancient ritualistic working for answers to questions unfathomable by science and religion. Submitting himself to the mysteries of the magic circle, he risks spiritual sacrifice in a gamble to step into adulthood without the loss of childhood wonder.

Clint Marsh’s candid memoir serves as a guide for anyone yearning for a more magical way of engaging with life. By turns personal and practical—complete with a five-point system for crafting your own magic circle—this essay features dreamlike illustrations by Alice Cao.

Clint Marsh uses elements of myth, magic, folklore, and humor to help ­people navigate everyday life. He is the ­editor of Fiddler’s Green Peculiar Parish Magazine and a winner of the Bookseller/Diagram Prize.

Alice Cao is an illustrator specializing in traditional pen-and-ink with the occasional splash of watercolor. Originally hailing from Vietnam, she loves to explore history, mythology, and folklore in her work, and can be found conjuring inky worlds in her home studio in the old town of Shrewsbury, Shropshire.

*Originally published in Fiddler’s Green 4