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https://www.bfi.org.uk/news-opinion/sight-sound-magazine/archives/old-weird-britain-film-rob-young

Great list of films which evoke the Fencraft mood; a lot of these titles are ones I've either seen, or waiting to watch, when building the community Reading List.

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Also, my neighbours have started parking their massive van between me and my view of three mountains, the light moving on the hillsides, the clouds coming together and dispersing and the birds wheeling, and I am ready to Go Out And Hurt Someone.

(My neighbours are currently expanding their patio so they've got a nicer sitting place with their view, so they can't park their van there any more. Can they park it in their alley? No. That's where their caravan is. Can they park it in front of their house on the side without a view? No. That's where they park their big moving van)

So instead, I'd like to share with you the soundtrack for Worzel Gummidge by the Unthanks.



Worzel Gummidge is part of the Haunted Generation trend of extremely unsettling 1970s British television for children - and it often has a pastoral/folk horror edge. It's about a scarecrow that comes to life. In 2019 it was remade at Christmas, and it's...unexpectedly wonderful. Just wonderful.

It's reassuring and beautiful; it's for children, but has got the political edge that is always essential when talking about the Land - in this case, talking about the climate emergency, and casting actors of colour as the protagonists, affirming that the mythology of the land is that of any who care for it, not a rural pastoral fetish for bigots. It's quite creepy. You can tell, I think, from the way the show is constructed, and some of the cast, and the very fact you'd remember Worzel with any fondness - it's made by haunted generation people, by people who believe a bit of horror is healthy for children or at least, an important part of a childhood.

Steve Pemberton is former cast of League of Gentlemen, the show which in part spurred the folk horror revival; and Mackenzie Crook has since been interviewed by environmental charities about his passion for the natural world.

There's a sincerity to this - a deep sincerity. I watched a very good youtube video about how modern films are too quick to laugh at themselves - following the tradition of Joss Whedon and Tarantino, a post-modern self-referential wink at the audience that undermines their own weight and drama. The video compares Dr Strange unfavourably to the films of the 80s, which wore their heart unashamedly on their sleeve: Rocky is their example; my go-to is John Boorman's 1970s Excalibur. Excalibur does not have a sense of humour, but it is otherworldly and powerful for it: telling the story of Arthur, the once and future king, the boy who pulled the sword from the stone, who rode with the knights of the round table. No grit, no cleverness, no post-modernity - just pure myth and wonder.

Worzel Gummidge has dancing scarecrows at midnight doing magic in the corn. Flocks of crows clustering in the hedgerows. It has the Green Man, quite unexpected, but some of my favourite imagery of the man I've ever encountered - drawn straight into my personal mythology.

(Again, harking back to the 1970s tradition of Robin of Sherwood, where the pagan implications of the greenwood company protecting the folk from the nobility was backed by the literal appearance of Herne, the god of the green. Here, Gummidge goes all in with its pagan sensibilities, by depicting the Green Man of the ways as present and part of Worzel's otherworld)

Underpinning it all is this incredible folk soundtrack by the Unthanks (whose Magpie you should also listen to, and learn). It's very soothing, I find. Just as the show is soothing. I cannot recommend either the mini-series or the soundtrack strongly enough.

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Pretty much the first, the only, the most important page on the Fencraft site will be the one about the Landweird itself; and you just know it's going to be the last one I finish...

...I think it helps, in part, that the Landweird is not a clear "deity" with like, myths or characteristics. It is at the heart of everything we do, and so perhaps this is right, that through all I write I am evoking the sense of wordless presence in the land, the sense of something forgotten but there. Like, maybe it's OK. At the same time, it does feel weird for the page on your central Divine Concept Of What We Revere to be the last one

What is Landcraft?

I am ready to launch the first stage of the Landcraft correspondence system, which organises all things in terms of the Solar, the Lunar and the Stellar.

The purpose of the Landcraft correspondence system is to be an alternative to the four classical elements, the gender binary, and the Tree of Life, an underlying system of magic for people who do not wish to use the standard correspondence systems for various reasons;  a system of correspondences which, additionally, feels earthy and pagan, organic and authentic to the land and the folklore beneath our feet. It is an open system: you may combine it with any other pagan tradition, not only Fencraft; as well as re-mixing and hacking it for your own purposes.

Now available:

• An overview chart of the correspondence system, summarising its binaries and contrasts
• The Wanderer's Map, the way that the three celestials* come together to make a map of our world, our cosmology, our folklore and the otherworlds
• A summary of what each of the three represents: the Solar, the Lunar, and the Stellar.

I hate the term "celestial", hate it hate it hate it, and very much welcome other suggestions.

These parts of the system have been fixed and certain for around two years now. The next step for Landcrafting is to release the fuller correspondence charts (colours and so forth), pin down how the dual-celestials work (concepts like the Solar-Lunar, the inbetween elements), and how they interact with physical elements (like Fire, Land, Water, and so forth). And then finally - the big bit that's still missing - how you actually *use* them in ritual and magic, which is still eluding me.

I've also written a first masterpost of Rural Psychogeography, works exploring the hidden mysteries of the land. I am now obsessed with Chanctonbury Rings.

Mood? A deep, relaxed, mellow breathing-out of satisfaction, completeness and success.