Tag Archives: harpies

5 Most Popular Classic Posts in 2015

Lita is so delighted when Gentle Readers drop by her blog posts from earlier years. Here are the top five most visited classic posts in 2015.

A beautiful harpy in the Clockpunk Wizard world

FIFTH PLACE: Harpies Are Misunderstood

Madam Harpy, our Winged Sister of the Sky. Who did a disservice to this magical creature, turning her from a beautiful woman with feathery wings, into a fearsome hag?

Hesiod, a Greek oral poet from the same time period as Homer, described harpies as women with fetching hair. Pottery showed them as lovely damsels with wings. Just what Lita was looking for, pretty bird gals having chronic Good Hair Days. More…

Shy Jack Frost, Winter’s Fantasy Boy

FOURTH PLACE: Fantasy Boy of Winter: Jack Frost

Burr, it’s wintertime outside of Lita’s castle here in the northern realms. Someone painted icy filigree on the windows. Let’s bundle up, go outside, and meet the artist.

Say hello to handsome Jack Frost, winter’s fantasy boy. This magician embodies lacy window paintings, trees draped with sparkling snow, and crystalline sculptures made of ice. He tosses about sheets of sleet as if they were billowing linens on a clothesline. More…

The Length of the Wand Matters Not

THIRD PLACE: 6 Critical Elements for Fantasy World Building (Part 3)

This is the third of a 3-part blog post about building rich fantasy worlds to immerse your readers. In part 1 we looked at two “big picture” elements: maps and politics. Part 2 was a “medium” view about wimpy food and eavesdropping.

This time we’ll talk about a couple of “detail” topics: the decorative apostrophe, and why it’s no fun for wizards to just wave their wands and rule the world. More…

Readers Love to Eavesdrop

SECOND PLACE: 6 Critical Elements for Fantasy World Building (Part 2)

This is the second of a 3-part blog post about building rich fantasy worlds to immerse your readers. In part 1 we looked at two “big picture” elements in building a fantasy world: maps and politics.

Today we will take a “medium-sized” view and see why meat and grog are wimpy. We’ll also learn how to speak in tongues. More…

There is Always Someone Opposing Your Fantasy People

FIRST PLACE: 6 Critical Elements for Fantasy World Building (Part 1)

World-building techniques have always fascinated me. High Fantasy and Epic Fantasy books were my delight as a young reader. I poured over the maps on the book’s end papers, studied every entry in the glossary in the back, even marveled over the lengthy character name lists in the front.

When it comes to creating fantasy worlds for my own fiction, I’m a writer who knows the details of the characters’ environment. I must have their vitae close at hand so I know them well enough to write about their struggles. It also doesn’t hurt to speak their language and follow the latest fads for their clothing styles. More…

Here are more for the curious minded:

Magic in Threes: Most Viewed Blog Pictures in 2014

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Where did Gentle Reader find the enchantments in Lita Burke’s fantasy worlds during 2014? Three is a magical number. Let’s take a look at the three most popular blog pictures for this year.

Previously:

A Female Enchanter

The first of the three most popular pictures with the Gentle Readers is a female enchanter from the Enchanters of Sye world of Wrath and Tredan’s Bane.

She holds a charm in her hand, and it glows with an Enchanter’s magical essence.

An “Ornithopter” Personal Flying Machine by Da Vinci

The second of the most popular Lita Burke blog pictures is an Ornithopter flying machine from the world of Clockpunk Wizard.

Wizard Kadmeion and his assistant Sir Bright use these Leonardo Da Vinci style flying machines in Old Bony Blue Eyes.

A Harpy in Ephraim’s Curious Device

The third of the three most popular pictures with the Gentle Readers of Lita’s blog is one of the lovely harpies from Ephraim’s Curious Device in the Clockpunk Wizard world.

This favorite harpy picture shows light ghostly wings, a curvy figure in fetching hot weather flying clothes, and a beautiful face.

Magic in Threes: Most Visited Classic Blog Posts in 2014

Bestiarum Vocabulum: Harpy

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The Bestiarum Vocabulum is the wizard’s encyclopedia of faerie beasties and mundane crossovers living in the lake and forest near Lita’s castle.

Harpy Queen

harpy [ˈhärpē ] noun, c.1400; < L harpȳiae (plural) < Gr hárpȳiai (plural); literally, “snatchers” probably associated with harpazein, personification of hurricanes and whirlwinds.

Denizen of the Clockpunk Wizard world.
A lovely, woman-shaped creature with wide wings and long sweeping tail. Her feathers and hair color range from glossy brown to shimmering silver. Only the Queen has red tresses and tail feathers. These graceful aerial magicians live in aeries on the dual floating islands of Strophades (the larger of the two) and tiny Arpia (with the Queen’s private residence).
Personages: Queen Tkun’winddance, Aello’stormswift, Celaeno’dark, Podarge’fleetfoot, and Ocypete’swiftwing in Ephraim’s Curious Device.
See “Harpies are Misunderstood” and Siren in “3 Naughty Ladies of Fantasy Fiction”

All Aboard for the Floating Lands

Harpies Are Misunderstood

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A harpy looks like this, but has darker hair and a long, sweeping tail.

Madam Harpy, our Winged Sister of the Sky. Who did a disservice to this magical creature, turning her from a beautiful woman with feathery wings, into a fearsome hag?

What Happened?

Appears to be a case of multiple mistaken identity. The ancient Greek playwright Aeschylus, often called the father of tragedy, wrote The Eumenides, where Aeschylus confused the harpies with the unattractive and rancorous furies. Greek mythology further mistook harpies for sirens, the femme fatales who lured hapless sailors onto Greece’s rocky shorelines and to their deaths.

Is Zeus Always Grumpy?

Zeus became angry with the prophecies of King Phineus, so the deity blinded Phineas and abandoned him on an island with a buffet feast. Zeus then had harpies snatch away the food from Phineas’ hands before he could eat, and soil the remaining buffet. This happened at every mealtime. Consider this the “Watch What You Say” diet.

Middle Ages Madness

Dante continued the harpy smear campaign in Inferno. On the seventh ring of hell is a special harpy-infested forest for suicides. The Trojans had driven the harpies from their island home of Strophades, so the bird women moved to this cursed wood. They perched in the eerie trees and lamented. I would complain too if unpleasant, sword-lashing men drove me from my lovely waterfront home.

In recent centuries, the English poet William Blake was so moved by Dante’s misinformation, that he continued the negative harpy hype with his watercolor work “The Wood of the Self-Murderers: The Harpies and the Suicides” now at the Tate Gallery in London. These harpies are overweight, have human faces with bird beaks, their breasts are too big, and their wings are too small. Some of these characteristics are unattractive–I’ll leave it for Gentle Reader to decide which ones.

Lita’s Harpies & Wizards

In the upcoming Clockpunk Wizard story Ephraim’s Curious Device, Wizard Kadmeion and his assistant Sir Bright take their airship to the floating island of Strophades. The harpies have a magical item that Kadmeion needs for Ephraim’s thingummy. The magicians end up in the harpy oubliette due to a small misunderstanding from the wizard’s unwanted Goon bodyguards killing two bird women.

That’s enough to turn the most even-tempered Harpy Queen grumpy.