The following are extracts from an Interview conducted separately with Flirt FM Dj Sophia Hadef 9/9/21
What inspired you both to write this trilogy ?
Richard Roche: We had always believed that the Irish folklore and mythological stories had huge potential and dramatic content, going back to our first exposure to these tales in Primary School. I can still remember how the first chapter in the Fourth Class History book, Footprints 1, was the story of Setanta and the hound, and how CúChulainn got his name. I remember talking with Derek in the pub one night in 2002, discussing the Lord of the Rings films – the second one had come out that year. We were making the point that there’s a scene with Sean Bean at the end of the first film which is reminiscent of the statue of CúChulainn strapped to the pillar in the GPO in Dublin. We both agreed that the Ulster Cycle of stories deserved a similar big-screen treatment, so after a few drinks we decided someone should write them as screenplays. After a few more drinks we decided that we should be the ones to do it. So we did – at first as screenplays, then later we converted them to novels.
Derek Fennell: It’s funny, there is somewhat of a debate between the two of us as to when and where and how we were originally inspired to embark on this journey but I’m starting to slowly come around to Richard’s theory – as he’s a very convincing man and has a far better memory than me – that the idea first germinated over pints of Guinness in a particular much-lamented, now-demolished pub in Dublin many moons ago.
We are both huge Tolkien fans and were particularly inspired by Peter Jackson’s treatment of the first book, the Fellowship of the Ring and how that vision was brought to the screen in a pleasantly dark and atmospheric style. We noted that Tolkien himself drew on a lot of concepts coming from both Anglo-Saxon and Celtic mythology and folklore and we got to talking about – and discovered that we shared a deep love for – our own particular Irish legends. We wondered why public consciousness of our homegrown mythology was so sketchy, outside of experts, academics and those passionate about the material and why there hadn’t been an enormous amount of successful efforts in presenting these tales in a way that could really capture the imagination of an audience.
The lord of the Rings was written in 1954 and it wasn’t until 2001 and the release of that first movie that many people finally started picking up and reading the books so it was apparent to us the power of of a really good adaptation. It can get people to begin exploring the source material and opening up a wonderful voyage of literary discovery that can last a lifetime, and really enrich that lifetime. So, heady with all the naivity we had at the time, mixed with that Guinness-fueled enthusiasm we set out to teach ourselves how to write movie scripts and delved into the folklore for an enormous amount of time and began to slowly hammer out and forge a new story arc taking éléments that we were particularly drawn to from various sources, seeking to take the supernatural and sometimes outrageous aspects of the old myths and tales that may have been a barrier to adaptation and place them in a specially created universe that allowed for a certain grounded and functional version of that magic and for the existence of all these wonderfully bizarre creatures and characters.
The concept took on many different permutations over the years until eventually we moved away from the idea of movie scripts and tv shows and decided that if we really wanted to tell our story, the one we had spent so long crafting, without any compromise and with the depth and flavour that truly excited us, we would have to tell it in exactly our own words, and so we decided that the best way to bring this idea to life was to write a novel. We enjoyed that so much that we ended up writing three !
Tell me more about the first book and its main characters?
RR: The first book introduces Setanta, a demi-god in an ancient version of Ireland (Eirú) where rival kingdoms battle for power, and dark gods use magic and deception for their evil designs. We are introduced to the kingdom of Ulagh, where King Conchobar rules from his seat at Eamhain Mhaca, the generals and warriors of Uladh’s army, the rival kingdom of Connacht, ruled by King Ailill and Queen Medb, and a variety of other characters who will determine Setanta’s fate. Book 1 tells of how Setanta becomes CúChulainn, his training in arms on the mysterious Isle of Shadows, and his defence of Uladh from the invading forces of the Fomorians.
DF: So, central to the concept of our work is the idea of Eriù, this being a version of the ancient Ireland so familiar from our myths and legends that exists, as Tolkien would say when speaking about Middle Earth history, as though it were medieval England ‘at a different stage of imagination’ Thus we see this re-imagined realm where the plot of our books unfold as, yes, seeming like mythical Ireland but a few fractions across another dimension so that while many things may seem familiar, they are also quite different. Fates of classic characters follow different trajectories, encounters between beings that may not have been narratively possible before can now be, the landscape is somewhat off kilter, the geography, the history, the speech, the names, the supernatural and the natural co-exist to the surprise of none so that magic, ghosts and the faerie, while not being exactly everyday occurrences, are seen as being very much a normal part of the universe for the characters. Though their relationships and attitudes to that other power, this other reality, can and do vary greatly.
When researching and sifting through the different versions of the tales, from translations of the earliest known to the later adaptations from people like Lady Gregory and others after her we decided that of all the many heroes the story the character that had the most potential to propel a story along and around which we could gradually paint the details of this new universe was Cú Chulainn . For me that was for two main reasons.
The first being that though he is probably, with Fionn Mac Cumhail, the most well-known of our mythical heroes, there are certain fundamental aspects to how he is traditionally presented that can trouble a modern reader. Here is a boy, bloody and violent, the majority of his stories revolving around him killing grown men in their hundreds, often in a comically gory way. He is prone to murderous rages that twist and deform his body in a really grotesque fashion (which I’d urge anybody to read in the translation of the Tàin Bo Culaigne for example as the descriptions are truly unique and disturbing !)
So, this is our Irish Achilles but he’s really pretty hardcore yet also deeply fascinating and the challenge then was to take the disparate, sometimes contradictory stories that have accreted around him and weave them into one coherent skein, have him interact with an expanded group of foils, enemies, allies, lovers and friends.
The other reason being that he alone occupies two worlds. As a semi-divinity he is grounded in, and constrained to the physical limits that come with, an earthly existence. And though broadly subject to the laws of nature he also exists as a being apart, a hybrid descendant from theTuatha dé Danann, a poweful elder race upon which Tolkien surely based his pantheon of higher powers when he began putting together the creation myths of his Middle Earth. So with this, our sideways dimension version of the Cú Chulainn character we have somebody who walks within the two realms and through whose unique eyes we can best portray this world of dark sorcery, romance and heroic battle.
How would you describe the atmosphere of the work?
RR: These tales have several key pillars, like drama, loyalty, romance and, crucially, draíocht or magic. The magic element always appealed to us, the sense of dark, malevolent gods using sinister magic and eldritch spells to achieve their goals. We’ve seen versions of these stories where this element has been left out, and it always struck us as unsatisfying, or clearly missing something, this dark, sinister aspect of the stories.
DF: In Irish mythology the darkness is already there.
Some of the most prominent figures that frequently turn up would really be quite ancient archetypes of the various sinister, powerful characters that are re-interpreted throughout the history of fiction. If you take the Morrigan, the dark goddess of battle and fate, the name in Irish being Mór-Ríoghain which is generally translated as ‘phantom queen’, she is very much the template for every sorcerous witch associated with crows, dark prophecy and all the classic trappings of the gothic. She would also be linked with the subsequent banshee folklore and through that the influence she has had in the minds of writers is endless. Every dark lady, every ghostly keening apparition announcing an imminent death can probably be traced back to her.
But you would also have a whole host of other dark powers and spirits trying to thwart the heroes of Irish mythology and further to that, the protaganists themselves would more often than not have considerable dark sides to their nature. This first book is called the Isle of Shadows because that is traditionally where Cú Chulainn would have gone to learn his martial skills from another sinister figure, Scàtach, the shadowy one. These sorts of figures fascinated us and inspired us to explore them and re-imagine a different version of them that would fit into the universe we sought to craft.
How did you meet? And what was the moment you realised you had to write together?
RR: Derek and I have been friends since the beginning of Secondary School, though our families knew each other well for years, even decades before that. We remained friends throughout our studies in different colleges, regularly crossing paths on the bus to and from Dublin, or in the many pubs of Naas. We had always shared an interest in fantasy and science fiction, and when we had that fateful conversation I mentioned above – which took place in that now-demolished pub on Townsend Street, though there is some disagreement about whether that was the place where we decided to do it – we knew that this was something we had to do, and were equipped to do.
DF: Oh, well we’ve known each other for over thirty years ! We’d have gone to school together and were friendly but it was only really many years later where we came to realise – again, over pints and chats, that we shared such a deep affection for old Irish folklore but also many other things like books, films, etc. I was a journalist at the time, and parallel to that I had always been writing something or other throughout my life. I’d won a couple of modest prizes for my wierd short stories and I just kept that up over the years with a vague idea of putting together a collection of modern gothic tales – which I’m still working on by the way ! One day…. Anyway, once we started writing the first few tentative chapters and treatments and secretly showing them to one another we quickly realised that this was something that we definitely wanted to do as the process of creation, when everything, from initial chaos, slowly starts to take shape and make sense, is really something exhilirating. Especially when we started to play around with the concepts and realised that we didn’t just want to re-tell the familiar tales but invent a new version that was our own without worrying about staying pure to what might be considered ‘canon’.
Have you always written? What books inspired your creativity?
RR: Before starting this project, I hadn’t done any creative writing since Secondary School, even though I always enjoyed writing essays in English class. I had embarked on the road of academia, so while I was writing, the subject matter was much more scientific, like research articles, book chapters etc. When we decided to start working on these books, I started up a blog to practice my writing; I found that really helped, as a way to organise my thoughts and play with language. I later wrote a couple of short stories, but had never tackled anything on this scale.
JRR Tolkien is clearly a huge influence for both of us; the scale and scope of what he created had a profound influence on what we tried to create here – but equally, Tolkien himself was strongly influenced by elements of Irish folklore, so in a way things have come full circle. People may assume George RR Martin is another influence, but we actually started work on this project before Game of Thrones took off as a phenomenon. CS Lewis would be another strong influence for me, and Brian Horwood – his Duncton Chronicles really helped to shape my approach to this project.
DF: Pretty much always, but I only really like to write two kinds of things : total humour or grim darkness ! It’s funny, I oscillate between the two because I think that when you go so far towards the dark you just have to start laughing and then when you finally stop laughing the silence and the brooding begins. Anyway, that works for me ! When I was a kid in school the happiest I ever felt was when I’d write a funny, just… ridiculous, story in English class and when I came to read it out and managed to make the class laugh, well I realised that was pretty much my favourite thing to do. Make a connection with people, elicit an emotional reaction from them through something I’d written. But I was also fascinated by ghost stories when I was growing up yet I would never show anybody the spooky tales I would write myself because I didn’t want people to think I was even wierder than they already surely thought I was ! This was pre-internet days, there were no forums for like-minded people back then and I didn’t have enough confidence in my ability at that point.
As for influences, apart from the obvious classics like HP Lovecraft, Shelley, Stoker, de Maupassant and the rest I would also absorb anything by Clive Barker, Anne Rice, Brian Lumley, Stephen King and all the usuals. As far as fantasy went I also devoured plenty of David Eddings, Robert E Howard, David Gemmell R.A Salvatore. I lived a huge portion of my young life lost in books and other worlds. I don’t know why. I was just one of those guys. Still am.
Also any comics, films or tv shows that were dark and twisted like the Twilight Zone or any of the great Hammer Horrors. However if you’re asking me for a particular book that would have inspired me, and I believe Richie also, down the path to writing this trilogy it would have been the old primary school history books in the early 1980’s where we’d first have encountered the tales coming from Irish folklore. There was some great artwork and writing there that fired my imagination for years. And now here we are and I’m thrilled and honoured to be adding this little part of ourselves to the old legends as all the tall-tale tellers have done before us throughout time.
You both are not full time writers, what are your current job roles and do they have an influence in your writing and novels?
RR: I’m a lecturer and neuroscientist for my day job, which seems about as far away as you can get from writing mythological epics… but there are some ways in which my “day job” has helped with the writing. Science Communication is becoming increasingly important in all areas of academia, so the principles of SciComm – like thinking about what the message is that we want to communicate, who the audience is, and how best to convey that message to them – apply to all forms of writing, whether it’s a research article, a science blog, a grant application or a novel about mythological heroes!
DF: Hmmm, interesting question. I’m a language trainer so I would have to say there is not a whole lot of overlap there apart from the root dynamic of communicating ideas. I always leaned towards working with language whether it was through my years in journalism or what I do now. Apart from that, I guess everybody you meet during your life, everybody who affects you whether for good or ill plays their part in informing your style of writing or what comes out in your writing, and I’m lucky enough to do something that I enjoy for a living and through which I meet a lot of different kinds of people.
Why are the Irish tales so important to you?
RR: I think we both felt that these tales should be as well known as the mythologies of other countries – everyone knows about the stories of Hercules, or King Arthur, or the Norse mythological heroes like Thor. We wanted people to be as familiar with CúChulainn and Ferdia, Lugh and the Morrigan and all these characters to be as well-known as these other characters. The themes of these stories – loyalty, sacrifice, betrayal, conflict, redemption – are as universal as any of the other collections of mythologies. In addition, there are elements of these myths that resonate strongly with Irish history – the fact that CúChulainn and Ferdia are blood brothers who find themselves on opposite sides of a conflict echoes the fates of Harry Boland and Michael Collins in the Irish Civil War. These tales are timeless, and deal with fundamental human experiences. We believe they deserve to be as widely known as the other mythic cycles.
DF: They are a part of our identity, a precious part of our heritage. They are unique, astounding, surprising, and when I was growing up, this magic, the draíocht, as our old Irish teacher would say, had me spellbound. The amazing things these characters would do, though often you would wonder why as some of the stories were so crazy or illogical to our modern ears, would set me off dreaming for hours on end. Every place in Ireland has its folklore attached to its geography. Many wonderful, colourful, fanciful stories to explain why a rock is where it is or what happened at such-a-such ford or in or around any given wood or lake. In reality, I’m totally Cartesian when it comes to the supernatural but that doesn’t stop me from being in love with all that stuff and entertaining the notions, just out of pure pleasure and the sensation of carrying on an ancestral tradition by talking about them, keeping them alive. There is something really valuable and worthwhile about their preservation and I would urge everybody to explore the older versions for themselves and re-connect with the huge wealth of stories and tales out there. I’m constantly learning new things myself that bowl me over and I can never get enough of it. But at the same time I love the idea of every storyteller adapting the tales to his audience thoughout the generations, whether huddled about a flickering fire in a medieval cottage on a stormy night or around a campfire in modern day, putting chills down the back of kids’ necks, but the core ideas and messages remaining intact, the characters intemporal.
Writing a book with another person must be tough. Was it a peaceful journey? Did it make the bond between you two even stronger?
RR: It was a surprisingly smooth process (I’ll be interested to see if Derek agrees). We spent a long time working out the mechanics of the story, the overarching plot, the key elements we wanted to include, so we both shared a common vision for what we wanted to create from the very start. We wrote separately, but shared each chapter with each other for edits, changes or suggestions, so it was a very iterative process where we were constantly revising and tweaking the content as we went. Luckily we both write in a very similar style – so much so that we now find it hard to tell who wrote what. Book 1 is pretty much 50-50 in the sense that we wrote roughly equal numbers of chapters. We wrote Books 2 and 3 in parallel, so Book 2 is much more Derek’s, with some input from me, and Book 3 the opposite. We can’t wait for people to finally read them!
DF: We were on the same page from the start and for the most part there was harmony. We took trips and secluded ourselves down the country in the early stages in order to carefully plan out the story over the entire trilogy as we wanted a definite beginning, middle and end to this particular cycle, taking what we thought was interesting and compelling from various sources and embroidering them into the original storyline we came up with to tie them all together in a satisfying way.
Richard lives in Dublin and I’m based in Paris so we would write chapters and send them to each other for reaction, feedback, opinion, advice and it would go back and forth and slowly build up and take form, it was really an enjoyable process as it’s fascinating to see how blind you can be to certain things when you are so close to them and how a second perspective can bolster the quality of your writing.
If ever we disagreed on something I felt like we would always offer an alternative that we would work through together and in general a compromise, a synthesis of the two points of view would emerge that pleased both of us. We wouldn’t settle on anything less than an idea that we found cool and interesting anyway. It got to the point though, when re-reading it, that we were so much in phase that became difficult to remember who wrote what as the narrative ‘voice’ just seemed to meld. I am most comfortable writing kinetic sequences and moving the story along in as richly visual a way as possible and Richard I think has a profound emotional intelligence that he instills into his characters as well as having a great knack for creating atmosphere, that in turn inspires me to improve my own sections in a positive feeback loop. And you know, we would just make each other laugh a lot with some of the more zanier ideas for scenes and dialogue that didn’t make the ‘final cut’ so to speak, a lot of that coming from the original myths and legends themselves which can be just side-splittingly funny despite all the slaughtering, murder and mayhem going on.
Mark Hill designed the cover of your first book, it’s a beautiful creation, and it reflects the darkness of the story, why did you both bring that dark side to the Irish legends?
RR: We wanted to create an atmosphere of mystery or uneasiness, a feeling that there are forces at play which the characters can’t quite grasp, supernatural influences beyond their ken. These characters are living in a time and place where the Unknown is a potent force in their lives – battling an opposing army is daunting but tangible; facing ethereal entities with sinister designs is a much more unnerving prospect. I think Mark’s cover really captures that sense of dread or foreboding, the idea that the characters have to battle enemies they can see, but also more powerful ones that they can’t. That dark cloud looms over them all.
I loved reading you and I can’t wait for people to be able to dive into this mythical Irish tale, why and to who would you both recommend to read it?
RR: I think broadly, I’d recommend it to people who enjoy mythological fantasy, fans of Tolkien or Martin (I would say our books are closer to the former than the latter in style). Beyond that, I think people who are familiar with some elements of the story – as many Irish people are – will find it interesting to see these characters fleshed out and given more depth, in an adventure with an overarching story arc; we had to fill in a lot of blanks in the original stories, invent some elements, change a few key things. What we’ve written here is hopefully a version of the story that will appeal to a modern audience who expect certain things in their fantasy. At the same time, I think people who have never heard of CúChulainn or the Irish myths will also find something to enjoy here – the story may be set in a version of Ireland, but the themes and struggles of the characters are not specific to Ireland. I would hope any audience can enjoy these books the same way they can enjoy King Arthur, Beowulf, Hercules and mythologies from many other cultures.
DF: It’s a great cover ! I love it, I think Mark really nailed the tone with the design and the colour scheme. He’s a talented guy and seems to just ‘get it’ in terms of this material.
As to your other question,I don’t know, is there something within us that makes us lean towards the dark and fantastical? That’s one for the psychologists. The phantasmagoric has always had it’s allure for me but, as I mentioned, the darkness was already integral to the actual tales upon which we base – very liberally – our own story so it was really a very natural – probably inevitable – tangent for it to take.
I always did feel that a sinister, gothic atmosphere suited this story and we made a point of side-stepping a lot of the preposterous, overblown, overly- comical or farcical elements that you might sometimes get when dealing with Irish folkore. Not that there isn’t a time and place for that, or that it hasn’t a certain value, but we had our vision that just so happens to be rather sombre and that’s the one for us.
Where can we find you on social media links/websites:
RR: I’m on Twitter at @RRocheNeuro and if people are interested they can read the two short stories here:
https://longstoryshort.squarespace.com/motorcycle
https://www.wattpad.com/724303923-the-relic
DF: I’m afraid I’m not very social media but I’m not impossible to reach on instagram at @DerekjFennell
