FAIRY CENSUS 2
Six years ago in these pages (), Simon Young announced the publication of , a 160,000 word collection of 500 fairy encounters gleaned from around the world (although predominately from Anglophone countries, and with a large contribution from FT readers). At the time, Simon hoped that this first would stimulate a new period of collecting and that he would in due course be able to publish the results. Well, – 200,000 words long and with a further 500 cases – is now out, and in this issue (p.38) Simon presents some highlights of this latest phase of his ongoing project to document, and possibly begin to understand, modern fairy encounters, focusing on some lesser-reported ‘emergent’ fairy types such as the ‘tresp’, the ‘orno-ento fairy’, the ‘flat fairy’ and the ‘wood diva’. This is important and fascinating research; and, as you would expect, it raises intriguing and wide-ranging questions about the whys and wherefores of liminal experiences like fairy encounters – that are relevant to other branches of fortean enquiry – while remaining closely focused on the specifics of the material at hand. This is an ongoing project, and if you want to report your own sighting for a future or just dig further into the subject, head over to , where you’ll find everything you need, including free downloadable PDFs of and .
