The Physics of Magic…

Isn't it strange what you find yourself focussing upon?  Today I'm pondering on how fairy wings attach to their bodies.  Wings are modified limbs, so it would have to have a ball and socket joint where it joins the body, (like an arm or hip bone). 

The classic ball bit of such a joint is heavy and clublike - shades of the opening scenes of 2001 A Space Oddity, where the apes use one as a tool to smash other bones - it's a brutal shape, and I think a socket joint would look far more elegant on the end of a delicate wing.   Yet a ball joint gives the wing strength and flexibility in flight.  Natural selection has decided which bit should be the cup, and which bit should be the ball, and the ball joint is always on the limb, not the body.   

Okay, in fairness, I have already played fast and loose with the laws of physics in my book, so I shouldn't worry too much about the laws of biology, but this is proving to be a conundrum.  

In trying to visualise what would be left if the wing parted from the body, a ball joint sticking out would be a lot less messy than a cup joint…

Okay, so why am I agonising over such a detail?  I'd better put all this in some kind of coherent context…   

I have been fired up by looking at the extraordinarily beautiful work of Wendy Froud.  She has contributed an amazing body of work to the fantasy film world over the years; remember 'Dark Crystal'?  She made Kira - yes, and other characters - but I loved Kira. 

Her baby son was the baby in 'Labyrinth' - here he is, chilling with David Bowie... 

All grown up now, and expecting to be a father himself very soon, Toby has been working on The Hobbit. 

 

Wendy's husband, Brian Froud, is the breathtakingly accomplished fantasy artist - if you don't know his work, (chances are you will), he's this century's answer to Arthur Rackham - with loads of extra edge.

A reader suggested The Last Changeling might appeal to the Froud's, as the creatures I call metahominids are a close match to their visuals, and I found myself speaking to Wendy just yesterday.  I say speaking, but I was a breathless puddle of adoring fandom, so I have no idea what I actually said… 

…but long after talking to her, I began pondering on how I could possibly construct something 'fey', in this case, a fairy wing.  The jewellers in Llangollen, The Oak Chest, are planning a display niche for the book, and I will need something really amazing to go in it.  Hence my pondering on how to construct a wing like this one:

            Then, Gnat caught sight of something he recognised.  His eyes grew huge as he stared up at it.  This one was faded, its colours dulled by a yellowish cast, but it was still breathtakingly beautiful. The one he had hidden at home was probably a third bigger, and far more vibrant.

This one was just over a metre long, and took up nearly half a shelf, but Gnat knew it was as light as a feather - it was indeed a wing.

Looking as if it had belonged to the biggest dragonfly that ever lived, it was clear but veined with pale green, and tinted with the faint iridescence of a fire-opal. It reminded him of a peacock’s breast, and butterfly wings and kingfishers' feathers: it looked like someone had captured a living rainbow in wafer-thin ice.

                                                                                  From:  THE LAST CHANGELING

 

So I need to go now, and ponder again the physics of bone, sinew... and magic!

P.S:

 I have set myself a challenge to make anything approaching this, but I'm handy and I like a challenge, so hey, I will let you know how I get on