The bards of old recorded the histories of Cymru through epic poetry, arcane dialogues and divinely inspired prose called Songs. Using this method, the diminishing tribes of the Blessed Isles were able to encapsulate not just shallow facts about battle sites and headstones but the thoughts, emotions, perspectives and motives of the heroes… and sometimes villains… of the Age of Arthur.
But what of THE VILLAIN - the traitor Mordred? Must he who brought about the demise of so great a kingdom be memorialized by such sacred approach, such wondrous script? God forbid!
Yet Taliesin, the Chief Bard, would have it so; for truth must not be limited to that which is comely, and the record not just to that which is delightful. And so Taliesin sings the Song of Mordred, the devil who deserves no song.
Are monsters born so? Or made by circumstance and rearing? Nature? Nurture? Trauma?
And what of free will and personal responsibility?
Or is that peculiar creation, Man, more complicated than the vain deductions of the philosophers…?
By use of the Awen, or Divine Inspiration, Taliesin yokes with the memories, feelings, the very mind of the Traitor. Through his journey into the dark heart, empathy wrestles justice, and grace is challenged by righteous judgement, the Chief Bard learning more about himself than his miserable and misunderstood subject.
