NaGeira (2006) (Pennywell Books):
The legend of Sheila NaGeira looms large in the early history of
the New World, and also stretches back to Ireland of the 1500s and an ancient
crone, Sheila Na Gig, whose form still haunts church doorways.
NaGeira, Paul Butler’s latest novel, tells two interlocking stories. The
first is of eighty-year-old Sheila, a midwife and healer living apart from a
settlement in the North American Bristol plantation in 1660. The second, a
parallel tale, tracks Sheila’s early life in Dublin’s English Pale where she is
caught in the crossfire of politics and tragedy. Even after she escapes
persecution, leaving her enemies far behind, Sheila finds that forces can still
resurface to conspire against her
In Newfoundland folklore, Sheila NaGeira is said to have been the first woman of
European descent (with the exception of the Vikings) to have given birth on the
island soon after her supposed landing in 1602. By this account, Sheila can be
described as the mother of the "nation" of Newfoundland.
Newfoundland myth and oral history have conspired to create in Sheila NaGeira a
figure who draws from our pagan past. She has been depicted through the years as
a healer, midwife, wise woman, and community leader and can be said to be the
object of goddess worship.
Sheila also has her equivalent in most western countries. In Ireland, for
instance, there is both a Sheila NaGeira and a Sheila Na Gig. The latter is
depicted on church entrances as a crone; she represents vitality, sexuality, and
fertility surviving into great age. She is a rather fearsome character, not at
all the Irish Princess of the Newfoundland legend. Yet as many accounts of
Newfoundland’s Sheila NaGeira stress that she lived to be very old, it seems
likely that the myths of Sheila NaGeira and Sheila Na Gig may have merged.
NaGeira is a radical reworking of the legend, reflecting the duality of
these Sheila myths.
NaGeira Reviews:
"The mythology is rich and the subject epic in scope . . . Butler's prose is smooth and clean; the story moves forward vigorously, with patches of poetry."
Globe and Mail
"All in all, minor complaints in Butler's otherwise brilliant exploration of one of Newfoundland's central mythological figures set within highly-crafted, well-written parallel stories that hinge on twists of fate and an intricate plot structure."
Julianna Bergwerff, Atlantic Books Today
