A ghostly short story ‘As I Walked Out One Morning in May’ recently aired on BBC Radio 4, written and read by Dr Paul Evans, a Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Arts (Place Writing) at the Manchester Writing School.

The fascinating tale is inspired by the ballad of Death and the Lady, the demise of a witch, folklore and the mysterious sounds of woodlands – of eerie interest in particular to HAUNT.

In this article, HAUNT’s J.J. Wray speaks to Dr Paul Evans about the story, the writing process and much more.

Dr Paul Evans has already worked with the BBC on a number of occasions, including with his award-winning drama ‘The Ditch’. He is also is the author of The Guardian’s Country Diary and a writer with many publications to his name, as well as a performance poet and broadcaster – particularly in terms of Natural History documentaries. His latest venture ‘As I Walked Out One Morning in May’ is a short story written and performed for the BBC’s Short Works short story audiobook podcast, and he had this to say:

When did you begin as a writer?

“I can’t remember when but [I] liked writing essays about wildlife at school and wrote a couple of entomology articles when I was 11/12. I started writing poems in my teens, later performance poetry. This involved performing with musicians as well as solo in both the UK and New York.

“It was natural history and conservation interests that informed my environmental journalism, which combined with my poetic interests to produce the kind of nature writing I have done since [the] 90s. I’m still working on it.”

How would you outline the story ‘As I Walked Out One Morning in May’?

“Haunted by a memory recovered from a wood about the murder of a witch by her lover - the story is shaped by local folklore, the ballad of Death and the Lady and the non-verbal communication with the wood itself. What begins as the story of an uncanny historical event becomes a story about myself.”

How so... about you reflecting on your surroundings, and the historical events that still haunt it to this day?

“Some places we encounter have an unsettling, eldritch quality about them. This may be due to things that happened there leaving an impression or trace transmitted from the stones, trees and earth of that place. This is not something I believe or reason to be true, this is something I and many others, experience. Perhaps memory can be recovered from place, perhaps it's inherited or picked up like memes, but something in me-you resonates with the story of the place, psychically and physically. In this story there is some part of me that is Arthur Watling.”

The ballad ‘Death and the Lady’ features in this story - what is it about the ballad that resonates with you, and why is this ballad linked to other variations such as ‘The Bold Grenadier’ and ‘One Morning in May’?

“Death and the Lady has been in the back of my mind for a couple of years since researching for a nonfiction novel about the wood, Far Wonders. It seems to be about how the youth and beauty of the lady will not protect her from death. It’s also a morality tale about hubris and vanity with misogynist overtones, but there’s an ambiguity about it. I listened to various versions and spoke to folklorist Roy Palmer before writing my own version which has the lady (who in my story is the witch) turning the tables on death (who is her lover).

“In the radio piece, fragments of the ballad are sung by the actor Elizabeth Counsell who has a wonderful voice and great experience. The ballad is old and like many becomes interchangeable with other themes. ‘As I Walked Out One Morning in May’ or ‘One Morning in May’ is the opening line for many folk ballads and for me it’s an invitation to cross into that otherworldly place.”

What was your process in building a story around these beloved ballads?

“The ballad is sung constantly in the mind of Arthur Watling, the lover and murderer of the Lady – an obsessive motif that replays throughout the story and becomes part of its aural landscape, like the birdsong, breezes and other sounds in the wood (supplied by the great wildlife sound recordist, Chris Watson with whom I’ve collaborated on many radio pieces). Because of its morally instructive nature, the ballad forms a cultural thread that links the present to the 1850s.”

How did this piece come to be recorded for the BBC?

“The piece was commissioned as one of the Short Works series and I was offered the opportunity to work with BBC radio producer Sarah Blunt based in Bristol. I have worked with Sarah on natural-history based drama-docs, radio poems and documentaries for many years.”

You have a wonderful narrating voice; you're a performance poet and broadcaster of documentaries. Do you feel stories, particularly short fiction stories in this instance, are essentially oral in nature?

“The voice was richer when I smoked and drank more, I think it’s a bit thinner now but at least I’m still around to use it! I love radio and think it’s the best medium for storytelling because it can engage the imagination and is open to ideas in ways that may be stifled by the primacy of the image in film. Radio is an extension of an oral tradition that not only expresses that deeply human desire for story but offers opportunities to listen to Nature.”

With Nature being key to so much of your work - what significance, does Shrewsbury, Shropshire and the general West/North West region have in this tale?

“I’m Shropshire born and bred (‘strong in the arm and weak in the ‘ed’ – though not that sure about the arm anymore) and although I’ve been around a bit, I’m enthralled by the places I wander in – a dark wonder. My writing about Wenlock Edge (Guardian country diary) is also a constant work of enchantment or obsession (take your pick). I feel more connected to the West, perhaps it’s a Celtic thing, and my instinctive trajectory is North-West.”

There is a lovely passage about the witch – ‘Rich or poor they came to her, jealous and desperate. Feared but respected. Queen of a scrap of woodland between parish boundaries.’ What was your inspirations in framing the witch this way?

“My story is based on that of Nanny Morgan, a woman regarded as a witch in these parts who was murdered by her lodger in the mid 19th century. She was feared and respected locally and occupied a very special position at the margins of rural society on the cusp of the modern world. Most of the story I tell is true, as far as I can tell, having researched it and spoken to people who knew people whose grandparents knew or at least had seen her. I feel a responsibility to Nanny Morgan’s memory and have fictionalised her identity here to separate the story – a speculative nonfiction - from her real place in this landscape.”

Did you also draw inspiration for her from the Celtic tradition, which is so aligned with nature?

“Yes, this could be a tale from the Mabinogian, the Black Book of Carmarthen or other Celtic texts. In the Nanny Morgan story, I'm struck by the connection with Morgan Le Fey of Arthurian legend. The Lady is a point in time when the local goddess becomes flesh through transmigration of the soul - that's what stories do. Nanny Morgan's death (as happened to other women in the past here and elsewhere) is a kind of sacrificial act during a moment of great change in the land. The war against Nature intensifies.”

What do you wish for listeners to get out of this tale?

“Places contain traces of things that happened there long ago. Through serendipity and instinct, we can recover these trace memories and let them live through our imaginations.”

‘As I Walked Out One Morning in May’ is available at the following link - https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0bbtdk

- By J.J. Wray

Image credit: Maria Nunzia @ Varvera