Flannan Isle
Flannan Isle is an English language poem by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson, first published in 1912. It refers to a mysterious incident that occurred on the Flannan Isles in 1900, when three lighthouse-keepers disappeared without explanation.[1][2]
In popular culture
The poem Flannan Isle is quoted by Tom Baker as the Doctor at the end of the Doctor Who story Horror of Fang Rock, which was set on a lighthouse and involved an alien explanation for the tragedy that befell the three keepers there and survivors of a shipwreck.
For the 1994 album Chansons des mers froides (Songs from the Cold Seas), French producer Hector Zazou adapted an extract of the poem Flannan Isle as a song entitled The Lighthouse. Lead vocals were performed by Siouxsie Sioux of Siouxsie and the Banshees, and backing vocals were provided by a female Nanai shaman.
The Genesis song The Mystery of Flannan Isle Lighthouse (on Archive 1967-75) is based on the incident as is the opera The Lighthouse by Peter Maxwell Davies.
The novel Some Strange Scent of Death by Angela J Elliott takes its name from a line in the poem and tells of the disappearance of the lighthouse keepers.
The main story of the video game Dark Fall II: Lights Out contains characters and locations related to the incident.[3]
2018 Scottish thriller film The Vanishing is set in the Flannan Isles.[4]
The Poem
Flannan Isle by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson (1878-1962)
- Though three men dwell on Flannan Isle
- To keep the lamp alight,
- As we steer'd under the lee we caught
- No glimmer through the night!
- A passing ship at dawn had brought
- The news, and quickly we set sail
- To find out what strange thing might ail
- The keepers of the deep-sea light.
- The winter day broke blue and bright,
- With glancing sun and glancing spray,
- As o'er the swell our boat made way,
- As gallant as a gull in flight.
- But, as we near'd the lonely Isle
- And look'd up at the naked height,
- And saw the lighthouse towering white
- With blinded lantern that all night
- Had never shot a spark
- Of comfort through the dark,
- So ghostly in the cold sunlight
- It seem'd, that we were struck the while
- With wonder all too dread for words.
- And, as into the tiny creek
- We stole, beneath the hanging crag,
- We saw three queer, black, ugly birds--
- Too big by far, in my belief,
- For guillemot or shag--
- Like seamen sitting bolt-upright
- Upon a half-tide reef:
- But as we neared they plunged from sight
- Without a sound or spurt of white.
- And still too mazed to speak,
- We landed and made fast the boat;
- And climbed the track in single file,
- Each wishing he was safe afloat
- On any sea, however far,
- So it be far from Flannan Isle:
- And still we seem'd to climb, and climb
- As though we'd lost all count of time
- And so must climb for evermore;
- Yet, all too soon, we reached the door--
- The black, sun-blister'd lighthouse door
- That gaped for us ajar.
- As on the threshold for a spell
- We paused, we seem'd to breathe the smell
- Of limewash and of tar,
- Familiar as our daily breath,
- As though 'twere some strange scent of death;
- And so, yet wondering, side by side,
- We stood a moment, still tongue-tied:
- And each with black foreboding eyed
- The door ere we should fling it wide,
- To leave the sunlight for the gloom:
- Till, plucking courage up, at last,
- Hard on each other's heels we passed
- Into the living-room.
- Yet as we crowded through the door
- We only saw a table spread
- For dinner, meat and cheese and bread,
- But all untouch'd, and no one there:
- As though, when they sat down to eat,
- Ere they could even taste,
- Alarm had come and they in haste
- Had risen and left the bread and meat,
- For at the table-head a chair
- Lay tumbled on the floor.
- We listened; but we only heard
- The feeble cheeping of a bird
- That starved upon its perch;
- And, listening still, without a word,
- We set about our hopeless search.
- We hunted high, we hunted low,
- And soon ransack'd the empty house,
- Then o'er the Island to and fro,
- We ranged, to listen and to look
- In every cranny, cleft or nook
- That might have hid a bird or mouse:
- But, though we search'd from shore to shore
- We found no sign in any place,
- And soon again stood face to face
- Before the gaping door,
- And stole into the room once more
- As frighten'd children steal.
- Ay, though we hunted high and low
- And hunted everywhere,
- Of the three men's fate we found no trace
- Of any kind in any place,
- But a door ajar and an untouched meal
- And an overtoppled chair.
- And as we listened in the gloom
- Of that forsaken living-room--
- A chill clutch on our breath--
- We thought how ill-chance came to all
- Who kept the Flannan Light,
- And how the rock had been the death
- Of many a likely lad--
- How six had come to a sudden end
- And three had gone stark mad,
- And one, whom we'd all known as friend,
- Had leapt from the lantern one still night
- And fallen dead by the lighthouse wall--
- And long we thought
- On the three we sought,
- And of what might yet befall.
- Like curs a glance has brought to heel
- We listen'd, flinching there,
- And looked, and looked on the untouch'd meal
- And the overtoppled chair.
- We seem'd to stand for an endless while,
- Though still no word was said,
- Three men alive on Flannan Isle
- Who thought on three men dead.
References
- ^ Flannan Isle poetry-archive.com Retrieved 8 Jan 2011.
- ^ Isle, Flannan. "Flannan Isle by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson". allpoetry.com. Retrieved 2019-10-31.
- ^ "Dark Fall II: Lights Out - Walkthrough". IGN. Retrieved 2019-10-31.
- ^ McIver, Brian (2018-11-29). "New Gerard Butler movie to shine light on mystery of Scots lighthouse keepers". dailyrecord. Retrieved 2019-10-31.