About this episode
In the middle of the night, you find yourself caught between dream and wakefulness, unable to move, unable to scream, with the feeling that someone's sitting on your chest. There are many names for this condition. Sleep paralysis. The Old Hag. The Nightmare. Mara. With returning guest, performance storyteller Dominic Kelly, we delve into this fascinating phenomenon that is deeply entrenched in the borderlands of folklore and belief. Dominic Kelly http://dominickelly.net/ MARA at Stealing Thunder storytelling festival in England on 3rd june 2023 https://stealingthunder.co.uk/ MARA at Helgoya Fortellerfestival in Norway on 5th august 2023 https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100092327174348 Bird sounds recorded by Ulf Elman https://xeno-canto.org/762155 Jelmer Poelstra https://xeno-canto.org/235198 PODCAST LINKS https://www.intheborderlands.com/ https://www.patreon.com/IntheBorderlands https://www.facebook.com/intheborderlands https://www.instagram.com/intheborderlands_podcast/ EMAIL contact@intheborderlands.com TORGRIM'S LINKS https://www.brittle.one/ https://www.facebook.com/kloverknekten https://www.instagram.com/kloverknekten/ MIKAEL'S LINKS https://smarturl.it/inanna https://www.facebook.com/mikael.oberg.performance.storyteller https://www.instagram.com/mikaelobergstoryteller/ REFERENCES Mara https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mare_(folklore) Sleep paralysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis Sleep Paralysis på Shelley R Adler (book) https://www.rutgersuniversitypress.org/sleep-paralysis/9780813548869 Hmong people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hmong_people Nocebo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nocebo The Old Hag of Newfoundland https://nuvomagazine.com/culture/canadian-urban-legends-newfoundlanders-can-tell-you-all-about-the-old-hag The Nightmare (film) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3317522/?ref_=vp_close The Terror That Comes in the Night by David J. Hufford (book) https://books.google.ca/books/about/The_Terror_That_Comes_in_the_Night.html?id=Qsd0CAAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false Hälsingland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A4lsingland Why We Sleep by Matthew Walker (book) https://books.google.se/books/about/Why_We_Sleep.html?id=mIh4swEACAAJ&redir_esc=y Granskogsfolk by David Thurfjell (book) https://www.norstedts.se/bok/9789113102771/granskogsfolk The Dreaming https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dreaming Avebury https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avebury West Kennet Long Barrow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Kennet_Long_Barrow Hallucinations by Oliver Sachs (book) https://www.oliversacks.com/oliver-sacks-books/hallucinations/ The Spell of the Sensuous by David Abram (book) https://www.davidabram.org/books The Encounter by Simon McBurney/Complicité (performance) http://www.complicite.org/productions/TheEncounter Reservoir 13 by John McGregor (book) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34146665-reservoir-13 Ravens in Winter by Bernd Heinrich (book) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ravens_in_Winter