Story Club — Chimeras
What is a wolf/raven chimera called? A Rolven. And it is very clever. This and other fantastic beasties were created at my young writer’s workshop this week. I had so much fun hearing about Hedgeflies (a hedgehog plus fly), the Geckamillion (Gecko, mouse, eagle) and many others.
Originally, in ancient Greece, a Chimera was a specific animal hybrid, often described as a lion with a second, goat’s head and snake tail.
Over time the word ‘chimera’ has come to mean any beast made of more than one animal.
Other mythical beasts include the Hippogriff (body of a horse and wings of an eagle), which appear in Harry Potter stories as Buckbeak. We can also find the ancient Persian manticore (head of a human, body of a lion, venomous tail), lurking the pages of middle grade fiction (Harry Potter, Fablehaven, Percy Jackson, Spiderwick Chronicles).
If you’d like to make your own chimera to place in your story, I suggest thinking of the qualities you’d like your beastie to have, and then choosing animals with those qualities.
Will it slink on land and water like a fox/otter cross? Will it swim and fly like the Pephimontah (falcon/dolphin)? Or it will defy any expectation like the elephant worm or the hummingbird/jellyfish hybrid?
Enjoy creating. And don’t be surprised if, as you think deeply about animals, you start to ask questions like, “Do bears have whiskers?” (Yes, just small ones, so we don’t often notice).
