Telling the story of the mole

The mole plays a rather prominent role in the 'collective bestiary'; it appears in many genres of traditional narrative: e.g., aetiological tales, fables, exempla, emblems, proverbs, and in children's literature. It is a subterranean, chthonic, blind animal which appears as a challenger of the sun, punished for its hybris; as a noxious, burrowing animal and subversive agitator; a builder of labyrinthine tunnels and mounds; a base, crude, unclean, pagan and avaricious animal; a creature of ecological symbolism. The attitudes towards the mole are manifold: there is, e.g., the relentlessness of the aetiological tale; an exegetical endeavour to ennoble the mole by attributing to it magical and healing properties which have no real correspondence in myth; the compensations and consolations of children's literature where it is represented as a symbol of new beginnings and enchantment.