Visions of Rhye: Images from Freddie Mercury’s Book Collection

The Books

Explore the illustrated worlds that inspired Freddie Mercury, from Victorian fairy tales to the mythic poetry and folklore that shaped Queen’s early work.

The Songs

Discover Queen’s early songs, lyrics and visual iconography, and the links between mythic and fairytale influences.

Richard Wagner
(trans. by Margaret Armour)
Siegfried & Twilight of the Gods
Illustrated by Arthur Rackham, 1911

This volume, drawn from Freddie Mercury’s personal library, presents Arthur Rackham’s visionary interpretations of the final dramas from Richard Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen (The Ring Cycle). Rackham’s intricate linework and atmospheric linework evokes a mythic world of gods, heroes and enchanted forests, shaped by Germanic legend and Norse mythology.

Mercury spoke of his admiration for Rackham’s work, recognising in it a visual intricacy that resonated with his own artistic sensibilities.

Explore the books

The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke, from Queen II, 1974

The Fairy Feller’s Master-Stroke is a frantic and surreal composition, densely packed with vivid fantasy characters. The song depicts a gathering for a momentous event: a woodcutter raising his axe to split a hazelnut in two, creating a carriage for Queen Mab. Mercury was fascinated by Richard Dadd’s painting of the same name and is known to have taken friends to view the work at the Tate Gallery. The painting, like the song, is obsessively detailed, presenting a roll call of arcane figures drawn from Shakespeare and English folk tradition.

Read more about the songs