Category:Moles

Moles are sensible beasts with a quaint dialect and a penchant for industrial work and hard labor, with a general tendency towards illiteracy. Egbert the Scholar is the sole known exception to all these characteristics. Despite this, moles are renowned for their common sense. Warrior moles like Axtel Sturnclaw are also rare. It is also uncommon for any but the youngest moles to be taken as captives or slaves by vermin.

The mole leader at Redwall Abbey is typically referred to as Foremole. Moles enjoy eating Turnip and Tater Deeper'n'ever Pie. It is commonly known that moles are usually afraid of heights and water, and also get emotional over the simplest of things. It seems that the way to greet someone by mole means is to tug their snout. Embarrassment among moles is typically displayed by the shuffling of footpaws or the covering of one’s face with either digging claws or, in the case of females, aprons.

The mole dialect is derived from the region of Somerset, England. Brian Jacques frequently tells the story of how when he was a truck driver in the 1960s, he drove through this part of the country while en route to Midsomer Norton and encountered the very old men speaking with this accent.

"The moles in my books use the Somerset dialect ... I used to regularly drive into Somerset, and it always amused me, how the little old men in Somerset spoke, in the villages. They'd hold the hand of another man, and they'd call him 'my dear, my beauty.' Nice people." - Locus magazine, November 1995

"Back when he was a truck driver and got lost in a backward little hollow of a county called Somerset. Emerging from some woods, he rumbled upon two old men sitting in front of a pub, clutching pints of cider, and asked them which way to go. They were kind and helpful, but the dialect they spoke sounded as if they had crab apples stuffed in their cheeks. 'So years later, when I came to write my book Redwall, and I was creating the characters, I began to think about the mole, those great little guys with all that soft, velvety fur, heavy digging claws, little button noses and bright eyes. I said, "Now how would he talk, a little mole like that?" And I said, "I know how he'd talk. He'd talk like a little old man from Somerset, that's how."'" - Anchorage Daily News, March 1994

{{#ev:youtube|PzNNvqq4R3o|400|center|Watch Brian Jacques talk about moles on the Redwall TV Series|frame|start=26}}

{{#ev:youtube|jj_ojRutBfw|400|center|Watch Brian Jacques talk about moles on his 2008 U.S. tour in Massachusetts|frame|start=406}}

{{#ev:youtube|b5gt6CvSagA|400|center|Watch Brian Jacques talk about moles on his 2008 U.S. tour in Texas|frame|start=462}}

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