-A sensitive, intelligent book.-
--Sander L. Gilman, Professor of Humane Studies, Cornell University

How is AIDS treated in the contemporary plays of Larry Kramer and William Hoffman? How important is the Black Death to a reader of Boccaccio's Decameron? How have the historical and current outbreaks of contagious disease affected the creation of literature, and how has this literature in turn shaped our response to disease? Original and moving, To Blight with Plague addresses these and other central questions raised by literary works whose main themes revolve around contagious,...

In her compendious study, of the folktale of the runaway wife] Leavy argues that the contradictory claims of nature and culture are embodied in the legendary figure of the swan maiden, a woman torn between the human and bestial worlds.
--The New York Times Book Review

This is a study of the meaning of gender as framed by the swan maiden tale, a story found in the folklore of virtually every culture. The swan maiden is a supernatural woman forced to marry, keep house, and bear children for a mortal man who holds the key to her imprisonment. When she manages to regain...