Kategoria BISAC: Social Science >> Folklore & Mythology

This original and compelling study argues against the traditional identification of Arthur as a king in Celtic Britain. Instead, Graham Anderson explores the evidence for two much older figures, known to classical writers as kings of Arcadia and Lydia, over a millenium before.

He shows how these kings can be clearly connected with traditional Arthurian characters and adventure, including an ancient Gawain, a Lady of Shallott, and a predecessor of Excalibur, and shows that the Arthurian universe found in Welsh tales and French romances is already anticipated in these earliest of...

In his latest book, fairy tales expert Jack Zipes explores the question of why some fairy tales "work" and others don't, why the fairy tale is uniquely capable of getting under the skin of culture and staying there. Why, in other words, fairy tales "stick." Long an advocate of the fairy tale as a serious genre with wide social and cultural ramifications, Jack Zipes here makes his strongest case for the idea of the fairy tale not just as a collection of stories for children but a profoundly important genre.

Why Fairy Tales Stick contains two chapters on the history and...

In When Dreams Came True, Jack Zipes explains the social life of the fairy tale, from the sixteenth century on into the twenty-first. Whether exploring Charles Perrault or the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen or The Thousand and One Nights, The Happy Prince or Pinocchio, L. Frank Baum or Hermann...

In When Dreams Came True, Jack Zipes explains the social life of the fairy tale, from the sixteenth century on into the twenty-first. Whether exploring Charles Perrault or the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Andersen or The Thousand and One Nights, The Happy Prince or Pinocchio, L. Frank Baum or Hermann...

First published in 1934, Gods, Heroes and Men of Ancient Greece has become one of the most popular, enduring--and captivating--retellings of the ancient myths for modern readers. Recognizing the sheer entertainment value of these timeless adventures, world renowned classical scholar W.H.D. Rouse delighted his students at the Perse School in Cambridge, England, with a conversational style and childlike wonder that made the legends come alive--a rare storytelling gift that continues to engage young and old alike.

Many of the...

It is both amazing and wonderful that so much of the richness of our language and our moral education still owes a huge debt to a Greek slave who was executed more than two thousand years ago. Yet "sour grapes," "crying 'wolf, '" "actions speak louder than words," "honesty is the best policy," and literally hundreds of other metaphors, axioms, and ideas that are now woven into the very fabric of Western culture all came from Aesop's Fables. An extraordinary storyteller who used cunning foxes, surly dogs, clever mice,...

Much of the ancient knowledge that has been passed down from Native American medicine men, or shamans is in danger of being lost. Bobby Lake-Thom, a Native American healer known as Medicine Grizzly Bear, has sought to preserve this powerful heritage by sharing his wisdom and experience learning from the world around us. The result is Spirits of the Earth, an extraordinary compilation of legends and rituals about nature's ever-present signs. From the...

Drawing on centuries of history, this work is an encyclopedic collection -- undoubtedly the largest royalty-free collection of its kind -- of devils, dragons, mythical creatures, fanciful beasts, animal-gods, totemic figures, and other supernatural beasts from the darker regions of man's imagination. Spanning many cultures and eras, the collection ranges from prehistoric rock paintings to the drawings of Max Ernst, from the masks of black Africa to the gargoyles of Notre Dame.
This volume incudes over 1,000 renderings of designs from ancient Egypt, Greece, and the Middle East: winged...