A collection of legends and spiritual teachings that depict the mysterious manitous, mystical beings who are divine and essential forces in the spiritual life of the Ojibway. From the rich oral culture of his own Ojibway Indian heritage, Basil Johnston presents a collection of legends and tales depicting manitous, mystical beings who are divine and essential forces in the spiritual life of his people. In this collection, the first by a Native American scholar, these lively, sometimes earthy stories teach about manitous who lived in human form among the Ojibway in the early days, after Kitchi-Manitou (the Great Mystery) created all things and Muzzu-Kummik-Quae (Mother Earth) revealed the natural order of the world. With depth and humour, Johnston tells how lasting tradition was brought to the Ojibway by four half-human brothers, including Nana'b'oozoo, the beloved archetypal being who means well but often blunders. He also relates how people are helped and hindered by other entities, such as the manitous of the forests and meadows, personal manitous and totems, mermen and merwomen, Pauguk (the cursed Flying Skeleton), and the Weendigoes, famed and terrifying giant cannibals.

This book is the logical continuation of a series of collected essays examining the origins and evolution of myths and legends of the supernatural in Western and non-Western tradition and popular culture. The first two volumes of the series, The Universal Vampire: Origins and Evolution of a Legend (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2013) and Images of the Modern Vampire: The Hip and the Atavistic. (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2013) focused on the vampire legend. The essays in this collection expand that scope to include a multicultural and multigeneric discussion of a pantheon of supernatural creatures who interact and cross species-specific boundaries with ease. Angels and demons are discussed from the perspective of supernatural allegory, angelic ethics and supernatural heredity and genetics. Fairies, sorcerers, witches and werewolves are viewed from the perspectives of popular nightmare tales, depictions of race and ethnicity, popular public discourse and cinematic imagery. Discussions of the "undead and still dead" include images of death messengers and draugar, zombies and vampires in literature, popular media and Japanese anime.

Superheroes have been an integral part of popular society for decades. Over time, superheroes have developed their own mythology. Though scholars and fans have recognized and commented on this myth, the structure of the mythology has gone largely unexplored until now. The lexicon at the heart of this book gives a structure that can be used to identify the mythology as it applies to characters, stories, and other forms of narrative. The lexicon is the first effort to codify the mythology and how it works. Included are specific and detailed examinations of the myth in several narratives, including Buffy the Vampire Slayer; Green Arrow, especially in the CW series Arrow; and Beowulf. It also draws on examples from characters as diverse as Batman, Wolverine, Invincible, and John Constantine. This book is a first step toward recognizing the structure of the superhero and helps explain why the myth matters so much in current popular society, not only in America, but worldwide.

This encyclopedia aims to provide a ready reference to various aspects of American culture. The time frame is from the colonial period to the end of the 20th century. The areas covered are fine arts (painting, sculpture, photography); performing arts (music, ballet, theatre, film); architecture; literature; and various non-artistic forms of culture (symbolic, material, culinary).

Journey through Lancashire, England, to visit 155 places where strange history meets creepy modern times. Arranged alphabetically by town and place, the stories tell of ghosts, witches, fairies, dragons, and altercations with the Devil (who is not as clever as he thinks!). Legends connected to ancient monuments, holy wells, and the locations of Green Man carvings are also included. Sometimes these tales echo history and sometimes they come from a deeper folklore. Sometimes ghost stories are discredited...sometimes they are not. A useful guidebook for tourists and travelers, this book is also an invaluable compendium for serious researchers. Stories are indexed by type and a separate index lists postcodes and Ordnance Survey map references for those who wish to visit the locations for themselves.

"Matthew Fox might well be the most creative, the most comprehensive, surely the most challenging religious-spiritual teacher in America."--Thomas Berry

"Rupert Sheldrake continues to chart a new course in our understanding of the non-local mind that connects all of us."--Deepak Chopra

Many people believe in angels, but few can define these enigmatic spirits. Now visionary theologian Matthew Fox and acclaimed biologist Rupert Sheldrake--pioneers in modern religious thinking and scientific theory--launch a groundbreaking exploration into the ancient concept of the angel and restore dignity, meaning, and joy to our time-honored belief in these heavenly beings.

The definitive and comprehensive edition of Robert Graves's classic retelling of the Greek myths 'Icarus disobeyed his father's instructions and began soaring towards the sun, rejoiced by the lift of his great sweeping wings. Presently, when Daedalus looked over his shoulder, he could no longer see Icarus; but scattered feathers floated on the waves below...' These are the greatest stories ever told - the labours of Hercules, the voyage of the Argonauts, Theseus and the minotaur, Midas and his golden touch, the Trojan War and Odysseus's journey home - brought together into one epic and unforgettable story. Ideal for the first time reader, it can be read as a single page-turning narrative, while full commentaries as well as a comprehensive index of names make it equally valuable for anyone seeking an authoritative and detailed account of the spectacular stories that make up the bedrock of Western literature. The Greek Myths is a classic among classics, a treasure trove of extraordinary tales and a masterful work of literature in its own right.

First Published in 1996. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Untying the Knot collects eighteen previously unpublished essays on the riddle-a genre of discourse found in virtually every human culture. Hasan-Rokem and Shulman have drawn these essays from a variety of cultural perspectives and disciplines; linguists, anthropologists, folklorists, and religion and literature scholars consider riddling practices in Hebrew, Finnish, Indian languages, Chinese, and classical Greek. The authors seek to understand the peculiar expressive power of the riddle, and the cultural logic of its particular uses; they scrutinize the riddle's logical structure and linguistic strategies, as well as its affinity to neighboring genres such as enigmas, puzzles, oracular prophecy, proverbs, and dreams. In this way, they begin to answer how riddles relate to the conceptual structures of a particular culture, and how they come to represent a culture's cosmology or cognitive map of the world. More importantly, these essays reveal the human need for symbolic ordering-riddles being one such form of cultural ritual.

Within every woman there is a wild and natural creature, a powerful force, filled with good instincts, passionate creativity, and ageless knowing. Her name is Wild Woman, but she is an endangered species. Though the gifts of wildish nature come to us at birth, society's attempt to "civilize" us into rigid roles has plundered this treasure, and muffled the deep, life-giving messages of our own souls. Without Wild Woman, we become over-domesticated, fearful, uncreative, trapped. Clarissa Pinkola Estes, Ph.D., Jungian analyst and cantadora storyteller, shows how woman's vitality can be restored through what she calls "psychic archeological digs" into the bins of the female unconscious. In Women Who Run with the Wolves, Dr. Estes uses multicultural myths, fairy tales, folk tales, and stories chosen from over twenty years of research that help women reconnect with the healthy, instinctual, visionary attributes of the Wild Woman archetype. Dr. Estes collects the bones of many stories, looking for the archetypal motifs that set a woman's inner life into motion. "La Loba" teaches about the transformative function of the psyche. In "Bluebeard", we learn what to do with wounds that will not heal; in "Skeleton Woman", we glimpse the mystical power of relationship and how dead feelings can be revived; "Vasalisa the Wise" brings our lost womanly instincts to the surface again; "The Handless Maiden" recovers the Wild Woman initiation rites; and "The Little Match Girl" warns against the insidious dangers of a life spent in fantasy. In these and other stories, we focus on the many qualities of Wild Woman. We retrieve, examine, love, and understand her, and hold her against our deep psyches as one whois both magic and medicine. In Women Who Run with the Wolves, Dr. Estes has created a new lexicon for describing the female psyche. Fertile and lifegiving, it is a psychology of women in the truest sense, a knowing of the soul.

Myth into Art is a comparative study of mythological narrative in Greek poetry and the visual arts. Thirty of the major myths are surveyed, focusing on Homer, lyric poetry and Attic tragedy. On the artistic side, the emphasis is on Athenian and South Italian vases. The book offers undergraduate students an introduction both to mythology and to the use of visual sources in the study of Greek myth.

Asian American Identities and Practices: Folkloric Expressions in Everyday Life probes the intersection, interplay, and interconnection of Asian and Asian American folklore and folklife in globally fluid and culturally creative landscapes among Asian American communities and subjects. Asian American folklore, as a way of life and practice, has emerged and continues to emerge as Asian Americans lay claim and take root in the American mosaic. As such, the contributors in this volume all show how the Asian American historical experiences and continued international migration inform the production of new folkloric practices, subjectivities, and ideologies, which in turn strengthen specific Asian American ways of life while normalizing folklore that are squarely produced in Asian America. This collection illustrates that Asian American folklore and folklife is interwoven with social relationships, the creation of various types of ethnic, cultural, and national identities, and adaptive strategies within the particular historical periods, communities, and shifting boundaries and demographics of Asian America. The global context of Asian American folklore and folklife, especially in the racially charged post-9/11 context, bespeaks how Asians, past and present, maneuver the cultural spaces of their host society and old traditions to create new sites and new opportunities for cultural folkloric production and expression in everyday life.

We live in an era of exploding scientific knowledge about the universe, and our place and future within it. Much of this new knowledge conflicts with earlier wisdom, and some has frightening implications. Cosmic evolution, space exploration, the search for extraterrestrial life, and concerns about humanity's future prompt us to seek new answers to old existential questions. Where did we come from? Why are we here? Are we alone? What will become of us? In our search for answers, we turn to science, religion, myth, and varying combinations thereof. Exploring an ambiguous region between recognized findings and unfettered imagination, Starstruck explores the multifaceted, far-reaching, and often contentious attempts of people with contrasting worldviews to develop convincing and satisfying interpretations of rapidly accumulating discoveries in physics, astronomy, and biology.

In an innovative sequence of topics, Ken Dowden explores the uses Greeks made of myth and the uses to which we can put myth in recovering the richness of their culture. Most aspects of Greek life and history - including war, religion and sexuality - which are discernable through myth, as well as most modern approaches, are given a context in a book which is designed to be useful, accessible and stimulating.

North Carolina Myths and Legends explores unusual phenomena, strange events, and mysteries in North Carolina's history. Each episode included in the book is a story unto itself, and the tone and style of the book is lively and easy to read for a general audience interested in North Carolina history. Read about the Cherokee legend of the Judaculla rock. Try to figure out if Tom Dula, subject of many a local myth and a popular folk song, really did murder his wife. Speculate as to what really caused the Carolina Bays indentations.

'When an afflicted person is believed to be a victim of nazar, or the glance of the evil eye, a particular kind of incense, which is made of seeds of the wild rue, mixed with myrtle and frankincense, is burned at sunset; and while the smoke is curling about the head of the victim the following incantation is repeated...' The Wild Rue is a unique study of magic, myth and folklore in Iran. In this classic work, Bess Donaldson records the beliefs and superstitions of the country at a time when they were increasingly threatened by the Shah's programme of modernisation. This earlier way of life, with its belief in angels and the evil eye, and with its age-old rituals surrounding childbirth and burial, is recounted in a highly readable text. Among the wide variety of topics covered are cosmology, dreams, names and numbers, talismans and signs, oaths and curses, childbirth, angels, trees and plants, the evil eye, and the calendar. Long unavailable, The Wild Rue is indispensable to any serious student of Iran and will be welcomed by all with an interest in the country's culture and history.

The Vampire in Folklore, History, Literature, Film and Television is the most comprehensive listing of writings about the vampire and related creatures covering material generated through the nineteenth and twentieth century to the present. The listings document the penetration of the vampire into all areas of Western society from scholarly discourse to popular culture, from politics to cook books. It especially reaches into to the mass market aspects of vampire life in television and the movies from Bela Lugosi's Dracula to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, True Blood, and the Twilight Saga. Beginning with vampire folklore, the volume covers historical writings, the vampire in literature, the cinema and television, and its widespread appearing in academic writings and its presence among true believers who want nothing more than to become a child of the night.

From the clouds with ghostly faces in the Chisos Mountains to the spirits of the Alamo, follow in the footsteps of a "spirit magnet" as she takes a wild Western romp across haunted Texas and beyond. Meet Joshua's ghost in his creepy room in Mineral Wells and Sara, who is one of the most active spirits at the Menger Hotel in San Antonio. Did phantom soldiers holding swords of fire really save the Alamo from destruction by the Mexicans? Is it really Teddy Roosevelt's ghost that haunts the bar at the Menger? Be amazed at the phenomenal results from the Spirit Scanner. Find out in this factual and spine-tingling adventure across the Lone Star State.

Part of our new and growing Myths, Mysteries and Legends series, Myths, Mysteries and Legends of New Mexico explores unusual phenomena, strange events, and mysteries in the Land of Enchantment's history. Each episode included in the book is a story unto itself, and the tone and style of the book is lively and easy to read for a general audience interested in New Mexico history. Stories include the mysterious disappearance of lawyer and civic leader Albert J. Fountain-a man known both for defending Billy the Kid and for taking on cattle rustlers-and his little boy, Henry; the near discovery of when humans first came to America by George McJunkin, a black cowboy, born a slave; and the unsolved murders of an old mining town that lies at the depths of Bonito Lake.

Since ancient times, writers and poets have grappled with death, dying, grief, and mourning in their works. The Final Crossing: Death and Dying in Literature compiles fifteen in-depth, scholarly, and original essays on death and dying in literature from around the globe and from different time periods. Written from a variety of critical perspectives, the essays target both scholars and serious students. Death and dying is an important area of study for a variety of disciplines, including psychology, psychiatry, sociology, gerontology, medical ethics, healthcare science, health law, and literary studies. The Final Crossing is a landmark compendium of academic essays on death and dying in literary texts, such as the Iliad, Hayy ibn Yaqzan, Hamlet, The Secret Garden, and The Grapes of Wrath. This collection of essays not only brings an international flavor, but also a unique angularity to the discourse on thanatology. The novelty of perspectives reflects the diverse cultural and intellectual backgrounds of the contributors. This diversity opens up a fresh conversation on a number of age-old questions related to "the final crossing." In this volume, readers will find an intriguing array of topics for further reflection and research.

In the predecessor to this book, The Universal Vampire: Origins and Evolution of a Legend, Brodman and Doan presented discussions of the development of the vampire in the West from the early Norse draugr figure to the medieval European revenant and ultimately to Dracula, who first appears as a vampire in Anglo-Irish Bram Stoker's novel, Dracula, published in 1897. The essays in that collection also looked at the non-Western vampire in Native American and Mesoamerican traditions, Asian and Russian vampires in popular culture, and the vampire in contemporary novels, film and television. The essays in this collection continue that multi-cultural and multigeneric discussion by tracing the development of the post-modern vampire, in films ranging from Shadow of a Doubt to Blade, The Wisdom of Crocodiles and Interview with the Vampire; the male and female vampires in the Twilight films, Sookie Stackhouse novels and True Blood television series; the vampire in African American women's fiction, Anne Rice's novels and in the post-apocalyptic I Am Legend; vampires in Japanese anime; and finally, to bring the volumes full circle, the presentation of a new Irish Dracula play, adapted from the novel and set in 1888.

Within the English-speaking world, no work of the German High Middle Ages is better known than the Nibelungenlied, which has stirred the imagination of artists and readers far beyond its land of origin. Its international influence extends from literature to music, art, film, politics and propaganda, psychology, archeology, and military history. Now for the first time all references to the vast Nibelungen tradition have been catalogued in this comprehensive encyclopedia containing nearly 1000 entries by several dozen international contributors, including the most distinguished scholars in the field. Readers will find illuminating passages on a variety of topics, including literary and extra-literary references, characters and place names, significant motifs and concepts, historical background, and cultural reception through the centuries. This monumental work is an invaluable guide to a fascinating, age-old tradition.

Tales of East Africa is a collection of 22 traditional tales from Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania.

Welcome to a world of magical adventure—a place where a boy spares the life of a fearsome monster, a flock of doves brings a girl back from the dead, and a hare wreaks havoc among all the other animals.

Translated and transcribed by folklorists and anthropologists in the early 20th century, these stories evoke the distinctive beauty and irresistible humor of East African folklore.

• The tales come alive alongside bold, contemporary art in this special illustrated edition.
• Each story transports readers to an enthralling world.
• Part of the popular Tales series, featuring Tales of Japan, Celtic Tales, and Tales of India

Tales of East Africa will enthrall fans of fairytales and captivate those interested in East Africa's rich history and culture.

Readers will encounter mischievous animals, plucky heroes and heroines, and monsters, and artist Jamilla Okubo pairs each tale with a bold and vibrant illustration.

• A visually gorgeous book that will be at home on the shelf or on the coffee table.
• A perfect gift for fairy tale and folklore lovers, fans of East African culture, people of East African ancestry, collectors of illustrated classics, adults and teens alike, and bibliophiles
• Add it to the collection of books like The Girl Who Married a Lion: and Other Tales from Africa by Alexander McCall Smith, Favorite African Folktales by Nelson Mandela, and Indaba My Children: African Folktales by Vusamazulu Credo Mutwa

For more than a thousand years, the adventures of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table have been retold across Europe. They have inspired some of the most important works of European literature, particularly in the medieval period: the romances of Chretien de Troyes, Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Malory's Le Morte d'Arthur. In the nineteenth century, interest in the Arthurian legend revived with Tennyson, Wagner and Twain. This Companion outlines the evolution of the legend from the earliest documentary sources to Spamalot, and analyses how some of the major motifs of the legend have been passed down in both medieval and modern texts. With a map of Arthur's Britain, a chronology of key texts and a guide to further reading, this volume itself will contribute to the continuing fascination with the King and his many legends.

In this book, first published in 1987, Wolfgang Mieder follows the intriguing trail of some of the best known pieces of folk literature, tracing them from their roots to modern uses in advertising, journalism, politics, cartoons, and poetry. He reveals both the remarkable adaptability of these tales and how each variation reflects cultural and historical changes. Fairy tales, legends, folk songs, riddles, nursery rhymes, and proverbs are passed from generation to generation, changing both in form and meaning with each use. This book will be of interest to students of literature.