A vivid look at 10 astonishing people who are maintaining some of the world's oldest and rarest cultural traditions.

Eliot Stein has traveled the globe in search of remarkable people who are preserving some of our most extraordinary cultural rites. In Custodians of Wonder: Ancient Customs, Profound Traditions, and the Last People Keeping Them Alive, Stein introduces readers to a man saving the secret ingredient in Japan's 700-year-old original soy sauce recipe. In Italy, he learns how to make the world's rarest pasta from one of the only women alive who knows how to make it. And in India, he discovers a family rumored to make a mysterious metal mirror believed to reveal your truest self. From shadowing Scandinavia's last night watchman to meeting a 27th-generation West African griot to tracking down Cuba's last official cigar factory “readers” more than a century after they spearheaded the fight for Cuban independence, Stein uncovers an almost lost world.

Climbing through Peru’s southern highlands, he encounters the last Inca bridge master who rebuilds a grass-woven bridge every year from the fabled Inca Road System. He befriends a British beekeeper who maintains a touching custom of "telling the bees" important news of the day. And he crunches through a German forest to find the official mailman of the only tree in the world with its own address – to which countless people from across the world have written in hopes of finding love. These are just some of the last custodians preserving age-old rites on the brink of disappearance against all odds. Let Eliot Stein introduce you to all of them.

A type of folklore, myth is central to all cultures. Myths convey serious truths learned over generations and provide practical advice for living within a society. And while many myths go back to antiquity, they are also an important part of popular culture. Because they are so fundamental to civilization, myths are studied in a range of disciplines and at all levels. This reference is a comprehensive but convenient introduction to the role of myth in world cultures. Written by a leading authority, this handbook is of use to high school students, undergraduates, and general readers. It defines and classifies types of myth and provides numerous examples, many of which illustrate the significance of myth to contemporary society. In addition, it surveys the history of the study of myth and overviews critical approaches. It examines the relation of myths to larger contexts, such as politics, religion, and popular culture. The volume closes with a bibliography of print and electronic resources and a glossary.

Race, religion, language, culture, and national character are full of contradictions. Brazil, the largest country in South America, embodies so much paradox that it defies neat description. This book will help students and general readers dispel stereotypes of Brazil and begin to understand what country's "bigness" means in terms of its land, people, history, society, and cultural expressions. This is the only authoritative yet accessible volume on Brazil that surveys a wide range of important topics, from geography, to social customs, art, architecture, and more. Highlights include discussions of the fluid definitions of race, rituals of candomble, the importance of extended family networks, beach culture, and soccer madness. A chronology and glossary supplement the text.

IN villages and towns across Spain and its former New World colonies, local performers stage mock battles between Spanish Christians and Moors or Aztecs that range from brief sword dances to massive street theatre lasting several days. The performances officially celebrate the triumph of Spanish Catholicism over its enemies. Such an explanation does not, however, account for the tradition's persistence for more than five hundred years nor for its widespread diffusion.

In this perceptive book, Max Harris seeks to understand the "puzzling and enduring passion" of both Mexicans and Spaniards for festivals of moros y cristianos. He begins by tracing the performances' roots in medieval Spain and showing how they came to be superimposed on the mock battles that had been part of pre-contact Aztec calendar rituals. Then, using James Scott's distinction between "public transcripts" and "hidden transcripts", he reveals how, in the hands of folk and indigenous performers, these spectacles of conquest became prophecies of the eventual reconquest of Mexico by the defeated Aztec peoples. Finally, he documents the early arrival of native American performance practices in Europe and the shift of moros y cristianos from court to folk tradition in Spain. Even today, as lively descriptions of current festivals make plain, mock battles between Aztecs, Moors, and Christians remain a remarkably sophisticated vehicle for the communal expression of dissent.