Ujarak, Iqallijuq, and Kupaaq were elders from the Inuit community on Igloolik Island in Nunavut. The three elders, among others, shared with Bernard Saladin d'Anglure the narratives which make up the heart of Inuit Stories of Being and Rebirth. Through their words, and historical sources recorded by Franz Boas and Knud Rasmussen, Saladin d'Anglure examines the Inuit notion of personhood and its relationship to cosmology and mythology. Central to these stories are womb memories, narratives of birth and reincarnation, and the concept of the third sex-an intermediate identity between male and female. As explained through first-person accounts and traditional legends, myths, and folk tales, the presence of transgender individuals informs Inuit relationships to one another and to the world at large, transcending the dualities of male and female, human and animal, human and spirit.This new English edition includes the 2006 preface by Claude Levi-Strauss and an afterword by Bernard Saladin d'Anglure.

Noted French scholar and linguist discusses the gods of the continental Celts, the beginnings of mythology in Ireland, heroes, and the two main categories of Irish deities: mother-goddesses-local, rural spirits of fertility or of war-and chieftain-gods: national deities who are magicians, nurturers, craftsmen, and protectors of the people.

Learn about compelling worlds and characters depicted in myths and legends in The Mythology Book. Part of the fascinating Big Ideas series, this book tackles tricky topics and themes in a simple and easy to follow format. Learn about Mythology in this overview guide to the subject, brilliant for novices looking to find out more and experts wishing to refresh their knowledge alike! The Mythology Book brings a fresh and vibrant take on the topic through eye-catching graphics and diagrams to immerse yourself in. This captivating book will broaden your understanding of Mythology, with: - More than 80 classics retold and explained in mythology - Packed with facts, charts, timelines and graphs to help explain core concepts - A visual approach to big subjects with striking illustrations and graphics throughout - Easy to follow text makes topics accessible for people at any level of understanding The Mythology Book allows you delve into each myth, discover the meanings behind them, and understand their significance to different cultures worldwide - aimed at adults with an interest in the subject and wanting to gain more of an overview. Here you'll find global coverage of world myths, profiling everything from the well-known tales of the Greeks, Norsemen, and Egyptians to the legends of the Caribbean, the Americas, Oceania, and East Asia. Your Mythological Questions, Simply Explained Learn about myths in this essential guide, from early creation beliefs to classical hero narratives and the recurring theme of the afterlife. Delve into each myth and discover the meanings behind these stories, getting to the heart of their significance to different cultures worldwide. If you thought it was difficult to learn about the many classic stories, The Mythology Book presents key information in a clear layout. Discover Zeus, god of the sky and ruler of the Olympian gods, Loki, the cunning trickster with a knack for causing havoc, Thor with his mighty hammer, and Hades, ruler of the underworld - and much more. The Big Ideas Series With millions of copies sold worldwide, The Mythology Book is part of the award-winning Big Ideas series from DK. The series uses striking graphics along with engaging writing, making big topics easy to understand.

* Offers evidence from Jesse James's secret encoded diaries * Examines Jesse James's close ties with other notorious outlaws, such as Johnny Ringo, Jesse Evans, and Billy the Kid * Shows how Jesse James was related, by blood or marriage, to powerful people in law enforcement and politics, including the elite families behind the Copperheads and the Knights of the Golden Circle organizations Jesse James and many other Old West outlaws were much more than just wild cowboys. As author Daniel Duke--the great-great-grandson of Jesse James--reveals, James and other infamous outlaws were part of a larger organization, centuries old, that has affected U.S. history from the small, rural streets of early America to the highest levels of the nation's government, with continuing influence to this day. Drawing on his great-great-grandfather's secret diaries, Duke unravels the hidden history of the Wild West to expose the outlaws, politicians, and secret societies who were pulling strings behind the scenes. He examines Jesse James's close ties with other notorious outlaws, such as Johnny Ringo, Jesse Evans, and Billy the Kid, and demonstrates not only how James faked his death and lived out his life under an alias, but how Billy the Kid did the same. He also details how both Jesse James and Billy the Kid continued their work for the nameless organization after their faked deaths.

This book contains a detailed account of the various types of Icelandic folk-story, their likely origins and sources, the folk-beliefs they represent, and their meanings. In Iceland, people do not compose verse just to comfort themselves; they worship poetry and believe in it. In poetry is a power which rules men's lives and health, governs wind and sea. Icelanders have faith in hymns and sacred poems too, because of their content. They also have faith in secular poetry composed by themselves, believing it to be no less able to move mountains than religious faith is. By this belief in their own culture, they transfer it into the realm of mythology, and the glow of the super-human is shed over it. Whatever may have been their origin, the folk-stories of Iceland come to mirror the people's life and character, and in the period when the idea gained ground that all power comes from the people, their poetry and lore became sacred things that were revered and looked to as a potential source of strength. Icelandic folk-stories were similarly an important element in the Icelanders' struggle for national and cultural integrity in the nineteenth century. They were more truly Icelandic than anything else worthy of the name.

A hilarious modern fairy-tale mash-up set in a world in which witches are real, magic is real and fairy tales are not only real ... but recent history. Roxy Humperdinck is still reeling from the Great Fairy Tale Cover-up when Cinderella Jones returns with a new mission: to investigate The Missing - the children who followed the Pied Piper into the mountain thirty years ago, never to be seen again. And so begins another crazy adventure that takes the girls up Jack's beanstalk, through Red Riding Hood's Woods ... and to the cottage of the most evil villain of all time, the Gingerbread Witch.

A collection of awe-inspiring stories from Finnish mythology, this treasury was assembled by educator James Baldwin, who specialized in adapting ancient narratives into captivating prose. Drawn from the oral traditions of the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala, these 38 entrancing tales are appropriate for all ages. 4 illustrations by N. C. Wyeth.

Halloween is a very special time of year and takes on huge significance for a vast number of people in different ways. For many, it's a chance to dress up, wander the streets for a trick or treat session, gorge on candy and have a party, whereas for others it is a time of remembrance, of visits to ancestors' graves, or prayers at this holy time. But what are the real origins and meanings of this festival that's commonly associated with darkness, witches, ghosts and ghouls? The oldest known Halloween celebration was the Celtic Samhain, a time when the souls and spirits of the dead would find it easiest to return to visit the living. Food was offered to keep the spirits happy and eventually the festival was formalised by the church as a time of remembrance in advance of All Saints Day. This fun little guide looks at the history of all things Halloween, from the earliest feasts and customs to the latest fun and games that are common around the world. We delve into the meanings of many of the symbols of Halloween, like pumpkins, black cats, apples, witches and ghosts, and examine the many different ways people celebrate around the world. There is plenty of fun stuff too: freaky facts, scary poems, classic candy, spooky songs, stunning stats, horror film suggestions and all manner of puns, jokes and sayings all relating to the creepiest day of the year. SAMPLE QUOTE: 'Halloween was confusing. All my life my parents said, "Never take candy from strangers." And then they dressed me up and said, "Go beg for it."' - Rita Rudner

Tales throughout the world generally place fabulous beasts in marginal locations - deserts, deep woods, remote islands, glaciers, ocean depths, mountain peaks, caves, swamps, heavenly bodies and alternate universes. Legends tell us that imaginary animals belong to a primordial time, before we had encompassed the world with names, categories and scientific knowledge. This book traces the history of imaginary animals from Palaeolithic art to the Harry Potter stories, and beyond. It shows how imagined creatures help us psychologically, giving form to our subconscious fears as 'monsters', as well as embodying our hopes as 'wonders'. Nevertheless, their greatest service may be to continually challenge our imaginations, directing us beyond the limitations of our conventional beliefs and expectations.

An examination of how and why Scotland gained its reputation for the supernatural, and how belief continued to flourish in a supposed Age of Enlightenment. SHORTLISTED for the Katharine Briggs Award 2019 Scotland is famed for being a haunted nation, "whare ghaists and houlets nightly cry". Medieval Scots told stories of restless souls and walking corpses, but after the 1560Reformation, witches and demons became the focal point for explorations of the supernatural. Ghosts re-emerged in scholarly discussion in the late seventeenth century, often in the guise of religious propagandists. As time went on, physicians increasingly reframed ghosts as the conjurations of disturbed minds, but gothic and romantic literature revelled in the emotive power of the returning dead; they were placed against a backdrop of ancient monasteries,castles and mouldering ruins, and authors such as Robert Burns, James Hogg and Walter Scott drew on the macabre to colour their depictions of Scottish life. Meanwhile, folk culture used apparitions to talk about morality and mortality. Focusing on the period from 1685 to 1830, this book provides the first academic study of the history of Scottish ghosts. Drawing on a wide range of sources, and examining beliefs across the social spectrum, it shows howghost stories achieved a new prominence in a period that is more usually associated with the rise of rationalism. In exploring perceptions of ghosts, it also reflects on understandings of death and the afterlife; the constructionof national identity; and the impact of the Enlightenment. MARTHA MCGILL completed her PhD at the University of Edinburgh.

In this booklet Jill Dudley describes many of the perilous adventures faced by the great hero Odysseus when returning to his island of Ithaka from the Trojan war. She explains the problems faced by his wife and twenty year old son who did not know whether Odysseus was dead or alive. Jill's explorations of the sites mentioned in the Odyssey leave the reader wanting to visit this beautiful and tranquil Ionian island.

Who but Italo Calvino could have selected two hundred of Italy's traditional folktales and retold them so wondrously? The reader is lured into a world of clearly Italian stamp, where kings and peasants, saints and ogres - along with an array of the most extraordinary plants and animals - disport themselves against the rich background of regional customs and history. Whether the tone is humorous and earthy, playful and nonsensical, or noble and mysterious, the drama unfolds strictly according to the joyous logic of the imagination.Chosen one of the New York Times's ten best books in the year of its original publication, Italian Folktales immediately won a cherished place among lovers of the tale and vaulted Calvino into the ranks of the great folklorists like the Brothers Grimm and Hans Christian Andersen. In this collection Calvino combines a sensibility attuned to the fantastical with a singular writerly ability to capture the visions and dreams of a people.

Worcestershire is a county of contrasts, with one face turned to the modern buzz of Birmingham and the other turned towards the quiet rural landscape of the West Country. Its folk tales reflect this dichotomy, with some stories based in the fears and superstitions of village life, and others evolving from the strains and pressures of a new industrial reality. From battles of the Civil War to witchcraft trials, Worcestershire is steeped in history - and almost every village has some dark tale of magical events to tell. Ordinary folk from all walks of life mix with devils, ogres and ghosts. Even the holy community is not safe - vengeance, infidelity and murder loom large in the county's religious history. Complemented by beautiful illustrations, Worcestershire Folk Tales is crammed with these myths, legends and mysterious yarns. David Phelps has worked as an oral storyteller since 2005, being much inspired by his grandmother's tales of Worcestershire's folklore. He is a member of both the Folklore Society and the Society for Storytelling, and is the author of Herefordshire Folk Tales and Haunted Hereford.

What is the role of folklore in the discussion of catastrophe and trauma? How do disaster survivors use language, ritual, and the material world to articulate their experiences? What insights and tools can the field of folkloristics offer survivors for navigating and narrating disaster and its aftermath? Can folklorists contribute to broader understandings of empathy and the roles of listening in ethnographic work? We Are All Survivors is a collection of essays exploring the role of folklore in the wake of disaster. Contributors include scholars from the United States and Japan who have long worked with disaster-stricken communities or are disaster survivors themselves; individual chapters address Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Maria, and two earthquakes in Japan, including the earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster of 2011. Adapted from a 2017 special issue of Fabula (from the International Society for Folk Narrative Research), the book includes a revised introduction, an additional chapter with original illustrations, and a new conclusion considering how folklorists are documenting the COVID-19 pandemic. We Are All Survivors bears witness to survivors' expressions of remembrance, grieving, and healing.

For more than 150 years, individuals have traveled the countryside with pen, paper, tape recorders, and even video cameras to document versions of songs, music, and stories shared by communities. As technologies and methodologies have advanced, the task of gathering music has been taken up by a much broader group than scholars. The resulting collections created by these various people can be impacted by the individual collectors' political and social concerns, cultural inclinations, and even simple happenstance, demonstrating a crucial yet underexplored relationship between the music and those preserving it.Collecting Music in the Aran Islands, a critical historiographical study of the practice of documenting traditional music, is the first to focus on the archipelago off the west coast of Ireland. Deirdre NI Chonghaile argues for a culturally equitable framework that considers negotiation, collaboration, canonization, and marginalization to fully understand the immensely important process of musical curation. In presenting four substantial, historically valuable collections from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, she illustrates how understanding the motivations and training (or lack thereof) of individual music collectors significantly informs how we should approach their work and contextualize their place in the folk music canon.

The prince no longer kisses the princess, Cinderella helps her new husband to pick a new dress and the relationship between Mr Wolf and the three little pigs is a bit more complicated than you might have thought. In this collection of delightful, empowering and often magical tales, Kevin Walker creates and adapts a host of stories for the LGBTQ+ community. These sometimes traditional and sometimes modern tales show queer people that they belong not only in today's world, but also in a storytelling tradition going back centuries, if not millennia. This is a wonderful collection for LGBTQ+ readers of all ages to enjoy and continue to tell for years to come, introducing characters who are romantic, brave, mysterious or fantastical - but always authentic.

This fully-illustrated book explores the concept of the monster in the Middle Ages, examining its philosophical and theological roots and analysing its symbolic function in medieval literature and art. Fascinating and comprehensive, this study of the grotesque in medieval aesthetic expression successfully brings together medieval research and modern criticism.

Fly away with Granny as she takes a magic carpet ride around the world, collecting a steadily increasing number of souvenirs from each exotic location This rhyming story will take young readers on an adventure to different countries while teaching them to count along the way.

Mythical creatures drawn largely from medieval travellers' tales, but encompassing civilisations from the Sumerians to the Wild West. A dictionary? No, this is really an astonishing ark filled with beasts from a fabulous zoo far more varied and entertaining than anything from ordinary natural history. From Abaia and Abath to Ziz and Zu, from the microscopic Gigelorum that nests in a mite's ear to the giant serpent Jormungandor who encircles the whole globe, there are beasts from every corner of man's imagination: the light-hearted Fearsome Critters of lumberjack tales find a place alongside the Sirrush of Babylon and the Winged Bulls of Assyria. Some of the fabulous beasts turn out to be real creatures in disguise - a Cameleopard is a kind of glamourised giraffe -while others are almost, but not quite, human. Among the six hundred entries are some which are full-scale essays in their own right, as on Phoenix or Giants; and just in case it seems as though the authors dreamt up the entire book, there is a detailed list of books for the would-be hunter in this mythical jungle.

Goddesses - Mythology - InspirationReaders who have enjoyed Warrior Goddess Training or Women Who Run with the Wolves will love Ann Shen's Legendary Ladies Goddesses from mythology: Goddess mythology from our past are celebrated in this lushly illustrated goddess book by Ann Shen, the author and artist who created Bad Girls Throughout History. Ann is an illustrator, letterer, and author based in Los Angeles who has created artwork for a number of publications, campaigns, products, and galleries. Explore the feminine divine and feel empowered: Legendary goddesses and powerful deities are celebrated in gorgeous artwork and enlightening essays to empower women. Lushly illustrated goddesses that you will love include: Aphrodite, the Greek goddess whose love overcame mortality Mazu, the Chinese deity who safely guides travelers home Lakshmi, the Hindu provider of fortune and prosperity Unique alternative to Goddess tarot cards or other gift items: Ann Shen's signature watercolors make Legendary Ladies a unique, gift-worthy homage to the mighty women within.

In the chaos that followed the death of Alexander the Great his distinguished marshal Seleucus was reduced to a fugitive, with only a horse to his name. But by the time of his own death, Seceucus had reconstructed the bulk of Alexander's empire, built Antioch, and become a king in his turn, one respected for justness in an age of cruelty. The dynasty he founded was to endure for three centuries. Such achievements richly deserved to be projected into legend, and so they were. This legend told of Seleucus' divine siring by Apollo, his escape from Babylon with an enchanted talisman, his foundations of cities along a dragon-river with the help of Zeus' eagles, his surrender of his new wife to his besotted son, and his revenge, as a ghost, upon his assassin. This is the first book in any language devoted to the reconstruction of this fascinating tradition.

Explore the sprawling network of culture to discover the incredible ways in which ideas connect to shape the world we see today. These mind-blowing essays dig down to the roots of stories, myths and literary genres, travelling from art to politics to history to folklore, and from high to popular culture and back again. Through an intricate web of sidenotes, embark on a voyage of discovery from the unluckiest book ever made to Viking horned helmets to the sex life of vampires .... or from mermaids frolicking in the margins to the ancient Amazons to the power of Amazon and on to Utopia and Atlantis ... This is western culture as you've never seen it before.

This colorfully illustrated multicultural Korean children's book presents Korean fairy tales and other folk stories--providing insight into a vibrant literary culture. Korean Children's Favorite Stories is a captivating collection of Korean folktales for children which are still being told, just as they have been for generations. Some are Korean-specific, while others echo those told in other countries. Written with wit and pathos, they unveil the inevitable foibles of people everywhere and expose the human-like qualities of animals and the animal-like qualities of humans. These Korean fables pulsate with the rhythm of life and the seasons, transporting the reader to a wonderland where ants talk, a baby rabbit outwits a tiger, a tree fathers a child, and a toad saves a whole village. Korean stories include: The Grateful Tiger: the story of a magical tiger, which demonstrates how empathy and kindness can affect your life in a positive way The Disowned Student: an intriguing tale of of a stolen identity and spirit The Pheasant, the Dove and the Magpie: the story of three ungrateful birds, one tough mouse, and why pheasants' cheeks are red And more...