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329 books match the query 'Folklore & Mythology' and 5 start with g

cover of George Magoon and the Down East Game War: History, Folklore, and the Law

George Magoon and the Down East Game War

History, Folklore, and the Law

Edward D. Ives

University of Illinois Press, 1988

George Magoon (1851-1929), a notorious
  moose and deer poacher in Maine, was the hero of scores of funny stories of
  how he outwitted game wardens. Preserving these oral histories, Edward Ives
  documents Magoon's life and explores his significance as a folk hero within
  the context of the conservation movement, the cult of the sportsman, and Maine's
  increasingly restrictive game laws.
"A rich and subtle book, an
  important work by a major scholar. . . . It is a major contribution to folklore
  studies, and to history and American studies as well."
  -- Journal of American Folklore
 
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cover of Global Tarantella: Reinventing Southern Italian Folk Music and Dances

Global Tarantella

Reinventing Southern Italian Folk Music and Dances

Incoronata Inserra

University of Illinois Press, 2017

Tarantella, a genre of Southern Italian folk music and dance, is an international phenomenon--seen and heard in popular festivals, performed across the Italian diaspora, even adapted for New Age spiritual practices. The boom in popularity has diversified tarantella in practice while setting it within a host of new, unexpected contexts. Incoronata Inserra ventures into the history, global circulation, and recontextualization of this fascinating genre. Examining tarantella's changing image and role among Italians and Italian Americans, Inserra illuminates how factors like tourism, translation, and world music venues have shifted the ethics of place embedded in the tarantella cultural tradition. Once rural, religious, and rooted, tarantella now thrives in settings urban, secular, migrant, and ethnic. Inserra reveals how the genre's changing dynamics contribute to reimagining Southern Italian identity. At the same time, they translate tarantella into a different kind of performance that serves new social and cultural groups and purposes. Indeed, as Inserra shows, tarantella's global growth promotes a reassessment of gender relations in the Italian South and helps create space for Italian and Italian-American women to reclaim gendered aspects of the genre.
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cover of Gods and Heroes of the Greeks: The "Library" of Apollodorus

Gods and Heroes of the Greeks

The "Library" of Apollodorus

Michael Simpson

University of Massachusetts Press, 1976

The immortal characters of Greek mythology enact their dramas, conflicts, and passions in the Library of Apollodorus. Probably composed in the first century A.D., it is the only Greek handbook of mythology to survive antiquity, and is a major source of our knowledge of Greek myths. 

Beginning with the birth of the gods and ending with the death of Odysseus, the Library traces the destinies of such great mythic figures as Prometheus, Oedipus, Heracles, Daedalus, and the heroes of the Trojan War. Sir James G. Frazer called the Library “an accurate record of what the Greeks in general believed about the origin an early history of the world and their race.” 

Michael Simpson’s new translation captures the fine simplicity and straightforwardness of the original. Leonard Baskin’s drawings throw a unique contemporary light on this ancient world. 

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cover of Gods, Demons, and Others

Gods, Demons, and Others

R. K. Narayan llustrated by R. K. Laxman

University of Chicago Press, 1993

Following in the footsteps of the storytellers of his native India, R. K. Narayan has produced his own versions of tales taken from the Ramayana and the Mahabarata. Carefully selecting those stories which include the strongest characters, and omitting the theological or social commentary that would have drawn out the telling, Narayan informs these fascinating myths with his urbane humor and graceful style.

"Mr. Narayan gives vitality and an original viewpoint to the most ancient of legends, lacing them with his own blend of satire, pertinent explanation and thoughtful commentary."—Santha Rama Rau, New York Times

"Narayan's narrative style is swift, firm, graceful, and lucid . . . thoroughly knowledgeable, skillful, entertaining. One could hardly hope for more."—Rosanne Klass, Times Literary Supplement

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cover of Grayhawk's Native American Folktales

Grayhawk's Native American Folktales

Grayhawk Perkins

University of Alabama Press, 2025

Beloved Houma/Choctaw storyteller Grayhawk Perkins shares age-old wisdom in an unforgettable collection of folktales.

Grayhawk’s Native American Folktales is the eagerly awaited collection of stories by Grayhawk Perkins, a noted Houma storyteller from Louisiana. Drawing on traditional Indigenous tales, Grayhawk transforms these narratives into stories that captivate contemporary readers and audiences.

The collection features universal animal characters such as Deer, Rabbit, Bobcat, Turtle, and Snake that embody a variety of traits. Their adventures and challenges in the natural world reveal human behavior and lessons about how to treat others. Creation stories explain how the world and its inhabitants came to be, including the diligent Crawfish, the origin of skunk stripes, and why opossums are white. Although written for children ages 7 to 12 and their families, all will be charmed by Grayhawk’s contributions to Indigenous literature.

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