The Shadows and Light Folktale Series: Discovering Story-Power
For a writer whose most famous book is about the biology of animal faeces, it may seem like a stretch to be creating stories with their roots in folktales.
Stories from the Arabian Gulf: Bu Draeyah, Um Homar and the Survival of Qatari Folktales
Two popular folktales of the Arab world tell of Bu Draeyah, a cruel sea creature, and Homarat Al-Guyla, a half-woman, half-donkey, who eats children.
Mermaid Folktales: A 19th Century History
During the nineteenth century, mermaids regularly appeared in art, literature, and music, as well as in the news, with reported public sightings recorded.
Folk Tales and Fairy Tales: Seven Miles of Steel Thistles
One of the things I wanted to do was to confront popular misconceptions about fairy tales, such as ‘fairy tales are all about princes rescuing princesses.’
A Pied Piper Mystery
hile the Pied Piper of Hamelin is undeniably a fairy tale, it’s uniquely grounded in real-world specifics – the date for one – June 26. That’s the date in 1284 when the town lost a significant portion of its population, a matter treated as fact in the first written allusion to the incidents, the initial […]