Download or read book Land of Women written by Lisa M. Bitel and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 1998 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "This book disperses the shadows in an obscure but important landscape. Lisa Bitel addresses both the history of women in early Ireland and the history of myth, legend, and superstition which surrounded them. It is a powerful and exact book and an invaluable addition to our expanding sense of Ireland through the eyes of Irish women."--Eavan Boland, author of In a Time of Violence: Poems"It is refreshing to read in a book by a woman on medieval women that not all clerics hated women and that not all men were oversexed villains consciously bent on exploiting women. [Bitel] challenges not only the medieval Irish male construct of female behavior, but she is also courageous enough to question constructs of medieval women invented by modern Irish medieval historians."--Times Higher Education Supplement

Download or read book From Girl to Goddess written by Valerie Estelle Frankel and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2014-01-10 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Many are familiar with Joseph Campbell's theory of the hero's journey, the idea that every man from Moses to Hercules grows to adulthood while battling his alter-ego. This book explores the universal heroine's journey as she quests through world myth. Numerous stories from cultures as varied as Chile and Vietnam reveal heroines who battle for safety and identity, thereby upsetting popular notions of the passive, gentle heroine. Only after she has defeated her dark side and reintegrated can the heroine become the bestower of wisdom, the protecting queen and arch-crone. Instructors considering this book for use in a course may request an examination copy here.

Download or read book Women Myth and the Feminine Principle written by Bettina Liebowitz Knapp and published by SUNY Press. This book was released on 1998-01-01 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book begins by probing the "Divine Feminine" in Tibet's Gesar of Ling, one of the most fascinating myths of all time. Especially intriguing is the hero's seemingly continuous dependency on the feminine principle for guidance. The heroine in Kalidasa's Sanskrit drama, Sakuntala focuses on the obstacles set in Sakuntala's earthly trajectory, and how these were instrumental in her evolution from the stage of passive, unconscious, and withdrawn archetypal Maiden to that of the conscious, decisive, strong spiritual Mother. To explore the highly complex personalities of Kriemhild and Brunhild in the High German Nibelungenlied is to enter the realm of sun and shadow, the lightened regions of consciousness and the deep interiors of primal darkness.

Download or read book The Woman s Hand written by Paul Gordon Schalow and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume has a dual purpose. It aims to define the state of Japanese literary studies in the field of women's writing and to present cross-cultural interpretations of Japanese material of relevance to contemporary work in gender studies and comparative literature.

Download or read book Middle English Legends of Women Saints written by Martha G Blalock and published by Medieval Institute Publications. This book was released on 2003-03-01 with total page 324 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Middle English Legends of Women Saints presents a collection of saints' Lives intended to suggest the diversity of possibilities beneath the supposedly fixed and predictable surfaces of the legends, using multiple retellings of the same legend to illustrate that medieval readers and listeners did not just passively receive saints' legends but continually and actively appropriated them. The collection opens with legends about two royal (or supposedly royal) women, Frideswide and Mary Magdelen, and continues with those of three popular virgin martyrs, Margaret of Antioch, Christina of Tyre, and Katherine of Alexandria. The final portion of the collection is devoted to St. Anne, mother of the Virgin Mary. The collection includes a number of relatively unknown texts that have not appeared in print since Horstmann's transcriptions in the nineteenth century and a few that have never before been published.

Download or read book The Silver Arm written by Ariele Sieling and published by www.ArieleSieling.com. This book was released on 2021-06-25 with total page 110 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Maybelle works as a mechanic fixing bots and ships on Rove City and she loves it. Her life should be good. Except that her merchant father hasn’t returned from his most recent trip, her younger sisters need more than she can give them, and the family is quickly running out of money. Not to mention, Gabor, a local security guard, has decided he deserves Maybelle’s affections—at any cost. She’s managing, until Gabor takes his attentions one step too far: he threatens her sisters. Maybelle realizes that she can’t protect them alone—it’s time to track her father down. But when she finally finds him, she discovers that it’s not that simple. He’s being held prisoner by Amarok, a temperamental cyborg who will only let her father go under one condition: Maybelle stays behind in his place. For the sake of her sisters, she agrees, but soon discovers that there is far more to Amarok than meets the eye. The longer she stays on board his ship, the clearer it is that something strange is going on—but she doesn’t know what it is or how to fix it. The Silver Arm is a science fiction retelling of Beauty and the Beast, and the third in the Rove City series.

Download or read book Hook s Regret written by Ariele Sieling and published by www.ArieleSieling.com. This book was released on with total page 108 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For nearly thirty years, Penny has searched the galaxy for her missing son. She has a reputation throughout the solar systems as a relentless mother on a mission—and as a woman who won’t let the chronic pain she suffers prevent her from achieving her goal. Then Penny gets a tip. Someone on Rove City might have a clue to her son’s whereabouts. This will probably be a dud, just like the last hundred tips, but she decides to try one last time. If she still can’t find him, she’ll settle down and live out her days on a nearby planet, and maybe try to find some peace for the first time in her life. When the tip turns out to be a double cross, she finds herself flying across the galaxy toward a mysterious planet said to be inhabited by ghosts, with two disreputable people who she absolutely cannot trust—and still with no idea where her son is. Penny must confront her own hopes, fears, and grief over her lost boy as she hurtles through space, destination unknown. Hook’s Regret is the fourth book in the Rove City series, and a retelling of Peter Pan.

Download or read book The Myth of Persephone in Girls Fantasy Literature written by Holly Blackford and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2012-04-23 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the myth of Persephone and Demeter as it informs the development of a long discourse about civilization, the development of children, child psychology, and fantasy literature. The pattern in the myth of girls who descend into underworlds and negotiate a partial return to the earth is a marked feature of girls’ literature, and the cycle also reflects the change of seasons and fertility/death. Tracing the parallel between the myth and girls’ literature enables an understanding of how female development is mourned but deemed necessary for the reproduction of culture. Blackford looks at the function of toys in children’s literature as a representation of the myth’s narcissus, combining this approach with classic interpretations of the myth as expressive of female psychology, mother-daughter object-relations, hieros gamos (fertility coupling) rituals, transition from matriarchal to patriarchal order, and excursions into the creative/artistic unconscious. The story of Persephone’s separation from her mother and abduction into the underworld is explored as an expression of ambivalence about female development in works such as Hoffmann’s Nutcracker and Mouse King, Alcott’s Little Women, Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, Barrie’s Peter and Wendy, Burnett’s The Secret Garden, White’s Charlotte’s Web, Rowling’s Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Meyer’s Twilight, and Gaiman’s Coraline. With this book, Blackford offers a consideration of how literature for the young squares with broader canons, how classics flexibly and uniquely speak through novels that enjoy broad appeal, and how female traditions are embedded in novels by both men and women.

Download or read book Encyclopedia of Beasts and Monsters in Myth Legend and Folklore written by Theresa Bane and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2016-05-22 with total page 428 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Here there be dragons"--this notation was often made on ancient maps to indicate the edges of the known world and what lay beyond. Heroes who ventured there were only as great as the beasts they encountered. This encyclopedia contains more than 2,200 monsters of myth and folklore, who both made life difficult for humans and fought by their side. Entries describe the appearance, behavior, and cultural origin of mythic creatures well-known and obscure, collected from traditions around the world.

Download or read book Dramatic Revisions of Myths Fairy Tales and Legends written by Verna A. Foster and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2012-10-10 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: These new essays explore the ways in which contemporary dramatists have retold or otherwise made use of myths, fairy tales and legends from a variety of cultures, including Greek, West African, North American, Japanese, and various parts of Europe. The dramatists discussed range from well-established playwrights such as Tony Kushner, Caryl Churchill, and Timberlake Wertenbaker to new theatrical stars such as Sarah Ruhl and Tarell Alvin McCraney. The book contributes to the current discussion of adaptation theory by examining the different ways, and for what purposes, plays revise mythic stories and characters. The essays contribute to studies of literary uses of myth by focusing on how recent dramatists have used myths, fairy tales and legends to address contemporary concerns, especially changing representations of women and the politics of gender relations but also topics such as damage to the environment and political violence.

Download or read book In Her Own Image written by Ingrid Wendt and published by Feminist Press at CUNY. This book was released on 1980 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The work of Western women artists, past and present, is collected here in a stunning array of forms: fiction, poetry, autobiography, essay, journal and letter writing, sculpture, painting, graphics, photography, ceramics, needlework, music, and dance. The unique experience of women artists from diverse national, ethnic, racial, and economic backgrounds is explored from their own viewpoints, as are the relationships between women's social condition and women's art.

Download or read book Thematic Guide to World Mythology written by Lorena Laura Stookey and published by Bloomsbury Publishing USA. This book was released on 2004-03-30 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: All around the world, myths address questions that humans have always posed about their origins, their environments, their ultimate destinies, and the meanings of their lives. This book examines 30 common motifs that thread their way through mythological tales across history and around the globe. The themes are presented in alphabetical order, moving from The Afterlife and Animals in Myth to The Underworld, World Tree, and Ymir Motif. Each thematic section defines and discusses a single recognizable motif, compares a number of different mythological traditions, and traces the repeated occurrences of one of these patterns through several different categories of narratives. The discussion of The Afterlife, for example, examines the theme's earliest known occurrences in ancient Mesopotamia and compares them with those in Greek, Aztec, Norse, and other ancient cultures, as well as with contemporary views from Innuit and Polynesian cultures. A glossary provides concise definitions of recurring terms. A list of suggested readings on these topics will further aid students who desire to deepen their knowledge of world mythology.

Download or read book Women Gender Religion written by E. Castelli and published by Springer. This book was released on 2001-01-01 with total page 552 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This up-to-date and forward-looking collection of essays on gender and religion fills a crucial gap. Interdisciplinary and multi-traditional, this volume highlights the contributions that different disciplinary approaches make to feminist/gender studies and religion. Designed for the classroom, the Reader simultaneously assesses the state of the field and raises questions for further inquiry and investigation.

Download or read book Women Androgynes and Other Mythical Beasts written by Wendy Doniger and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 1982-11-15 with total page 408 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "An important, provocative and original work, of great interest to Indian scholars, historians of religions, psychologists and historians of ideas, but accessible also to the cultivated reader. Even if one does not always agree with the author's interpretation, one cannot but admire her vast and precise learning, her splendid translations and exegesis of so many, and so different, Sanskrit texts, and her uninhibited, brilliant, and witty prose."—Mircea Eliade, University of Chicago "This is . . . a book which is as rich in detail as the carvings of the great Hindu temples. It shares with them a delight in the interplay of myth and mundane experience, and above all an empathy with the Hindu preoccupation with the meaning of human existence in all its complexity."—G. M. Carstairs, Times Literary Supplement

Download or read book Anthropology and Religion written by Robert L. Winzeler and published by Rowman Altamira. This book was released on 2008 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawing from ethnographic examples found throughout the world, this text covers what anthropologists know or think about religion, how they have studied it, and how they interpret or explain it. A key text for students of upper division courses in the anthropological study of religion.

Download or read book Life Between the Tides written by Adam Nicolson and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2022-02-22 with total page 298 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Adam Nicolson explores the marine life inhabiting seashore rockpools with a scientist’s curiosity and a poet’s wonder in this beautifully illustrated book. The sea is not made of water. Creatures are its genes. Look down as you crouch over the shallows and you will find a periwinkle or a prawn, a claw-displaying crab or a cluster of anemones ready to meet you. No need for binoculars or special stalking skills: go to the rocks and the living will say hello. Inside each rock pool tucked into one of the infinite crevices of the tidal coastline lies a rippling, silent, unknowable universe. Below the stillness of the surface course different currents of endless motion—the ebb and flow of the tide, the steady forward propulsion of the passage of time, and the tiny lifetimes of the rock pool’s creatures, all of which coalesce into the grand narrative of evolution. In Life Between the Tides, Adam Nicolson investigates one of the most revelatory habitats on earth. Under his microscope, we see a prawn’s head become a medieval helmet and a group of “winkles” transform into a Dickensian social scene, with mollusks munching on Stilton and glancing at their pocket watches. Or, rather, is a winkle more like Achilles, an ancient hero, throwing himself toward death for the sake of glory? For Nicolson, who writes “with scientific rigor and a poet’s sense of wonder” (The American Scholar), the world of the rock pools is infinite and as intricate as our own. As Nicolson journeys between the tides, both in the pools he builds along the coast of Scotland and through the timeline of scientific discovery, he is accompanied by great thinkers—no one can escape the pull of the sea. We meet Virginia Woolf and her Waves; a young T. S. Eliot peering into his own rock pool in Massachusetts; even Nicolson’s father-in-law, a classical scholar who would hunt for amethysts along the shoreline, his mind on Heraclitus and the other philosophers of ancient Greece. And, of course, scientists populate the pages; not only their discoveries, but also their doubts and errors, their moments of quiet observation and their thrilling realizations. Everything is within the rock pools, where you can look beyond your own reflection and find the miraculous an inch beneath your nose. “The soul wants to be wet,” Heraclitus said in Ephesus twenty-five hundred years ago. This marvelous book demonstrates why it is so. Includes Color and Black-and-White Photographs

Download or read book The Woman Who Raised the Buddha written by Wendy Garling and published by Shambhala Publications. This book was released on 2021-03-23 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nautilus Book Award Winner The first full biography of Mahaprajapati Gautami, the woman who raised the Buddha--examining her life through stories and canonical records. Mahaprajapati was the only mother the Buddha ever knew. His birth mother, Maya, died shortly after childbirth, and her sister Mahaprajapati took the infant to her breast, nurturing and raising him into adulthood. While there is a lot of ambiguity overall in the Buddha's biography, this detail remains consistent across all Buddhist traditions and literature. In this first full biography of Mahaprajapati, The Woman Who Raised the Buddha presents her life story, with attention to her early years as sister, queen, matriarch, and mother, as well as her later years as a nun. Drawing from story fragments and canonical records, Wendy Garling reveals just how exceptional Mahaprajapati's role was as leader of the first generation of Buddhist women, helping the Buddha establish an equal community of lay and monastic women and men. Mother to the Buddha, mother to early Buddhist women, mother to the Buddhist faith, Mahaprajapati's journey is finally presented as one interwoven with the founding of Buddhism.