(1982) of Beowulf the Anglo-Saxon poem, dating back to before AD 1000 is extended to
become an atmospheric horror-hero story by Charles Keeping’s chilling black and white
drawings. (Rosemary Sutcliff has also retold the story of Beowulf in prose as Beowulf:
Dragon Slayer (1966), while Ian Serraillier tells the tale in verse, Beowulf the Warrior
(1954)). As with Keeping’s illustrations for Leon Garfield and Edward Blishen’s sagas of
creation and the early Greek world, The God Beneath the Sea (1970) and The Golden
Shadow (1973), there is an overtone of sexuality which is often latent but at times explicit
in the early stories themselves.
Also at times chilled by northern mist and tempest is the Kalevala: The Land of Heroes
fragments of heroic songs collected by a nineteenth-century Finnish folklorist and poet,
Elias Lonnrot. These songs tell of Vainamoinen the Wise, Ilmarinen the Smith and the
hare-brained rogue, Lemminkainen, and of their feud with Mistress Louhi, the sorceress
of the bitter North. Ursula Synge has retold the stories in lyric prose in Kalevala: Heroic
Tales from Finland (1977); and a striking picture book for young children, Louhi Witch of
North Farm (1986) has text by Toni de Gerez and ice-cold pictures by Barbara Cooney.
Since Caxton printed Mallory’s Morte d’Arthur in 1485 the Arthurian romances have
attracted many scholarly retellings as well as popularised chapbook versions. Robin
Hood stories taken from early ballads and oral sources have also proliferated. From
America has come Howard Pyle’s grandly medieval cycle of both the Robin Hood (1883)
and Arthurian stories (1903). But perhaps the finest modern interpreter of the old hero
tales from the Middle Ages has been Rosemary Sutcliff. Her Arthurian trilogy remains
one of the most accessible and poetic yet scholarly versions for children and adults—The
Sword and the Circle: King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table (1981); The Light
Beyond the Forest: The Quest for the Holy Grail (1979); and The Road to Camlann: The
Death of King Arthur (1981). Her Tristan and Iseult (1971) pares away accretions to the
romantic love story to lay bare in taut narrative the stark tragedy of the star-crossed
lovers.
A latter-day Celtic revival was perhaps fuelled by the publication in 1949 of a
translation of the thirteenth-century Welsh classic, The Mabinogion by Gwyn Jones and
Thomas Jones. Here the story is dense and concentrated, and daunting to young
readers. More easily digestible are the tales from the Mabinogion included in Barbara
Leonie Picard’s Hero Tales from the British Isles (1963) and Gwyn Jones’s Welsh Legends
and Folktales (1955). Gwyn Jones and Kevin Crossley-Holland collaborated to tell in
measured prose Tales from the Mabinogion (1984) with strong, stylised illustrations by
Margaret Jones.
A comprehensive analysis of available editions of ‘myths, legends and fairy tales up to
1976 is Elizabeth Cook’s The Ordinary and the Fabulous (2nd edn, 1976), while Mary
Steele in 1989 compiled Traditional Tales: A Signal Bookguide which details then
available collections of legend and hero tales, Norse myths, Irish myths, Welsh legends,
Greek legends, Robin Hood stories and Traditional tales from around the world.
Perhaps one of the most useful references to world mythology is the Hodder and
Stoughton series of some twelve titles ranging from Gods, Men and Monsters from Greek
Mythology (1977) to Warriors, Gods and Spirits from Central American Mythology (1983).
Each volume sets the stories in their cultural and historical context, the retellings are
dramatic, vivid and arresting; the illustrations colourful and energetic. For children
170 MYTH AND LEGEND