Having grown up in an isolated forest, Beaufils sets off for Camelot to find his father and winds up undertaking quests with Sirs Gawain and Galahad, visiting various hermits, and traveling to the fairy world.

How have fairy tales from around the world changed over the centuries? What do they tell us about different cultures and societies? Spanning the years from 900 to 1500 and traversing geographical borders, from England to France and India to China, this book uniquely examines the tales told, translated, adapted and circulated during the period known as the Middle Ages. Scholars in history, literature and cultural studies explore the development of epic tales of heroes and monsters and enchanted romance narratives. Examining how tales evolved and functioned across different societies during the Middle Ages, this book demonstrates how the plots, themes and motifs used in medieval tales influenced later developments in the genre. An essential resource for researchers, scholars and students of literature, history and cultural studies, this volume explores themes including: forms of the marvelous, adaptation, gender and sexuality, humans and non-humans, monsters and the monstrous, spaces, socialization, and power. A Cultural History of Fairy Tales (6-volume set) A Cultural History of Fairy Tales in Antiquity is also available as a part of a 6-volume set, A Cultural History of Fairy Tales, tracing fairy tales from antiquity to the present day, available in print, or within a fully-searchable digital library accessible through institutions by annual subscription or on perpetual access (see www.bloomsburyculturalhistory.com). Individual volumes for academics and researchers interested in specific historical periods are also available digitally via www.bloomsburycollections.com.

The English Romance in Time is a study of English romance across the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It explores romance motifs - quests and fairy mistresses, passionate heroines and rudderless boats and missing heirs - from the first emergence of the genre in French and Anglo-Norman in the twelfth century down to the early seventeenth. This is a continuous story, since the same romances that constituted the largest and most sophisticated body of secular fiction in the Middle Ages went on to enjoy a new and vibrant popularity at all social levels in black-letter prints as the pulp fiction of the Tudor age. This embedded culture was reworked for political and Reformation propaganda and for the 'writing of England', as well as providing a generous reservoir of good stories and dramatic plots. The different ways in which the same texts were read over several centuries, or the same motifs shifted meaning as understanding and usage altered, provide a revealing and sensitive measure of historical and cultural change. The book accordingly looks at those processes of change as well as at how the motifs themselves work, to offer a historical semantics of the language of romance conventions. It also looks at how politics and romance intersect - the point where romance comes true. The historicizing of the study of literature is belatedly leading to a wider recognition that the early modern world is built on medieval foundations. This book explores both the foundations and the building. Similarly, generic theory, which previously tended to operate on transhistorical assumptions, is now acknowledging that genre interacts crucially with cultural context - with changing audiences and ideologies and means of dissemination. The generation into which Spenser and Shakespeare were born was the last to be brought up on a wide range of medieval romances in their original forms, and they could therefore exploit their generic codings in new texts aimed at both elite and popular audiences. Romance may since then have lost much of its cultural centrality, but the universal appeal of these same stories has continued to fuel later works from Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress to C.S. Lewis and Tolkien.

This volume recommends some 500 positive, heart-warming stories for young readers—stories of the human spirit and what it can accomplish; stories of loving families surviving crises in positive ways; historical tales full of quick-witted people (especially girls); fairy tales with strong women; true stories of survival; and more. These gentle and uplifting reads span every genre—from science fiction and fantasy, to mysteries, realistic fiction, biographies, and nonfiction. They are Accelerated Reader titles, Reading Counts titles, and Junior Library Guild selections. Primarily intended for grades 5 to 9, this is a list of reading suggestions for the young adult who wants a great read but does not want to be offended. Grades 5-9.

“Adventure, magic, love, and knights of the realm collide in this delightfully witty tale . . . this romp through the land of King Arthur is a gem.” —School Library Journal Luneta is tired of living in dull Orkney with her mother and father (who happens to be the most boring knight of King Arthur’s Round Table). She prides herself on always getting what she wants, so when the opportunity presents itself, she jumps at the chance to stay at a family friend’s castle near Camelot. Her handsome cousin, Sir Ywain—a young knight seeking adventure—arrives just in time to escort her to King Arthur’s court. Along the way they pick up a knight-turned-fool named Rhience, whose wit and audacity set many a puffed-up personality in its place. Before arriving at Lady Laudine’s castle, the trio stops at Camelot, where they hear the story of the Storm Stone, a magical object deep in the forest that soon sweeps everyone into a web of love, betrayal, and more than a bit of magic. Filled with broken promises, powerful enchantresses, unconventional sword fights, fierce and friendly lionesses, mysterious knights, and damsels in and out of distress, The Lioness and Her Knight proves itself as witty and adventuresome as the rest of Gerald Morris’s tales from King Arthur’s court. “Morris balances farce and drama with ease, and his main characters are memorable, sympathetic, and frequently hilarious.” —The Horn Book “Clever, funny and wise . . . Once again, Morris brilliantly re-animates an old story, keeping readers engaged while gently, genially urging them to ruminate over the truths at its heart.” —Kirkus Reviews

“Gracefully interweav[es] Arthurian legend, realistic and magical elements, humor, and heartbreak . . . an engrossing conclusion to a notable series.” —Booklist In this final installment of the Squire’s Tale series, Terence and his fellow Knights of the Round Table must come together in a last stand to save Camelot. The characters Gerald Morris has brought to life throughout his series—Terence and Gawain, Lynet and Gaheris, Luneta and Rhience, Dinadan and Palomides—each have an important role to play in this climactic final conflict. Maintaining their faith, selflessness, and honor, Arthur’s court bands together to try to defeat Morgause and Mordred and banish the dark magic from England forever. “Morris pulls off a spectacular conclusion to his humane and witty Squire’s Tales series as destructive intrigues both provide a backdrop for a fan-pleasing reunion of favorite figures from past episodes and lead up to the final battle between Arthur and his brilliant, hideously warped son Mordred . . . Well done.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) “The knights’ simplicity, honor, and kitchen-table philosophizing will continue to entrance readers, straight through to the end of this thrilling, elegiac, hope-from-the-ashes saga.” —The Horn Book (starred review) “In this final title in the series, Morris once again makes the adventure, excitement, and magic of King Arthur and his court accessible to every reader . . . An excellent end to a worthwhile and well-written series that can be recommended to reluctant and skilled readers alike.” —School Library Journal

Third in the medieval fantasy series. “A perfectly delicious, not entirely serious, reimagining of part of Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur.”—Booklist Her castle under siege by an evil knight who keeps beheading all her would-be rescuers, Lady Lynet realizes the only way to get help is to get it herself. So one night she slips away and strikes out for King Arthur’s court where she hopes to find a gallant knight to vanquish the Knight of the Red Lands and free her castle. Gerald Morris’s Arthurian novel is a highly comic tale of hidden identities, mysterious knights, faeries and enchantments, damsels-in-distress, and true love. “In Morris’s third wry, sometimes hilarious, take on an Arthurian legend, a sharp-tongued young damosel gets an education in sorcery, intrigue and what true knighthood is all about . . . Fans of Gail Carson Levine’s Ella Enchanted, Patricia Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Chronicles and similarly lighthearted fantasy will be delighted.”—Kirkus Reviews “A rollicking treatment of a lesser-known episode from Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur . . . The novel is also enjoyable for its good-natured spoofing of the conventions of its medieval setting.”—School Library Journal “A rare action-fantasy that crosses age and gender lines.”—The Bulletin