Stories Of Trees, Woods, And, Stafford, Fiona

Trees have starred in stories ever since Ovid described the nymph Daphnes metamorphosis into a laurel, and the landscape of literature has long been enlivened by wild woodlands, sacred groves, and fertile orchards. This delightful collection ranges from Ovid to Austen and from Robin Hoods Sherwood Forest (via Thomas Love Peacocks Maid Marian) to Washington Irvings The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

Here are forest-haunted fairy tales both classic (the Brothers Grimm) and inventively retold (Angela Carter). There is room in these woods for comedy as well as terror, in Stella Gibbonss Cold Comfort Farm, and Alexander McCall Smiths Head Tree. Notable writers from around the world contribute arboreal fiction--from South Africa, Finland, France, Zimbabwe, Russia, Martinique, and India, as well as Britain, Ireland, Canada, and America. From Daphne du Mauriers The Apple Tree to R. K. Narayans Under the Banyan Tree, the sheer range of stories in these pages will leave readers refreshed and dazzled.