7 h 23 minAudiobook7 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 7 h 23 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
A road, a stretch of water, a strange creature: any of them can lead beyond the world you know.
In More Celtic Fairy Tales, Joseph Jacobs gathers traditional stories where ordinary life stands close to powerful magic. The collection opens with The Fate of the Children of Lir. A father's love meets a stepmother's jealousy, and an enchantment forces the children into the shapes of swans.
In the Welsh story of Pwyll, Prince of Dyfed, a hunt leads Pwyll to an agreement with Arawn, a ruler of the otherworld. Elsewhere, bold adventurers and clever folk heroes face dangerous bargains, strange demands, and uncertain intentions. The mood shifts from playful cunning to grief and wonder, with loyalty and endurance tested along the way.
What you’ll discover
- The children of Lir Meet children caught between family love, jealousy, and the grief of a powerful enchantment.
- An otherworldly agreement Follow Pwyll from a meeting during a hunt into an agreement with the otherworld's ruler.
- Cunning under pressure Discover characters who rely on cleverness when strange demands and practical troubles press them.
- Magic with real dangers Enter tales where enchanted animals and unfamiliar beings make ordinary encounters uncertain.
- Laughter beside loss Move between playful tales of human foolishness and legends shaped by loyalty, loss, and endurance.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy fairy lore, tricksters, enchanted animals and old heroes will love this book. Its songs, jokes and lively voices also welcome readers who love sharing stories aloud in short sittings.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- Four royal children are turned into swans
- A boy with a quick wit becomes a master thief
- A promise made too quickly causes great trouble
- Strange gold and a faithful horse bring fortune
- A scholar faces a king's terrible hunger
- Foolish men are tricked by their own simple minds
- A talking fox helps a young gardener
- Magic helps those who treat others kindly
- Old heroes, riddles and a very short last tale
Who’s who
- JackA farmer's youngest son who steals by wit alone and wants to marry the squire's daughter.
- Anier MacConglinneyA young scholar from Armagh who sets out to cure King Cathal of his terrible hunger.
- SmallheadA despised eldest sister who follows her mother's advice and tries to protect her cruel half-sisters.
- The FoxA talking fox who guides the gardener's youngest son and scolds him when he lacks sense.
- FinThe hero of the Fians, whose smaller stature makes the Big Men take him for a dwarf.
- LusmoreA humpbacked basket maker whose good ear earns him a gift from the fairies of Knockgrafton.
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- Hardcover
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- Large print paperback
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- Large print hardcover
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Nouveaux contes de fées celtiques in 25 languages, side by side, paragraph by paragraph, once the book texts are online: the way to learn a language with a book you love.
Nouveaux contes de fées celtiques
by Joseph Jacobs · 1894
A king's four children become swans, and only a marriage can free them after nine hundred years.
Easy read5–10 hours to read25 languages
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In short
What would you do if a stepmother turned your four children into swans for nine hundred years? That is how More Celtic Fairy Tales begins.
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
Four royal children are turned into swans
The first tale is one of the three sorrowful tales of Erin. King Lir loses the contest for high king but is offered a bride to keep the peace. After his first wife dies, he marries her sister Oifa, and the four children of Lir are loved by everyone who sees them.
Oifa grows jealous. She drives the children into a lake and strikes them with a Druid wand, and they become white swans. They keep human speech and a music no one can match. She says the spell lasts nine hundred years, and ends only when Lairgnen of Connaught marries Deoch of Munster.
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What is More Celtic Fairy Tales about?
It is a collection of Irish and Highland tales retold by Joseph Jacobs. They include the swan children of Lir, Jack the Cunning Thief, Smallhead, the fox and the wolf, and old hero stories of Fin and Cormac.
Who collected the stories in More Celtic Fairy Tales?
Joseph Jacobs chose and retold them from earlier collectors. He praises collectors including Larminie, Hyde, Curtin, Kennedy and Campbell. He wrote that the Celtic tales were so rich that a whole clan of folklorists was needed to gather them.
Who is Fingula in the children of Lir?
Fingula is the eldest daughter of King Lir. After their stepmother turns the four children into swans, she sings songs of comfort and shelters her three brothers beneath her wings through years of wandering.
The author
Joseph Jacobs
1854–1916 · Australian folklorist and historian
Joseph Jacobs was born in Sydney, Australia, in 1854. He moved to England in 1872 and to the United States in 1900. He was a folklorist, historian, and writer. He published English Fairy Tales in 1890 and More English Fairy Tales in 1894. He died in Yonkers, New York, in 1916.
More by Joseph Jacobs
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