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Tuesday, June 1, 2021

The Lore of Love (The Enchanted World)

 


               by Ellen Galford (Editor) & the Editors of Time-Life Books

          Publisher : Time-Life Books; First Edition (January 1, 1987)

                                         Hardcover, 143 pages

                                              Amazon Listing

“Love engendered dreams and nightmares, begat ecstasy or madness, inspired poetry and madness in equal measure. The human heart was its playground and its battlefield, but few folks were foolish enough to imagine that the human will was its master. Young people passed on charms that would, they hoped, enabled them to see the face or hear the name of a future mate. But they knew full well that they had no power to change what was thus disclosed to them.” 

As you might be able to guess, the theme of this volume are love stories, or trysts, which intersect with the macabre, the divine, or magic. Because of that a lot of the stories are very similar Boy A sees Girl B (or vice versa), falls in love, and either connives to win the other’s love, or the pair are in love but then separated for some reason. The denouement being the pair end up together, if not in this life, then the next. The art is superb as always, perfectly complimenting the stories with lush touching material. 

Love stories are ubiquitous. Tales from all over the world are here. From Heroic India, to Arthurian Legend, to Ancient Greece, to Aztec times, to Imperial China, to old Persia. Familiar ones such as the story of Narcissus to wild and odd tales like The Aztec’s Couple Reunion in Flames. Every story here is worth a gander. Volume seventeen here of The Enchanted World series is a treasure. 

For more readings, try books by Rex Hurst




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