The Green Man : Tales from the Mythic Forest

by Ellen Datlow (Editor)

Other authorsNeil Gaiman (Author), Emma Bull (Author), Terri Windling (Editor), Charles de Lint (Author), Midori Snyder (Author), Charles Vess (Illustrator), Nina Kiriki Hoffman (Author), Kathe Koja M. Shayne Bell (Author), Bill Lewis Jeffrey Ford (Author)
Hardcover, 2002

Status

Available

Call number

808.80351

Collection

Publication

Viking Juvenile (2002), Edition: 3rd, Hardcover, 400 pages

Description

A collection of stories and poems by a variety of authors relating to the Green Man and other myths of the forest.

User reviews

LibraryThing member jedimarri
In "The Green Man: Tale from the Mythic Forest" we find a collection of stories all surrounding the legendary figure of the Green Man. The Green Man is a figure that has been seen through out mythic history in one form or another. He has been seen across many cultures, and there is even an
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appearance of a Green Woman from time to time. The authors in this anthology were challenged to write their own Green Men stories, stories rooted deep in the woods, and they rose to the challenge magnificently.

Some of these stories (and there are a few poems as well) feature a more traditional representation of the Green Man. Others take the concept, and dream it in an entirely different direction! I certainly found my imagination stimulated as read this variety of stories.

One thing that I found pretty interesting was the story by Charles de Lint called "Somewhere in My Mind There is a Painting Box." It continues the story of a girl named Lily that I first met in his children's book, "A Circle of Cats." It's sheer coincidence that I read the other book first, but it was a lot of fun to explore more of her character in a longer story!
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LibraryThing member nimoloth
I must say I enjoyed this very much. The stories were all very different in tone and setting, but all good too. I'm not sure if I had a favourite. "Charlie's Away" does stick out in my memory though, as does the one set in Central Park, and "Hunter's Moon" (which was slightly disturbing in a grey
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autumn twilight sort of way).
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LibraryThing member thioviolight
I so don't regret buying this book on impulse! Ellen Datlow/Terri Windling anthologies are really excellent reads! I'm not very much a nature person, but I do love trees. I think they're wonderful creations. The stories give me even more perspectives of the green.

I don't think I can choose a
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favourite story from the book. There are several that I really loved (like Tanith Lee's "Among the Leaves So Green" and Nina Kiriki Hoffman's "Grounded"). Of course there were also others that I didn't enjoy as much, but that's to be expected. There's always something in an anthology that wouldn't suit someone's taste. But there's certainly a lot in this one that suits mine!
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LibraryThing member cmbohn
I just found this collection of short stories at the library and it looked like fun. Like most collections, I really liked some of the stories, some were fun, but nothing special, and some were not my style at all. I did find some new authors to read - Tanith Lee and M. Shayne Bell both had stories
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I really enjoyed.
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LibraryThing member heinous-eli
This is a really great book. Like any anthology, it's a mixed bag, but none of the stories were actually awful. For being about the same topic, there are a remarkable number of genres represented in the book: poetry, urban fantasy, myth retelling, bildungsroman, magic realism, folktale retelling,
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and even a hint of Arthurian allusion in the last tale.
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LibraryThing member weeksj10
A great book that brings the ancient beings of the forests, some of the stories are modern, others are as ancient as the old trees, but they are all wonderful and enlightening. I love how it gives people a new way of looking at the woods/wild, and what lives there.
LibraryThing member Nialle
A few words on The Green Man. The words are as follows: Disappointing, undiverse, and adolescent. I picked up the book because I find fascinating both "the green man" as mythological figure and the carved figures of people with faces made of or exuding leaves, some of which date back before the
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common era (not the same; the two were conflated in the early 20th century by an amateur folklorist, and kudos to editor Terri Windling for explaining this in her informative introduction). Among other reasons for my interest, I have an ongoing fascination with the relationship between humans and forests (why do we anthropomorphize trees almost uniformly around the world, and sociomorphize forests?), especially in folklore, and I have a particular interest in small communities' relationships with highly localized mythological or religious figures. It also fascinates me to see how various writers render beings that are supposed to be both humanlike and alien (not just "green men"), which is one of the reasons I read fantastic fiction in the first place.This anthology contains a handful of stories that actually interest me conceptually, usually when the stories portray "green men" having a more complex relationship with humans and environment than simply being tricksters, environmentalists, or extralegal power wielders. Unfortunately, the balance of the stories either demonstrate the writer's desire to think of something "different" or are representative of the new wave of colloquialized bildungsromane about urban teens interacting with updated mythological creatures, most of which are shabby copycats of the work of Charles de Lint.
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LibraryThing member kmajort
One of my favorites....
LibraryThing member franoscar
Read for Science/Nature Challenge.
This is a collection of stories (mostly) and poems, written for the theme. The quality & interest vary. I found only one unreadable and several quite good. I noted these names: Delia Sherman, Michael Cadnum, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, and Emma Bull.
LibraryThing member Treebeard_404
I usually anticipate that 20-25% of a short-story collection will not be to my liking. So I was pleased to find only 1 story here that I just skipped over.

Awards

World Fantasy Award (Nominee — Anthology — 2003)
Locus Recommended Reading (Anthologies — 2002)
Best Fiction for Young Adults (Selection — 2003)

Language

Original publication date

2002-05-27
2020-03-24 (ebook)

Physical description

400 p.; 8.4 inches

ISBN

0670035262 / 9780670035267

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