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The Runes of Elfland
Ari Berk, Brian Froud

Harry N. Abrams, 2003 - 112 pages

average customer review:based on 11 reviews
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   highly recommended  highly recommended



The kind of stories that don't exist anymore.

Let's face it, the majority of stories we tell each other these days is nothing but gossip. Gone are the days of fables and poems and limericks. Stories like this are considered bedtime rituals for kids rather than something important that we can learn from.

Brian Froud and Ari Berk team up in this book to deliver 24 stories (some short, some long) based on ancient culture, each one with a twist in the tale and the meaning of of it laid out afterwards. A runic code is also featured for every one, that takes a few minutes to unravel. But once you get familiar with the Key, it'll be easier for you.

Some of these stories are easy to identify with, but some are really out there. Since Berk has a degree in Modern, Classic and Medieval English Literature you can expect him to have pretty diverse writing skills. All of the stories may be set in the same world but you'll never know where he'll go in the next one.

Froud's paintings are definitely interesting and vivid, but I'd be hard-pushed to call them beautiful. Some are so abstract and weird that I could look at it for ages and still not fully understand it's point.

It took quite a while to get through this book. A lot of patience is needed to decipher the codes and I'm not the kind of guy who can read several different fables in one night. It does make for a good bedtime read for kids and adults though. But I wouldn't expect many children to appreciate the book at all.


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Really Good

I liked the book a lot. It was captivating and interisting.The illustrations were originall, and Brian Froud did a good job doing them. It was all around awesome!!! :)









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Praise for "The Runes of Elfland"

In the Age of Technology, it is a testament to myth's eternal power to inspire that a book like "The Runes of Elfland" by Brian Froud and Dr. Ari Berk has come into being. At once whimsical, passionate, solemn, and joyful, each page is a gift, a fresh breeze that blows across the mind and takes the reader to a special place uncorrupted by that which is easily acquired and jealously owned.

Myth and runes are owned by no one; they are tools by which we can escape into the unexplored corners of our minds, and one could want for no better guides than Froud and Berk. The point and counterpoint of the work is exquisitely displayed as you turn each page and presents something certain to affect everyone who looks at the book, if even for a moment.

As always, there is darkness and sensuality in even the most innocent picture, as Froud's faeries peer out from the corners of the pages, yet even the most sinister picture has some measure of beauty. Berk's words are soaring poetry, written with a deft touch that presents a deep scholarship in mythic conventions without being pretentious or pontifical.

While the book claims to be nothing more than, as Berk says, "a process of seeing, listening, and remembering," this is expert and elegant storytelling that respects the reader and the material. In fact, it is even more because through these words and images, we gain (or re-gain) the power to appreciate not only the "landscapes in [our] memory," but the land itself. No matter your spiritual orientation, there is something to be gained and cherished from the journey you take each time you open this wonderful book.


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The magic of storytelling is reborn here

This book is a series of fantastic retellings of old stories of myth that are associated with the runic alphabet of Northern European prehistory. The Rune of Protection, for instance, is a retelling of "The Waking of Angantyr" from the Elder Edda. All these associative stories are incorporated into a mystical world known as "Elf-Land", both illuminated by Dr. Berk and envisioned by the reknowned fantasy artist, Brian Froud (most known for his book "Faeries" and having done conceptual art for the Jim Henson movies "Labyrinth" and "Dark Crystal")

I've had the pleasure of being a student in several of Dr. Berk's classes at Central Michigan University, and I can say that his way of looking at the world through the folklore of generations has profoundly changed my own view. It is great seeing his vision of the world on the printed page, and complimented so beautifully by the illustrations of Mr. Froud, who is a good friend of his and a current collaborator.

This book is a must-have for both lovers of fantasy and of folklore. It has many profound teachings by ways of courtesy in the realm of nature and the invisible world of Faerie, brought forth excellently by Dr. Berk's unique language.

For a closer look at Berk and Froud's somewhat eccentric "academic" relationship, check out "Goblins!" which was released in Nov. 2004. It is a new volume in the Lady Cottington series, under a sort of Faerie ethnological study of those pesky creatures that cause us so much woe.


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great book but...

it has less correlation to traditional runes that i would have liked. For instance, the traditional futhark order isn't observed, nor are the traditional names of the runes given. However, the pictures and stories are wonderful, and the book lends a new and creative perspective to runework which is at once easy to understand and very cryptic.


reviews: page 1, 2, 3



In 24 never-before-seen paintings, best-selling fantasy artist Brian Froud interprets the ancient and mystical runes of Celtic and European origin through Elfland, a world of faeries and myth. Each painting is inspired by a specific rune, richly symbolic and potent icons open to infinite interpretations. In the hands of the exceptional folklorist and poet Ari Berk, the secret meanings of these runes are revealed and their power is made manifest. In the pages of this book a single symbol provides the visual key to a host of mythic stories, lands, and adventures. By using the runes and Froud's paintings as tools to explore both the "seen" and the "unseen" world, readers of The Runes of Elfland will be inspired to reimagine their own lives and tell their own tales. Both storybook and oracle, Runes of Elfland provides a wellspring of personal insight for the Froud fan and the Faery aficionado.


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