folklore

Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature Series

Singers and Tales in the Twenty-First Century

Grounded in the intellectual legacies of two pioneering scholars of oral literature, Milman Parry (1902–1935) and Albert Lord (1912–1991), Singers and Tales in the Twenty-First Century gathers reflections on what the study of oral poetry might mean today across diverse poetic traditions, especially in light of ongoing global transformations that have dramatically reshaped and destabilized the very notion of tradition. This collection of essays spans disciplinary perspectives from Classics and comparative literature… Read more

Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature Series

Wild Songs, Sweet Songs: The Albanian Epic in the Collections of Milman Parry and Albert B. Lord

In the 1930s, Milman Parry and Albert B. Lord, two pioneering scholars of oral poetry, conducted adventurous fieldwork in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia and northern Albania, collecting singularly important examples of Albanian epic song. Wild Songs, Sweet Songs presents these materials, which have not previously been published, for the first time. Nicola Scaldaferri and his collaborators provide a complete catalogue of the Albanian texts and recordings collected by Parry and Lord; a selection… Read more

Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature Series

Embroidered with Gold, Strung with Pearls: The Traditional Ballads of Bosnian Women

Bosnian traditional ballads have intrigued many by their beauty and eloquence, from Goethe’s poetic interest in them in the eighteenth century to the work of twentieth-century scholars such as Milman Parry and Albert Lord. These songs are now available to the English reader in a bilingual edition offering a selection of never before translated or published materials from Harvard University’s Parry Collection. The forty oral ballads, many appearing in multiple… Read more

Curated Books

Heat and Lust: Hesiod’s Midsummer Festival Scene Revisited

J.C.B. Petropoulos examines the description of midsummer in Hesiod’s Works and Days, explores modern Greek agrarian practices and relevant folk beliefs, proverbs, symbols, and songs, and cautiously attempts a ‘backward extrapolation’. With the help of comparative ethnographic models, readers will not only better appreciate the seasonal settings of Hesiod’s harvest and its midsummer aftermath, but also will obtain a provocative sidelight into the local song traditions and general lore that… Read more

Curated Books

Greek Mythology and Poetics

Gregory Nagy here provides a far-reaching assessment of the relationship between myth and ritual in ancient Greek society. Nagy illuminates in particular the forces of interaction and change that transformed the Indo-European linguistic and cultural heritage into distinctly Greek social institutions between the eighth and the fifth centuries B.C. Included in the volume are thirteen of Nagy’s major essays—all extensively revised for book publication—on various aspects of the Hellenization of… Read more