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Books

Spirit of place: the landscape of myth and magic

The medieval historian Carolyne Larrington finds tales of green men and black dogs still flourishing in 21st-century Britain

19 September 2015

8:00 AM

19 September 2015

8:00 AM

The Land of the Green Man: A Journey Through the Supernatural Landscapes of the British Isles Carolyne Larrington

I.B. Tauris, pp.256, £20, ISBN: 9781780769912

We live in disenchanted times. We barely do God, most of us don’t do magic and frenzied consumerism occupies our minds more than any local spirit of place. At first glance it looks as though the supernatural folktales of old — those witches and giants who lend their names to pools or hilltop crags in Britain’s remoter spots — are all but lost.

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Available from the Spectator Bookshop, £18 Tel: 08430 600033. Nina Lyon is the author of Uprooted: On the Trail of the Green Man.

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