DIVDIVOne of the most enduring characters in Native American mythology comes boldly and brilliantly alive in sixty-eight tales of magic and wonder from National Book Award–winning author Barry Lopez/divDIV According to Native American legend, Old Man Coyote created the earth and humankind, arranged the heavens, and brought fire and death to the world. Cunning and canny, he is a trickster, a devil, a warrior, a lover, and a fool. A magical creature of insatiable appetites, he is forever scheming, yet finds all too often that his ingenious intrigues are ultimately turned back upon himself./divDIV /divDIVIn Giving Birth to Thunder, Sleeping with His Daughter, critically acclaimed author Barry Lopez presents sixty-eight adventurous, humorous, ribald, and often profound Coyote tales gathered from forty-two different tribes, infusing timeless lore with new life and wonder./divDIV /divDIVThis ebook features an illustrated biography of Barry Lopez including rare images and never-before-seen documents from the author’s personal collection./div/div

Prankster, warrior, seducer, fool – Old Man Coyote is the most enduring legend in Native American culture. Crafty and cagey – often the victim of his own magical intrigues and lusty appetites – he created the earth and man, scrambled the stars and first brought fire . . . and death. Barry Lopez – National Book Award-winning author of Arctic Dreams and recipient of the John Burroughs Medal for his bestselling masterwork Of Wolves and Men – has collected sixty-eight tales from forty-two tribes, and brings to life a timeless myth that abounds with sly wit, erotic adventure, and rueful wisdom.

In Now I Know Only So Far, sociolinguist and ethnopoetic scholar Dell Hymes examines the power and significance of Native North American literatures and how they can best be approached and appreciated. Such narratives, Hymes argues, are ways of making sense of the world. To truly comprehend the importance and durability of these narratives, one must investigate the ways of thinking expressed in these texts?the cultural sensibilities also deeply affected by storytellers? particular experiences and mastery of form. ø Included here are seminal overviews and reflections on the history and potential of the field of ethnopoetics. Native North American stories from areas ranging from the Northwest Coast to the Southwest take center stage in this book, which features careful scrutiny of different realizations and tellings of the same story or related stories. Such narratives are illuminated through a series of verse analyses in which patterned relations of lines throw into relief differences in emphasis, shape, and interpretation. A final group of essays sheds light on the often misunderstood and always controversial role of editing and interpreting texts. Now I Know Only So Far provides penetrating discussions and absorbing insights into stories and worlds, both traditional and new.

"Trespass might as well be Desert Solitaire's literary heir . . . It's hard to imagine a personal history more transporting that this one."—Judith Lewis, Los Angels Times Book Review Trespass is the story of one woman's struggle to gain footing in inhospitable territory. A wilderness activist and apostate Mormon, Amy Irvine sought respite in the desert outback of southern Utah's red-rock country after her father's suicide, only to find out just how much of an interloper she was among her own people. But more than simply an exploration of personal loss, Trespass is an elegy for a dying world, for the ruin of one of our most beloved and unique desert landscapes and for our vanishing connection to it. Fearing what her father's fate might somehow portend for her, Irvine retreated into the remote recesses of the Colorado Plateau—home not only to the world's most renowned national parks but also to a rugged brand of cowboy Mormonism that stands in defiant contrast to the world at large. Her story is one of ruin and restoration, of learning to live among people who fear the wilderness the way they fear the devil and how that fear fuels an antagonism toward environmental concerns that pervades the region. At the same time, Irvine mourns her own loss of wildness and disconnection from spirituality, while ultimately discovering that the provinces of nature and faith are not as distinct as she once might have believed.

Did you know that the humble marmot is responsible for more than one billion human deaths? Or that it’s possible to be bitten by a snake’s head for up to an hour after it’s been decapitated? On the flip side, for every person bitten by a shark each year, 25 people are bitten by New Yorkers. It seems that truth sometimes is stranger than fiction!These facts and many more appear in this fascinating tribute to our world’s ‘deadly’ wildlife. At its heart, however, 'Deadly Beautiful' makes a passionate plea for us to learn to better cohabit with our fellow residents of planet Earth. Ever-increasing concern for the fate of the environment and the world’s endangered wildlife means that this book is a particularly timely addition to the world of natural history publishing. Dr Liana Joy Christensen, one of Australia’s foremost nature writers, takes a fresh and entertaining look at the ‘deadly’ animals with which humans have for so long enjoyed a love–hate relationship. These animals are generally not the aggressors nor the lethal killing machines that mythology and tradition would have us believe. Most also serve vital roles in maintaining the ecological balance of their habitats, while their fascinating behaviour and often striking beauty make them worthy of close study, particularly as so many of them are facing the worst death of all — extinction.Beautifully illustrated, 'Deadly Beautiful' is certain to foster a new understanding and appreciation of these incredible animals and their importance on a global scale.

In the tradition of Daniel Boorstin, the cofounder of "Omni" delivers an original work of history that demonstrates why modern science rests on a foundation built by ancient and medieval non-European societies.

Native American tricksters can be buffoons, transformers, social critics, teachers, and mediators between human beings, nature, and the gods. A vibrant part of American Indian tradition, the trickster has shown a remarkable ability to adapt into the twenty-first century. In Living Sideways, Franchot Ballinger provides the first full-length study of the diverse roles and dimensions of North American Indian tricksters. While honoring their diversity and complexity, he challenges stereotypical Euro-American treatments of tricksters. Drawing from the most influential scholarship on Native American tricksters, Ballinger shows how many critics have failed to consider both the specifics of trickster stories and their cultural contexts. Each chapter concentrates on a particular aspect of the trickster theme, such as the trickster’s ambiguous personality, the variety of trickster roles, and the trickster’s role as social critic. Ballinger further considers issues of sex, gender, and humor, the use of trickster tales as instructions on social values and community control, and the trickster as an emblem of modern Indian survival. Living Sideways also includes illustrative trickster stories at the end of each chapter, a comprehensive bibliography, and discussion of the literary aspects of tricksters. Examining both the sacred power of tricksters and the stories as literature, Living Sideways is the most thorough book to date on Native American tricksters.