Early English Hero Tales

Jeannette Augustus Marks (1875 - 1964)

Supposing you were asked to enter a Great Palace? And within that palace, you were told, were more than a thousand golden doors? And those doors opened into rooms and upon gardens and balconies, all of which were the most beautiful of palace rooms and gardens? And some were more beautiful than anything the world had ever known before? Do you think you would go through the gate to that palace?

And if you were told that in the palace were lamps so bright that they lighted not only the palace, but cast a glow over the whole world? And that these lamps hung from chains the ends of which you could not see, just as Pryderi was not able to see the ends of the hanging golden chains in the palace which he entered? And once within the Great Palace you were not only better for being there, but also happier and stronger and more beautiful, and never any more could you be lonely? It sounds like an Aladdin's lamp, does it not, which, once seen and touched, could bring so much beauty and power into our lives! Indeed, it is Aladdin's lamp—the lamp of men's minds and souls. And the Great Palace is the Palace of English Literature. - Summary by From the introduction

Genre(s): Myths, Legends & Fairy Tales

Language: English

Section Chapter Reader Time
Play 00 Introduction Stacey Malcolm
00:05:37
Play 01 Chapter 1 - The First English Hero Winnifred Assmann
00:11:47
Play 02 Chapter 2 - Welsh Magic Cassandra A.M.
00:12:07
Play 03 Chapter 3 - The Battle at the Ford Belladana
00:16:16
Play 04 Chapter 4 - Caedmon the Cowherd Elizabeth Copnall
00:15:41
Play 05 Chapter 5 - The Shepherd of Lauderdale James Oligney
00:10:07
Play 06 Chapter 6 - The Boy Who Won a Prize Jim Pierson-Perry
00:13:37
Play 07 Chapter 7 - A Fisherman's Boy Agnes Robert Behr
00:15:12
Play 08 Chapter 8 - The Werewolf DetectiveC
00:08:42
Play 09 Chapter 9 - At Geoffrey's Window ToddHW
00:13:51
Play 10 Chapter 10 - A Famous Kitchen Boy JonnyO
00:23:49