The Mabinogion

I'm splitting the difference between my love of the medieval collection (i.e. Y Mabinogi and other Welsh tales) and Lady Charlotte Guest's sometimes-bowdlerized, romanticized, nineteenth-century (and I mean that in the worst possible way) translation (which would garner at best two stars, because I'......more

Where does the title 'Mabinogion' come from? Its use for this collection of tales dates from the 19th Century when Lady Charlotte Guest's version of these 11 myths appeared in book form. However, Mabinogion is not even a Welsh word. Mabinogi is a Welsh word, but in these texts only appears in the fi......more

I like mythological and I like medieval but this book is much more than that. There’s a dreaminess to these tales I find so surprising, seductive, and mysterious. They intoxicate me with dream and weird my imagination in wonderful ways. That said, it’s a very uneven book. The first four “branches” ar......more

This work was rather different from Norse Mythology or German Mythology that I've recently read. This is attributed to Wales or Celtic mythology and features 11 tales taking place during the Medieval era. It features plenty of knights and of course Arthur is mentioned in the tales. This book was men......more

This is an excellent translation of the Mabinogion. Unlike Gantz, Davies uses familiar spellings of names, which I like; unlike Jones and Jones, she divides dialogue up into paragraphs--a conversation can be pretty confusing when it's printed as a single paragraph. Above all, though, Davies translat......more