Rosalind Kerven: WORKING WITH MYTHS, LEGENDS & FAIRY TALES: World Myths & Legends

CAMBRIDGE 'LEGENDS'

LEGENDS OF THE ANIMAL WORLD (Cambridge University Press 1986)

THE TREE IN THE MOON and other Legends of Plants and Trees

(Cambridge University Press 1989)

KING LEOPARD'S GIFT and other Animal Legends

(Cambridge University Press 1990)

(chosen by the Federation of Children’s Book Groups for their ‘pick of the year’ list)

“stimulating and well researched...will give children much pleasure and enhance their knowledge of other cultures” - TES

“Rosalind Kerven’s retellings are accessible to the eye and ear and the success of each story lies in its affinity with the oral tradition… worth adding to any storyteller’s source library” - School Librarian

“the style of writing is strongly oral… a useful and enjoyable book” - British Book News

“particularly helpful introduction...approachable and encourages further exploration of animal legends” - Signal Selection of Children’s Books

“told in a manner accessible to children but faithful to the oral story-telling styles of their source cultures” - New Jersey Goodlife

Although I had already published several children’s novels, Legends of the Animal World was the first book I wrote in the ‘myths and legends’ genre. It was well received, so I was commissioned to write two more for the Cambridge Legends series.

Each book consisted of short retellings of 11 or 12 stories, with a large colour illustration to accompany each one. They were sourced from many different countries including Australia (Aboriginal peoples), African-America and Native America, India, China, Japan, Malaysia, Ghana, Nigeria, Papua New Guinea, Tahiti, Jamaica, Inuit, New Zealand (Maori people), Brazil and Norway – as well as some from Britain and Ireland.

They sold well in the USA and Australia as well as the UK.

MYTHS, LEGENDS AND FAIRY TALES

FOR SCHOOL LITERACY SCHEMES

Over many years I’ve contributed numerous ‘myths, legends and folk tale’ books to literacy schemes published by: CUP, OUP, Ginn, Heinemann, Pearson and Rigby. I’ve also written traditional tales for Scholastic’s Literacy Time magazine and for many publishers’ reading scheme anthologies . Some of these have been translated into different languages, ranging from Malay to Gaelic. Others have gone into ‘English as a Foreign Language’ (EFL) editions, for use in the Far East, India and Norway.

These offer a great way for young children to discover traditional tales - though a shame that they might appear as primarily educational!

CAMBRIDGE READING

This was a wonderful project to work on. Each title was commissioned to be a 'real' book rather than looking like part of an educational reading scheme, and a lot of effort went into editing the books and choosing outstanding illustrators. My three contributions for this level come from the Native American Hopi people, Siberia and Hawai.

SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS

HOW DID THE WORLD BEGIN?

Contains four creation myths:

Baskets of Magic (Native American pueblo people, New Mexico)

Good and Evil (Iran (ancient Persia)

The Chain of Gold (Yoruba, Nigeria)

The Mud People (China)

JOURNEYS TO OTHER WORLDS

Contains four folk tales:

The World of the Night Sky (Native American)

The World Below the Water (Kenya)

The World of the Magic Ring (Arabian)

The World of the Sleeping King (Welsh)

'SUNSHINE MYTHS AND LEGENDS'

I was series editor for this complete set of twelve books. I was also commissioned to write three of them myself, retelling myths from Uganda, Mexico (ancient Aztecs) and Australia (Aboriginal)