She reveals them to be curious, clever connoisseurs of their world, technologically inventive and ecologically adaptable. Above all, they were successful survivors for more than 300,000 years, during times of massive climatic upheaval.At a time when our species has never faced greater threats, we’re obsessed with what makes us special. But, much of what defines us was also in Neanderthals, and their DNA is still inside us. Planning, co-operation, altruism, craftsmanship, aesthetic sense, imagination... perhaps even a desire for transcendence beyond mortality.It is only by understanding them, that we can truly understand ourselves.

    Here, acclaimed scholar Stephen Greenblatt explores it with profound appreciation for its cultural and psychological power as literature. From the birth of the Hebrew Bible to the awe-inspiring contributions of Augustine, Dürer, and Milton in bringing Adam and Eve to vivid life, Greenblatt unpacks the story’s many interpretations and consequences over time. Rich allegory, vicious misogyny, deep moral insight, narrow literalism, and some of the greatest triumphs of art and literature: all can be counted as children of our “first” parents.

    For good and for evil, religion is the single greatest influence in the world. We accept as self-evident that competing economic systems (capitalist or communist) or clashing political parties (Republican or Democratic) propose very different solutions to our planet's problems. So why do we pretend that the world's religious traditions are different paths to the same God? We blur the sharp distinctions between religions at our own peril, argues religion scholar Stephen Prothero, and it is time to replace naÏve hopes of interreligious unity with deeper knowledge of religious differences. In Religious Literacy, Prothero demonstrated how little Americans know about their own religious traditions and why the world's religions should be taught in public schools. Now, in God Is Not One, Prothero provides readers with this much-needed content about each of the eight great religions. To claim that all religions are the same is to misunderstand that each attempts to solve a different human problem. For example: –Islam: the problem is pride / the solution is submission –Christianity: the problem is sin / the solution is salvation –Confucianism: the problem is chaos / the solution is social order –Buddhism: the problem is suffering / the solution is awakening –Judaism: the problem is exile / the solution is to return to God Prothero reveals each of these traditions on its own terms to create an indispensable guide for anyone who wants to better understand the big questions human beings have asked for millennia—and the disparate paths we are taking to answer them today. A bold polemical response to a generation of misguided scholarship, God Is Not One creates a new context for understanding religion in the twenty-first century and disproves the assumptions most of us make about the way the world's religions work.

    It was a cruel and noisy spirit, given to rapping and gnawing sounds before it found its voices.With these voices and its supernatural acts, the Bell Witch tormented the Bell family. This extraordinary book recounts the only documented case in U.S. history when a spirit actually caused a man's death.The local schoolteacher, Richard Powell, witnessed the strange events and recorded them for his daughter. His astonishing manuscript fell into the hands of novelist Brent Monahan, who has prepared the book for publication. Members of the Bell family have previously provided information on this fascinating case, but this book recounts the tale with novelistic vigor and verve. It is truly chilling.

    Under her, women's roles were far more prominent than in patriarchal Judeo-Christian cultures. Stone describes this ancient system and, with its disintegration, the decline in women's status. Index, maps and illustrations.

    He produces a wonderfully skillful synthesis of the available material—one that sees the occult in the light of reason and reason in the light of the mystical and paranormal. The result is a wide-ranging survey of the subject that provides a comprehensive history of magic, an insightful exploration of our latent powers, and a journey of enlightenment. “I am very impressed by this book, not only by its erudition but…above all for the good-natured, unaffected charm of the author whose reasoning is never too far-fetched, who is never carried away by preposterous theories.”—Sunday Times

    The lyrical passages and poetic images, the wry humor, the tall-tale extravagance, and the homely realism of the 'Kalevala' come through with extraordinary effectiveness.

    It's a place where magic, religion, folklore, and mythology from multiple traditions merry meet and meld to create something incredible and new.In Nyx in the House of Night—a 2-color illustrated companion to the House of Night series—some of your favorite YA authors, plus a few experts, help you navigate the influences behind the House of Night series in a guide that would get even Damien's seal of approval.Travel with P.C. Cast as she gets her first tattoo in Ireland, climbs the ruins of Sgiach's castle, and discovers the lore that led to the Isle of Skye vampyres. Read Kristin Cast's defense of women in history and mythology who, like Zoey, have made a practice of juggling multiple men. Sit in on a vampyre lecture by Bryan Lankford, the real-life basis for House of Night instructor Dragon Lankford, on the parallels between Wiccan and vampyre circle rituals. Tour Tulsa's House of Night landmarks with local Amy H. Sturgis.Plus:•Karen Mahoney on Nyx and other goddesses of the night•John Edgar Browning on vampires in folklore, fiction, and reality•Jana Oliver on tattoos and other Marks•Ellen Steiber on feline familiars•Yasmine Galenorn on priestesses and goddess worship•Jordon Dane on Zoey's Cherokee heritage•Jeri Smith-Ready on the Raven Mockers and Kalona's less than heavenly inspiration•Christine Zika on the connection between Nyx and the Virgin Mary•Triniy Faegen on the Greek version of the OtherworldNyx in the House of Night also includes an appendix of character names that reveals the myth behind Zoey's last name, which House of Night cats have ties to Camelot, Egypt, and Middle-earth, and more!

    Professor Jan Harold Brunvand expands his examination of the phenomenon of urban legends, those improbable, believable stories that always happen to a "friend of a friend."

    Civilization, we are told, could be achieved only by sacrificing those original freedoms or, alternatively, by taming our baser instincts. David Graeber and David Wengrow show how such theories first emerged in the eighteenth century as a conservative reaction to powerful critiques of European society posed by Indigenous observers and intellectuals. Revisiting this encounter has startling implications for how we make sense of human history today, including the origins of farming, property, cities, democracy, slavery, and civilization itself.Drawing on pathbreaking research in archaeology and anthropology, the authors show how history becomes a far more interesting place once we learn to throw off our conceptual shackles and perceive what's really there. If humans did not spend 95 percent of their evolutionary past in tiny bands of hunter-gatherers, what were they doing all that time? If agriculture, and cities, did not mean a plunge into hierarchy and domination, then what kinds of social and economic organization did they lead to? The answers are often unexpected, and suggest that the course of human history may be less set in stone, and more full of playful, hopeful possibilities, than we tend to assume.The Dawn of Everything fundamentally transforms our understanding of the human past and offers a path toward imagining new forms of freedom, new ways of organizing society. This is a monumental book of formidable intellectual range, animated by curiosity, moral vision, and a faith in the power of direct action.

    From Gothic ghost stories to psychological horror to science fiction, women have been primary architects of speculative literature of all sorts. And their own life stories are as intriguing as their fiction. Everyone knows about Mary Shelley, creator of Frankenstein, who was rumored to keep her late husband’s heart in her desk drawer. But have you heard of Margaret “Mad Madge” Cavendish, who wrote a science-fiction epic 150 years earlier (and liked to wear topless gowns to the theater)? If you know the astounding work of Shirley Jackson, whose novel The Haunting of Hill House was reinvented as a Netflix series, then try the psychological hauntings of Violet Paget, who was openly involved in long-term romantic relationships with women in the Victorian era. You’ll meet celebrated icons (Ann Radcliffe, V. C. Andrews), forgotten wordsmiths (Eli Colter, Ruby Jean Jensen), and today’s vanguard (Helen Oyeyemi). Curated reading lists point you to their most spine-chilling tales.Part biography, part reader’s guide, the engaging write-ups and detailed reading lists will introduce you to more than a hundred authors and over two hundred of their mysterious and spooky novels, novellas, and stories.

    In bold contrast to the predominant Freudian school of thought, Becker tackles the problem of the vital lie -- man's refusal to acknowledge his own mortality. In doing so, he sheds new light on the nature of humanity and issues a call to life and its living that still resonates more than twenty years after its writing.

    In this book, you'll uncover the history and mystery behind these bloodthirsty monsters with folklore, mythology, and poetry from every tradition in the world. From the Bosnian Lampir, whose disease-ridden corpse spread infection and death throughout villages, to Bram Stoker's charming Dracula, who helped define modern-day vampires, the wicked stories surrounding these nocturnal beings are sure to captivate anyone who has ever wondered about these shadow-loving creatures. Whether you're interested in exploring the culture of vampires or just want to learn more about their supernatural abilities, you'll discover dozens of compelling tales, historical accounts, and haunting legends that shed some light on these sinister beings.Complete with detailed illustrations, Vampires reveals the dark allure and gruesome power of these creatures of the night.

    Is the yeti just a phantasm of our imagination, or is it a real creature? A survivor from our own savage ancestry? This is the mystery that Bryan Sykes set out to unlock.Three hair samples from the remote Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan are the cause of the investigation. The hair samples were from the miogi, the Bhutanese yeti, that legendary creature of the high snows that has haunted the imagination of travellers for centuries. Professor Sykes was asked to identify the hairs using DNA analysis. The miogi hairs did not surrender their secrets easily, but eventually two were identified as known species of bear. The third remained a mystery. Ten years later two scientific developments caused the migoi to enter Professor Sykes' thoughts again. The first, a purely technical improvement, meant that it was now possible to get a very good DNA signal from a single hair. The second development came from the surprising conclusion of an article published in 2010. This paper contained the details of the DNA sequence from another human species, Homo neanderthalensis, the Neanderthals, widely thought to be extinct. One of the many theories to account for the yeti legend is that there were small groups of Neanderthals that had managed to survive until recent times, or maybe even until the present day. If so, would it be possible to detect recent interbreeding between our own species and Neanderthals in the genomes of indigenous people living in remote regions. Locations where the yeti legends are strongest and the sightings most numerous?Professor Sykes set a goal to locate and analyse as many hair samples as possible, with links the yeti. In doing so Professor Sykes found himself entering a strange world of mystery and sensationalism, fraud and obsession and even the supernatural. Protected by the ruthless vigour of genetic analysis he was able to listen to the stories of the yeti without having to form an opinion. The only opinion that mattered was the DNA.Two years on the project is almost complete, and there have been some surprising and significant discoveries. The yeti remains an enigma. There is something out there. But what?

    Popular books, movies and television shows have cemented the city's connection to vampires in public imagination.Rumors swirled about the fate of the Casket Girls, a group of mysterious maidens traveling to the New World from France with peculiar casket-shaped boxes. A charismatic man who moved to the French Quarter in the early 1900s eerily resembled a European aristocrat of one hundred years prior bearing the same name. A pair of brothers terrorized the town with their desire to feed on living human blood during the Great Depression. Marita Woywod Crandle investigates the origins of these legends so intricately woven through New Orleans's rich history.