Enchanted Forests : The Poetic Construction of a World Before Time

In 1985 Boria Sax inherited an area of forest in New York State, which had been purchased by his Russian, Jewish, and Communist grandparents as a buffer against what they felt was a hostile world.

For Sax, in the years following, the woodland came to represent a link with those who currently live and had lived there, including Native Americans, settlers, bears, deer, turtles, and migrating birds.

In this personal and eloquent account, Sax explores the meanings and cultural history of forests from prehistory to the present, taking in Gilgamesh, Virgil, Dante, the Gawain poet, medieval alchemists, the Brothers Grimm, Hudson River painters, Latin American folklore, contemporary African novelists, and much more. Combining lyricism with contemporary scholarship, Sax opens new emotional, intellectual, and environmental perspectives on the storied history of the forest.

CONTENTS: Introduction: Forests and Memory; Wood and Leaves; The Spirituality of Trees; Mythic Beings of the Forest; Conquest of the Woods; The Royal Hunt; The Forest and Death, Lord of the Forest; Lady of the Forest; Classical, Rococo and Gothic Woods; The Primeval Forest; The Forest of Dreams; Law of the Jungle; The Man with the Big Axe; The Politics of Trees; The River in the Forest; Epilogue; Timeline of Forests in Culture; References; Further Reading; Acknowledgements; Photo Acknowledgements; Index.