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University of California Press

About the Book

Nine tales, selected and retold here by anthropologist and author Theodora Kroeber for the adult general-interest reader. The new foreword by her son, Karl Kroeber, provides context about the author's methods and describes his own personal connection to the stories themselves.

About the Author

Theodora Kroeber (1897-1979) was a noted anthropologist and also the author of Ishi in Two Worlds (California). Karl Kroeber, son of Theodora Kroeber, is Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University and coeditor of Ishi in Three Centuries (2002).

Table of Contents

Foreward by Karl Kroeber
Introduction

I.
The Inland Whale
Loon Woman
Butterfly Man
Dance Mad
Love Charm
Umai
About-the-House Girl
Tesilya, Sun's Daughter
The Man's Wife

II.
Some Qualities of Indian Stories
About the Stories in This Book

Sources

Reviews

PRAISE FOR THE FIRST EDITION:

"Thanks to Mrs. Kroeber’s simple, supple style, the stories all succeed as stories; they please, engage, move, or divert without depending for their effect on their exotic source."—The New Yorker

"The varying but almost always superb story style of these narratives will speak to all."—New York Herald Tribune

"This is a jewel of a book."—San Francisco Chronicle

"These stories enlarge life. They remind us of Shakespeare and Aeschylus…. That Mrs. Kroeber’s book should generate such thoughts is proof of its power and beauty."—New York Times Book Review