Books like The robber with a witch's head by Jack Zipes

>Monsters, ghosts, fantastic beings, and supernatural phenomena of all sorts haunt the folklore and popular culture of Japan. Broadly labeled *yōkai*, these creatures come in infinite shapes and sizes, from *tengu* mountain goblins and *kappa* water spirits to shape-shifting foxes and long-tongued ceiling-lickers. Currently popular in anime, manga, film, and computer games, many yōkai originated in local legends, folktales, and regional ghost stories. >Drawing on years of research in Japan, Michael Dylan Foster unpacks the history and cultural context of yōkai, tracing their roots, interpreting their meanings, and introducing people who have hunted them through the ages. In this delightful and accessible narrative, readers will explore the roles played by these mysterious beings within Japanese culture and will also learn of their abundance and variety through detailed entries, some with original illustrations, on more than fifty individual creatures. *The Book of Yōkai* provides a lively excursion into Japanese folklore and its ever-expanding influence on global popular culture. It also invites readers to examine how people create, transmit, and collect folklore, and how they make sense of the mysteries in the world around them. By exploring yōkai as a concept, we can better understand broader processes of tradition, innovation, story telling, and individual and communal creativity.

"Murder, mutilation, cannibalism, infanticide, and incest: the darker side of classic fairly tale figures as the subject matter for this study of Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm's Nursery and Household Tales. This updated and expanded second edition includes a new preface and an appendix containing new translations of six tales, along with commentary by Maria Tatar. Throughout the book, Tatar employs the tools not only of a psychoanalyst but also of a folklorist, literary critic, and historian to examine the harsher aspects of these stories. She presents new interpretations of the powerful stories in this book. Few studies have been written in English on these tales, and none has probed their allegedly happy endings so thoroughly."--Jacket.

Explore how Celtic peoples revered animals—wild and domestic—through rituals, mythology, and daily life, using archaeological and literary evidence.

A collection of twelve traditional tales from various parts of China.