Less than a century ago, particularly in Celtic countries, fairies were not dismissed so much as superstition but rather as a force to be reckoned with. It's curious that activities now attributed to aliens, such as crop circles and abductions, were once considered the ken of fairies; fairies today are merely woodland nymphs of yore by another name. Author and former president of the Theosophical Society Dora Van Gelder was born 95 years ago and saw these little creatures as a child in the northern California redwood forests and woodlands of the Pacific Northwest. One has to wonder at how much change Van Gelder has seen, especially how dreadfully our relationship to the natural world (of which fairies are so much a part) has changed in the second half of the 20th century. At the very least, Van Gelder's matter-of-fact descriptions of the various types of fairies and tree spirits will charm you. And maybe the book will help you to see through the blinders of modern life and into mystical realms. As an added bonus, this second edition of the 1977 classic has a new introduction by Celtic folk expert Caitlín Matthews, which places belief in the fairy realm into fascinating historical perspective. --Randall Cohan
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