Tales of Superhuman Powers: 55 Traditional Stories from Around the World

by Csenge Virág Zalka

Overview

Csenge Virag Zalka, a Hungarian storyteller, has collected 55 folktales from around the world about supernatural abilities like superhuman strength, invulnerability, flying, heightened senses, speed, invisibility, healing, agility, precognition, telepathy, fire manipulation, teleportation, water powers, and shifting. These tales represent powers that people have dreamed of, conjured up and strived for through the ages. Many of the powers are present in popular culture, making the superheroes who wield them the direct descendants of characters such as the princess who could see through walls or the invulnerable Isfandiyar. Zalka excluded stories about magic or about gods with divine powers, and focused on less well-known stories. She included information on similar heroes, the ability in the story, sources of the powers, the origin of the story, teachings in it, the recommended age group, sources, variants, and comments.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476612898
Publisher:	McFarland & Company, Incorporated Publishers
Publication date:	10/11/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	240
File size:	573 KB
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Csenge Virág Zalka is a professional storyteller and researcher from Budapest, Hungary. Her interests focus on role-playing games as a form of storytelling, historical fiction, oral traditions and popular culture.
Csenge Virag Zalka is a Hungarian storyteller and author, in the United States as a Fulbright student interested in historical fiction, oral traditions and popular culture. She lives in Hungary.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Greetings, Dreamer
Part I: Physical Powers—Also Known as the Classics
Superhuman Strength
János and Rózsa
Alderblock
Invulnerability
Isfandiyar
The Fellow with the Goat Skin
Flight
The Winged Prince
People Who Could Fly
Heightened Senses
Green Péter
The Tale of Sir James Ramsay of Bamff
Finn MacCool and the Giants
Three Critical Men
Speed
Princess Szélike
The Giant’s Ankle (or, Betcha You Didn’t Know This About Achilles)
Invisibility
The Gold­Spitting Prince
The Tengu’s Magic Cloak
King Laurin’s Rose Garden
Color Changing
The Queen of Many Colors
Healing Factor, Healing Others, or Not Healing at All
The Prince with the Two Hearts
Anne Jefferies and the Fairies
Growth, Elasticity and Body Shaping
Longshanks, Girth and Keen
A Is for Agility and Archers
Ekalavya, the Archer
Camilla
Eye Beams (Yes, Really)
The Unfinished Story of Princess Greenleaf
Sonic Blast
The Robber Called Nightingale
Poison Secretion
The Poison Maiden
Part II: It’s All in Your Head—Mind Games, Mental Prowess, and the Power of Knowledge
Precognition, Also Known as Fortune-Telling, Future Sight, Clairvoyance and Other Fancy Words
Aicha, the Demon-Hunter
Astral Projection and Other Out­of­Body Experiences
Quiet Girl Becomes a Goddess
The Dream House
Telepathy
János Carnation­Hair
Michael Scott
Telekinesis
The Man Who Had No Story
Infinite Knowledge
The Serpent Wife
Illusion
The Rooster Beam
Technomancy
The Ebony Horse
Animal Speech
The ­Gold-­Spinners
Part III: At the Mercy of the Elements—Powers of Water, Fire, Earth and Weather (and Ice)
Fire Manipulation
The Daughter of the Sun
Pietro Baillardo
Water Powers
Fergus Mac Léti
The Tide Jewels
Earth Manipulation
The Son of the Hunter
Weather Manipulation
Garabonciások
Ice and Snow
Snow Daughter and Fire Son
Part IV: Transitional Powers—From One State to Another
When Drawings Come to Life
The Legend of King Vikramaditya
Painted Dragons
Teleportation
The Three Soldiers
The Magic Book
Phasing
The Taoist Priest of Lao­shan
Shifters, Changers and Individuals of Multiple Shapes
Human Shifting
Pomona and Vertumnus
Animal Shifting
Sigmund and Sinfjötli
Boots and the Beasts
The Weretiger
Nanaue, the Shark­Man
Plant Shifting
The Elder Tree Witch
Inorganic Shifting
Kampó Táltos
Multi-­Shifting
Mestra
The Mad Pranks of Robin Goodfellow
Honorable Mentions
Appendix: Tales by Powers
Further Readings
Index

Editorial Reviews

great entertainment”—Fanboy Comics; “focuses on less well-known stories...includes information on similar heroes”—ProtoView.

From the Publisher