Legends of King Arthur Through the Ages - Softcover

‘A Time Before Tales’ is a new story by myself, based on the events before a King Arthur. As I state in the introduction to the book it is ‘based upon facts which may even be true’ and gives us one possible explanation for a real Arthur.

`Kilhwch and Olwen or the Twrch Trwyth', by Lady Charlotte Guest, from her translation of the Welsh classic The Mabinogion, forms the second section of the book, and is possibly the first written Arthurian romance in any language.

‘The Legends of King Arthur and his Knights’ by Sir James Knowles is the classic collection of the Arthurian legends as we know them today. The Sword in the Stone, the Knights of the Round Table, the wizard Merlin, the Sangreal and Camelot are all here, splendidly captured in this swashbuckling epic.

All the stories from Sir James’s original book are reproduced here, perhaps leading some to look at this as ‘The Legends of King Arthur and his Knights’ with a few bonuses. If so, then Howard David Johnson’s illustrations must be considered as a very special extra. Thoroughly capturing the magic and adventure of the original tales, they betray a lifetime’s devotion to art and legend and a true talent.

Welcome back to Camelot.

Colin Bradshaw-Jones Cwm Llynfi, Cymru/Wales MMV

Colin is also the author of the revolutionary 10CD language course ‘Cadw Swn’, which teaches Welsh using classical music and stories to accelerate the learning process.

Lady Charlotte Guest is best known for her translation of the Welsh epic The Mabinogion into English, a language which she had learnt after coming to Wales from England. After the death of her first husband, Sir John Guest, she took over the running of the Dowlais Iron Works. She later remarried, and together with her second husband, Charles Schreiber, began assembling a ceramics collection, known today as the Schreiber collection on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Howard David Johnson is a visual artist with a background in the natural sciences and history. He works in a wide variety of media ranging from traditional oils to digital media. After a lifetime of drawing and painting, his art was exhibited in the British Museum in London in 1996, as well as many others, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art. His work has appeared in every major bookstore in America as well as magazines and educational texts around the world. As an illustrator he has not only used the computer but has been involved in developing and marketing of software for Adobe Photoshop.

Sir James Knowles is credited as ‘compiler and arranger’ of The Legends of King Arthur and His Knights, which he describes as ‘an abridgement of Sir Thomas Malory’s version of them as printed by Caxton – with a few additions from Geoffrey of Monmouth and other sources – and an endeavour to arrange the many tales into a more or less consecutive story.’ He was knighted in 1904, and died in 1908.