Böcker av Martin Shaw

"Through the Smoke Hole, we will find beauty in the wild. Through the Smoke Hole, we will escape the gaze of the Spyglass and find ourselves. Assailed by seductive promises and controlled by social media, we are losing our sense of direction. We are losing ourselves. We have networks, not communities. At a time when we are all confronted by not one, but many crossroads in our lives - identity, technology, trust, love, politics and global pandemic, celebrated mythologist and wilderness guide Martin Shaw delivers Smoke Hole: three metaphors for the modern world - a commons of imagination. Let us journey together, and these stories be your ally - hold them in your pocket, breathe deeper, feel steadier and become acquainted with rapture. Praise for Martin Shaw 'I can still remember the first time I heard Martin Shaw tell a story. The tale that emerged was like a living thing, bounding around, throwing itself at us there listening. I had never heard anything like it before.' - Paul Kingsnorth, Booker shortlisted author of The Wake 'Martin Shaw's work is so very beautiful. A new animal. His love of images is deep and contagious.' - Coleman Barks, author of The Essential Rumi 'Shaw has so much wisdom and knowledge about the old stories, it emanates from his pores.' - John Densmore, The Doors"--

Bardskull is the record of three journeys made by Martin Shaw, the celebrated storyteller and interpreter of myth, in the year before he turned fifty. It is unlike anything he has written before. This is not a book about myth or narrative: rather, it is a sequence of incantations, a series of battles. Each of the three journeys sees Shaw walk alone into a Dartmoor forest and wait. What arrive are stories - fragments of myth that he has carried within him for decades: the deep history of Dartmoor itself; the lives of distant family members; Arthurian legend; and tales from India, Persia, Lapland, the Caucasus and Siberia. But these stories and their tellers don't arrive as the bearers of solace or easy wisdom. As with all quests, Shaw is entering a domain of traps and tests. Bardskull can be read as a fable, as memoir, as auto-fiction or as an attempt to undomesticate myth. It is a magnificent, unclassifiable work of the imagination.

Bardskull is the record of three journeys made by Martin Shaw, the celebrated storyteller and interpreter of myth, in the year before he turned fifty. It is unlike anything he has written before. This is not a book about myth or narrative: rather, it is a sequence of incantations, a series of battles.Each of the three journeys sees Shaw walk alone into a Dartmoor forest and wait. What arrive are stories – fragments of myth that he has carried within him for decades: the deep history of Dartmoor itself; the lives of distant family members; Arthurian legend; and tales from India, Persia, Lapland, the Caucasus and Siberia. But these stories and their tellers don’t arrive as the bearers of solace or easy wisdom. As with all quests, Shaw is entering a domain of traps and tests.Bardskull can be read as a fable, as memoir, as auto-fiction or as an attempt to undomesticate myth. It is a magnificent, unclassifiable work of the imagination.

'A modern-day bard.' Madeline Miller, author of Circe and The Song of Achilles'Shaw has so much wisdom and knowledge about the old stories, it emanates from his pores.' John Densmore, The Doors'Through feral tales and poetic exegesis, Martin Shaw makes you re-see the world, as a place of adventure and of initiation, as perfect home and as perfectly other. What a gift.' David Keenan, author of Xstabeth'I can still remember the first time I heard Martin Shaw tell a story. The tale that emerged was like a living thing, bounding around, throwing itself at us there listening. I had never heard anything like it before.' Paul Kingsnorth, Booker shortlisted author of The WakeToday, as we are confronted by not one, but many crossroads in our lives - identity, technology, love, seduction, politics - celebrated mythologist and wilderness guide Martin Shaw delivers Smoke Hole - three ancient myths that serve as metaphors for our world today. Assailed by the seductive promises of social media and shadowed by a pandemic that brought loneliness to an all-time high, Martin argues that we are losing our sense of direction, our sense of self. He invites us to use these stories to help find 'a commons for the imagination, a place to breathe deeper, feel steadier and become acquainted with rapture.' Smoke Hole is a passionate call to arms and an invitation to use these stories to face the complexities of contemporary life, from fake news to parenthood, climate crises, addictive technology and more. Available now as a podcast! Subscribe to Smoke Hole Sessions to hear amazing conversations between Martin Shaw and some of our most admired writers, actors, comedians, musicians and more, including Sir Mark Rylance and Tommy Tiernan (Derry Girls).

Dramatic new retellings of Celtic poetry's great lyrics and legendsCinderbiter collects tales and poems originally composed and performed centuries ago in Ireland, Scotland, and Wales, when notions of history and authorship were indistinguishable from the oral traditions of myth and storytelling. In the spirit of recasting these legends and voices for new audiences, celebrated mythologist and storyteller Martin Shaw and award-winning poet Tony Hoagland have created extraordinary new versions of these bardic lyrics, folkloric sagas, and heroes' journeys, as they have never been rendered before.In long, shaggy tales of the unlikely ascensions of previously unknown heroes such as Cinderbiter, in the shrouded origin stories of figures such as Arthur and Merlin, and in anonymous flickering lyrics of elegy, praise, and heartbreak, these poems retain at once the rapturous, supernatural imagination of the deep past layered with an austere, devout allegiance to the Christian faith. Shaw and Hoagland's collaboration summons the power within this storehouse of the Celtic mind to arrive at this rare book-distinctive, audacious, and tuned to our time and condition with a convincing resonance.

I'm inviting you to join me on a pilgrimage I'll be making with a friend of mine! This pilgrimage will be of the imagination, of the heart. I suppose in truth, it's a fictitious pilgrimage. My friend is none other than St Francis of Assisi. For me, the imagination's a vital and an exciting tool for reliving something of a saint's life. So I'll be, as it were, 'walking and talking' with you, through these pages, about the story of the pilgrimage which'll take who knows how long. At each stage, I'll have my own personal reflections and I'll be addressing you personally in the hope to make some connection with where you might be. The story of the pilgrimage, apart from walking, is mostly about ordinary experiences: eating, resting, talking, getting irritated, being bored, embarrassed, delighted: and any other mood you care to add. I'll be picturing Francis, my friend and I hope yours also, carrying a copy of St Matthew's Gospel in his pocket, as I will myself. Maybe you'll do the same.ABOUT THE AUTHORMartin Shaw, prior to being consecrated Bishop of Argyll and The Isles in June 2004 at St John's Cathedral in Oban, was Chaplain and acting Dean of King's College Cambridge, working as a priest in Glasgow, Edinburgh, Dunoon and London. As Canon Precentor at St Edmundsbury Cathedral, he was responsible for Liturgy and Music. Since 1972 he has been a member of the Third Order of St Francis and has a particular interest in Franciscan spirituality and pilgrimage. Through his singing and writing poetry, Martin Shaw has a keen involvement in art as an important approach to Christian spirituality. Since 2010 he has been an honorary assistant bishop in the Diocese of Exeter.

The central aim of this book is to analyse whether [or not] the global constitutes a fundamental challenge to the social-scientific study of politics, including the structure of disciplines and the division of labour between them.