The Wisdom of Many: Essays on the Proverb

by Wolfgang Mieder

Overview

The Wisdom of Many explores research on proverbs of many cultures. More than twenty essays written by scholars of such diverse disciplines as folklore, literature, psychology, linguistics, and anthropology illustrate the significance of traditional proverbs and trace variations of proverbs over time, drawing on African, Chinese, Spanish, Finnish, Irish, and Yiddish examples.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780299143602
Publisher:	University of Wisconsin Press
Publication date:	08/15/1994
Edition description:	1
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.80(h) x 1.00(d)

About the Author

Wolfgang Mieder is professor of German and folklore and chair of the Department of German and Russian at the University of Vermont.  Author of more than sixty books on folklore and proverbs, including Proverbs Are Never Out of Season and Howl Like a Wolf: Animal Proverbs, Mieder is co-editor of A Dictionary of American Proverbs and A Dictionary of Wellerisms. Alan Dundes is professor of folklore and anthropology at the University of California-Berkeley.  His books available from the University of Wisconsin Press include Parsing through Customs: Essays by a Freudian Folklorist and several folklore casebooks: The Cockfight, The Evil Eye, The Blood Libel Legend, Cinderella, and Little Red Riding Hood.

Editorial Reviews

“Newcomers will find here a wide-ranging and stimulating selection of essays representing the varied approaches that characterize modern proverb scholarship, while readers with a prior background in this area should welcome this convenient ‘state of the art’ assemblage of widely scattered studies, some well known and many less so, complete with their original notes and bibliographies.”—Shirley  L. Arora, Western Folklore



“The Wisdom of Many [includes] general overviews, definitions, discussions of structure and function, examples of proverbs in literary contexts, detailed investigation of individual proverbs, examinations of the use of proverbs in psychological testing, considerations of the value of proverbs in identifying national character, and essays on the influence and use of proverbs in modern mass media.  In its variety this group of articles is as broad-ranging as any compilation yet made and includes material folklorists usually slight in their considerations of proverb literature.”—W. K. McNeil, Journal of American Folklore

From the Publisher

A collection of 20 studies of proverbs first published in 1981 by Garland. Among the general topics are structure, oral transmission, and practical reasoning. Proverbs examined in detail include African, Yiddish, Shakespeare's, Chinese, Irish, and those used in advertising. Includes an addenda to the bibliography. No index. Paper edition (unseen), $19.95. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

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