"Niles' excellent translation should bring Lüthi's sensitive and articulate study the recognition it deserves among English readers." —Library Journal Lüthi demonstrates how the folktale, by its very distance from reality, can play upon the most important themes of human existence.

This database is an electronic edition of the Motif-Index of Folk-Literature, revised and enlarged by Stith Thompson, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1955).

This index is organized by motif, or subject, so related versions of particular stories are classified together, across cultures and time periods. Very detailed, with source citations, is a classic work of its type.