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Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales
Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales
Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales
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Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales

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“Folktales have the ability to live long and deep. These ones, beautifully refashioned by Jon Sweeney, make you think beyond the Christian references Tolstoy craved for himself and his readers. They can be easily ‘converted’ for all faiths. They are readable, tellable, lovely, to be relished and repeated.” —Marilyn Price, Jewish storyteller

You’ve met the characters in these stories before. We meet them in folktales from all around the world. There is the simple, wise old man who understands far more than he knows; the pompous religious expert who discovers his folly before it’s too late; nosey neighbors and petty relatives; and a fight between good and evil in which, by story’s end, good and evil almost seem to switch places. These classic tales, made popular a century ago by Leo Tolstoy, are retold here for a new generation, beautifully illustrated in this gorgeous book designed for reading out loud, reading over and over again, and giving to friends.
LanguageEnglish
Release dateAug 1, 2015
ISBN9781612617398
Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales
Author

Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy grew up in Russia, raised by a elderly aunt and educated by French tutors while studying at Kazen University before giving up on his education and volunteering for military duty. When writing his greatest works, War and Peace and Anna Karenina, Tolstoy drew upon his diaries for material. At eighty-two, while away from home, he suffered from declining health and died in Astapovo, Riazan in 1910.

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    Three Simple Men - Leo Tolstoy

    "Of all the works this great man and artist has written,

    his short stories have made the strongest impression upon me.

    I regard them as the most perfect tales ever written."

    —ELISABETH OF WIED, Queen consort of Romania (1881–1914)

    "The Russian great was considered mad by some and a genius

    by others. He was a radical and a saint. A noble-turned-ascetic

    wanderer. No wonder so many were fascinated with

    his life and stories."

    —WRITING GOODER, a blog of the Young Writers Society for teenagers and young college students

    "One of Tolstoy’s greatest gifts—and also a source of torment—

    was his addiction to the question of the meaning of life. He

    never ceased asking himself why and how he should live, and

    what was the point of all his money and fame."

    —ROMAN KRZNARIC, cofounder of The School of Life in London; author of How Should We Live?

    "As in the most abstract of narrators, what counts in Tolstoy is

    what is not visible, not articulated."

    —ITALO CALVINO, twentieth-century Italian novelist and short story writer

    LEO TOLSTOY

    THREE

    SIMPLE

    MEN

    & Other Holy

    Folktales

    RETOLD WITH NOTES AND INTRODUCTION

    BY JON M. SWEENEY

    ILLUSTRATED BY ANNA MITCHELL

    2015 First printing

    Three Simple Men: And Other Holy Folktales

    Text copyright © 2015 by Jon M. Sweeney

    Illustrations copyright © 2015 by Anna Mitchell

    ISBN 978-1-61261-586-8

    Scripture quotations marked NRSV are from New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

    Scripture quotations marked ESV are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

    The Paraclete Press name and logo (dove on cross) are trademarks of Paraclete Press, Inc.

    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

    Tolstoy, Leo, graf, 1828-1910.

    [Short stories. Selections. English]

    Three simple men : and other holy folktales / Leo Tolstoy ; retold with notes and introduction by Jon M. Sweeney ; illustrated by Anna Mitchell.

       pages cm

    Summary: You’ve met the characters in these stories before. We meet them in folktales from all around the world. There is the simple, wise old man who understands far more than he knows; the pompous religious expert who discovers his folly before it’s too late; nosey neighbors and petty relatives; and a fight between good and evil in which, by story’s end, good and evil almost seem to switch places. These classic folktales, made popular a century ago by Leo Tolstoy, are retold here for a new generation, beautifully illustrated in this gorgeous book designed for reading out loud, reading over and over again, and giving to friends— Provided by publisher.

    ISBN 978-1-61261-586-8 (paperback)

    1. Tolstoy, Leo, graf, 1828-1910–Translations into English. 2. Tales–Russia. 3. Religious fiction. I. Sweeney, Jon M., 1967- II. Mitchell, Anna, illustrator. III. Title.

    PG3366.A15S94 2015                                                          891.73'3—dc23

    10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1

    All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in an electronic retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other—except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

    Published by Paraclete

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