Howard Pyle. The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood. 1883; Amazon Digital Editions, 2012. E-book.

The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood by Howard Pyle is one of those books that I have always wanted to read since I was a boy, but just never got around to doing it. It is fun.

In vague ways, Robin Hood is still a part of the English-speaking culture. Although I had never read Pyle’s version of the stories, I had read or seen others from time to time. The chapter on Allan a Dale, for example, does follow the basic plot line of the Allan a Dale ballad that I have read.

There are multiple archery contests, and even a few wrestling and quarterstaff matches. Robin Hood is a true gentleman. Even the people he robs he usually hosts them for dinner in Sherwood Forest. He especially is incensed against corrupt government officials like the Sheriff of Nottingham. Queen Eleanor and King Richard come off very well. He also goes after hypocritical churchmen as many were living lives quite out of line for someone who has taken a vow of poverty.

There is a lot of disguise here and derring-do. We can see how tales like these would grow, perhaps be reduplicated, and then appear in other forms. Of course in our era that would mean television and film. I can still recite the theme song from the Robin Hood television show. It was, like the show, very simple.

Robin Hood, Robin Hood riding through the glen
Robin Hood, Robin Hood with his band of men,
Feared by the bad, loved by the good
Robin Hood, Robin Hood, Robin Hood.

Pyle’s version of the Robin Hood stories contains a number of ballads and songs from the time period or made to imitate them. “May Ellen’s Wedding” may be part of a tradition that extends to Keats’ “Belle Dame Sans Merci” and Yeats’ “The Stolen Child.” Action, yes, but beauty and longing also.

The e-book is a freebie available from either Amazon or Project Gutenberg. The one liability is that the edition lacks the author’s illustrations. Howard Pyle was one of the most famous illustrators of the Nineteenth Century and mentor to N. C. Wyeth and many others. Still, it is a lot of fun. You can see many of the illustrations here: https://topillustrations.wordpress.com/2013/06/19/howard-pyle/

There is a certain tongue-in-cheek quality to these tales. The author writes in a deliberately pseudo-archaic style. But we can chuckle at the style just as we chuckle at some of Robin Hood’s exploits.

Some also are quite serious. This is especially true of Robin Hood’s encounter with Guy of Gisbourne, the thirteenth-century version of a hit man. He is in many ways, along with Goliath and King Herod, the original super villain.

If we are to think about it, Robin Hood really is a kind of medieval version of Batman or Spiderman: disguised, loyal followers, helps the weak, but those in authority are suspicious of him. Before Action Comics, before Tarzan, before the Three Musketeers, there was Robin Hood.