#thesilverarrow

Author @levgrossman’s forthcoming #TheSilverArrow (09/01/20) is such a delight! Geared for readers ages 8-12 , the audiobook is narrated by the sublime #SimonVance. https://www.instagram.com/p/CDHOOpkgG6U/?igshid=h4jlpg2whfqc

Robin Hood and the Silver Arrow #RobinHood #theSilverArrow #RobinHoodandtheSilverArrow Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men, standing out against injustice, robbing the rich to give to the poor and having their home in Sherwood forest, has been a popular figure from the middle ages right up to today. His exploits were related in ballads by minstrels long before they were written down. The earliest text of a Robin Hood ballad, which is preserved in Cambridge University, was 'Robin Hood and the Monk', written down just after 1450. This sets Robin in Nottingham and includes Little John and Much the Miller’s son, as well as the bitter enmity between Robin and the Sheriff. Plays about Robin and his exploits were also popular in medieval times in the May Day celebrations held in villages throughout the land. Maid Marian and a jolly Friar (probably the forerunner of Friar Tuck) also figured in the May Dav games and probably entered the legend this way. A very popular work 'A Lytell Geste of Robyn Hode', the longest Robin Hood story of the time, was printed about 1500 and reprinted many times throughout the following century. It has many strands to the story including the contest of the ‘Silver Arrow.’ In these early sources, Robin is a yeoman, a freeman farmer or person serving in a noble household, definitely a commoner. But later stories portray him as a nobleman himself who has been robbed of his lands and outlawed by the evil Sheriff. In 1598, Anthony Munday wrote a play called 'The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntingdon', in which he identified Robin Hood as this Earl. By this time, Robin Hood is a firm favourite with authors and audience alike, and he even appears in an unfinished play, 'The Sad Sheppard' by Ben Johnson, a well known contemporary of Shakespeare. Indeed Shakespeare mentions Robin Hood in two of his plays, 'The Two Gentleman of Verona and As You Like It.'