The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries: The Classic Study of Leprechauns, Pixies, and Other Fairy Spirits [Mass Market Paperback]

W.Y. Evans Wentz (Author), Terrance McKenna (Introduction)

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 576 pages
• Publisher: Citadel (December 31, 2025)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0806525797
• ISBN-13: 978-0806525792
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #637,877 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Mother Lode, February 27, 2006

By 

Dawn Killen-Courtney (St. Louis Park,, MN United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries: The Classic Study of Leprechauns, Pixies, and Other Fairy Spirits (Mass Market Paperback)

To think, even Katharine Briggs sites this book! It still seems the best in so many ways, and certainly the broadest, most scholarly, yet open-minded exploration of the whole concept of this place and these beings we usually cannot even see. Evans-Wentz was catching the last of the lore as it was seen and believed in by the old people who would've come of age in the 19th century, since he was recording their stories about 1910, in out of the way places where the inroads of the Industrial Age had not made a permanent home in the mind sets of the country people. There is so much in this one book, it would tax me to list it all; so dive in for yourself and see, and hear the words of the people as Evan-Wentz recorded them. He does it in a way I so admire, though he, as an American, was an outsider coming into this lore, the respect he feels for the knowledge and insights, the values and views of the informants is evident in every line. What a book. W.Y Evans-Wentz was a treasure, a great spiritual pioneer, and I revere his memory and his works.
P.S. I am returning to this review a long time later (Feb.2008) to state I am sorry if I lead anyone to this particular, and evidently, poorly done edition. I was reviewing the book in general, and have no knowledge of the quality of this edition. My edition is from Citadel Press, 1994, their Library of the Mystic Arts. Again, my apologies if I lead anyone astray on this edition. Everything else I said about the book in general still stands!

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars good stuff, May 1, 2008

By 

elfdart - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries: The Classic Study of Leprechauns, Pixies, and Other Fairy Spirits (Mass Market Paperback)

this book is a good source of fairy culture from ireland, britain, scotland, wales, cornwall and the like. there are a lot of case studies in the beginning, so if you don't like those, stay away- or just skip over it. the author of this book is an anthropologist who went around the british ilses collecting fairy lore. he uses both stories from the people he meets and later gets into different aspects of the fairy faith. this is a wonderful resource and a must read for all seriously obsessed with fairies.

1 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Stylistically impenetrable, virtually empty of logic or sense., July 10, 2010

By 

James Yanni (Bellefontaine Neighbors, Mo. USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries: The Classic Study of Leprechauns, Pixies, and Other Fairy Spirits (Mass Market Paperback)

This author, writing in the early days of the 20th century, attempts to prove the existence of fairies and other mythical entities, and claims to have done so. He hasn't. I'm not such a sceptic as to insist that a failure to prove the existence of something, or even (as in this case) a particularly weak attempt at proof, necessarily proves the nonexistence of such phenomena. But his entire 500 page book fails to provide so much as a smidgeon of evidence that would convince anyone above the mental age of, say, 13, who was not already inclined to agree with him. What's more, it fails to do so in an overly wordy, pompous and pseudo-scientific way that approaches unreadability; not only does he fail in his major purpose, but he doesn't even manage to be an enjoyable read in the process.

His primary "evidence" for the existence of fairies and other creatures of the spirit world is interviews that he had with numerous elderly folk of the British Isles, folk who were elderly in the first decade of the 20th century and thus were at their youthful prime in the mid-19th century. These were folk who had grown up in the rural areas of the country, and many of them swore to him that they had had personal experience of the "little folk". And, of course, he took them at their word, never considering the possibility that the locals might "have a bit of fun" with the big-city urban researcher coming to study their "backwards" ways. Granted, I have no proof that this is the explanation for the results of his interviews, but I think it's at least as likely as the hypothesis that all of his subjects were being perfectly straightforward with him. And even if some of them were serious, there is certainly no proof that they saw or heard what they thought they had; I once saw a sunset shining off of the clouds that looked for all the world like a giant flaming bird with wings that stretched from horizon to horizon. That doesn't prove that phoenixes truly exist.

All in all, every single scrap of "evidence" Evans-Wentz provides is either hearsay or speculation. If you're interested in reading interviews with people who claim experience with the "other side", there's some minor value in this book. Otherwise, there is none.