Arthur
A New Life
Will be published approx. on 10. September 2026
Book
Hardback
400 pages
978-1-5294-3168-1 (ISBN)
Description
It is said that a monument now stands before the high church of Caerleon: an anvil pierced through with a sword. It is said that the sword can only be taken by the Britons' rightful king...
From Sunday Times bestseller Amy Jeffs', Arthur: A New Life mines the deep, elusive seams of a story we think we all know: the legend of King Arthur.
But here he is anew: a larger-than-life warlord, a hero raised by fairies, a leader of the wild hunt, a monster-slayer, lying wounded under the ash cloud, longing to rise again.
Tracing an epic story from Merlin's conception and the building of the Round Table to the abduction of Guinevere and King Arthur's ambitious quest for Empire, this Arthur is as real as any other, brought back to life from the earliest sources.
Drawing out the dark and beautiful stories from the original medieval and early modern texts, Amy guides the reader from citadels through forests, into volcanoes, caves and riverbanks and beyond, even as far as Hell and the Otherworld. Going further than merely the stories, she provides incisive commentary about each tale, emphasising the legends' crafted nature and their symbiotic relationship with the political cultures of contemporary medieval Europe.
Thirty original linocut illustrations map the inky Arthurian myth-scape, darkened by time, familiar as a dream.
From Sunday Times bestseller Amy Jeffs', Arthur: A New Life mines the deep, elusive seams of a story we think we all know: the legend of King Arthur.
But here he is anew: a larger-than-life warlord, a hero raised by fairies, a leader of the wild hunt, a monster-slayer, lying wounded under the ash cloud, longing to rise again.
Tracing an epic story from Merlin's conception and the building of the Round Table to the abduction of Guinevere and King Arthur's ambitious quest for Empire, this Arthur is as real as any other, brought back to life from the earliest sources.
Drawing out the dark and beautiful stories from the original medieval and early modern texts, Amy guides the reader from citadels through forests, into volcanoes, caves and riverbanks and beyond, even as far as Hell and the Otherworld. Going further than merely the stories, she provides incisive commentary about each tale, emphasising the legends' crafted nature and their symbiotic relationship with the political cultures of contemporary medieval Europe.
Thirty original linocut illustrations map the inky Arthurian myth-scape, darkened by time, familiar as a dream.
Reviews / Votes
Gripping, learned, funny and often shocking, Arthur strips the greatest body of British legend back to its medieval bones, and shows the King Arthur cycle in all its original glorious strangeness. Beautifully illustrated and engagingly told, this is a book you will return to over and over again. -- Dan Jones, bestselling author of The PlantagenetsMore details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Quercus Publishing
Product notice
Trade binding
Illustrations
25 original prints
Dimensions
Height: 240 mm
Width: 156 mm
Thickness: 21 mm
Weight
575 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-5294-3168-1 (9781529431681)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Person
Amy Jeffs is a Somerset-based author and artist, she has a PhD in Art History from Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, and specialises in medieval art and culture. Jeffs' first book, Storyland: A New Mythology of Britain, was a Sunday Times bestseller, shortlisted for Waterstones Book of the Year and named a Times Historical Fiction Book of the Year. Her second book, Wild: Tales from Early Medieval Britain, explores an old idea of the wilderness through medieval stories of outcasts, monsters and the natural world. The audiobook, illustrated with song, was named audiobook of the week by the Times and the Guardian. Arthur is her fifth book.