Get ready to dive into the fascinating world of urban legends with this book that will take you on a journey to uncover the truth behind some of the most mysterious stories that have captivated audiences for years. From haunted houses to legendary creatures, this book explores a wide range of urban legends that have become ingrained in popular culture. Each chapter delves into a different urban legend, providing a detailed history of its origins and exploring the various theories surrounding its truth or fiction. Through in-depth research and insightful analysis, the author seeks to separate fact from fiction, shedding light on the real stories behind the legends that have been passed down through generations. Whether you're a skeptic looking to debunk urban legends or a believer seeking confirmation of your favorite stories, this book offers something for everyone. With a blend of storytelling and investigative journalism, "Exploring Famous Urban Legends: Uncovering The Truth Behind Mysterious Stories" is a must-read for anyone interested in the hidden truths behind the myths and legends that have captured our imaginations. Get ready to uncover the secrets behind some of the most famous urban legends and discover the real stories that lie beneath the surface.
A collection of modern-day urban myths and folklore explores questions relating to famous figures, government conspiracies, paranoia, revenge, chain letters, and humiliating experiences.
This fascinating book uncovers the history behind urban legends and explains how the contemporary iterations of familiar fictional tales provide a window into the modern concerns—and digital advancements—of our society. What do ghost hunting, legend tripping, and legendary monsters have in common with email hoaxes, chain letters, and horror movies? In this follow-up to Libraries Unlimited's Tales, Rumors, and Gossip: Exploring Contemporary Folk Literature in Grades 7–12, author Gail de Vos revisits popular urban legends, and examines the impact of media—online, social, and broadcast—on their current iterations. What Happens Next? Contemporary Urban Legends and Popular Culture traces the evolution of contemporary legends from the tradition of oral storytelling to the sharing of stories on the Internet and TV. The author examines if the popularity of contemporary legends in the media has changed the form, role, and integrity of familiar legends. In addition to revisiting some of the legends highlighted in her first book, de Vos shares new tales in circulation which she sees as a direct result of technological advancements.
Writing the Uncanny sees some of the best contemporary authors explain what drew them to horror, ghost stories, folklore and beyond, and reveal how to craft unsettling fiction which resonates. An essential guide for both the casual reader and the aspiring writer of strange tales.
Presents descriptions of hundreds of urban legends and their variations, themes, and scholarly approaches to the genre, including such tales as disappearing hitchhikers and hypodermic needles left in the coin slots of pay telephones.
The subject of urban myths and legends is one I have been interested in for a couple of years now. It occurred to me, one day at lunch with friends on the Isle of Dogs, that many long rambling conversations (and ours are certainly long and always rambling) will include a tall tale or two. One person will then be reminded of a story he or she once heard which is then presented as near or actual fact. The story will be introduced like this: 'That reminds me of a story I once heard . . .' or 'I remember my uncle/aunt/sister/hairdresser telling me what happened to a friend of theirs . . .' So urban legends are easy to spot and always have a ring of truth about them. The events they describe could happen or might have happened to any of us. Each of us could have been as unfortunate or stupid as the character(s) in the story, and that is one of the reasons we all enjoy urban legends so much: that the misfortune involved didn't happen to us but to somebody else. And that makes us laugh. The stories come in many different forms. Some involve ghostly goings on, some are about love found or lost. Some centre on plain stupidity and some on unfortunate coincidences, although some do have happy endings. The connecting feature is that all are told and then retold and come back around in altered forms, and all of them are passed around by word of mouth or, especially these days, via the internet, where they spread like wildfire. These 'legends' (so-called 'urban, ' although they don't need to have an urban setting) are the modern-day version of medieval folklore and all of the anecdotes in this collection can be recited the next time you are at lunch, dinner or in the pub with friends. They can make even the most unimaginative person seem interesting, I promise. They seem to be working for me, at any rate. I should point out here that many of the tales told in this collection are probably not true and that any names given, apart from when they are used to back up evidence in genuine accounts, are made up, by me. So, for example, if there really is a Peter Patsalides who worked at the World Trade Centre in New York prior to 11 September 2001 (see Caught with his Trousers Down), then I am not suggesting he was having an affair because that is also the name of a friend of mine, the one who told me the story in the first place. So please don't sue and leave me penniless if your marriage collapses as a result of something I have written. I am sure many of the stories included must be untrue, despite their ring of truth, but that is part of the fun of urban legends: any one of them could be true and it is up to us to decide for ourselves what to believe and what not to. Some well-known urban legends are bound to be missing from this book, but they may well pop up in a second volume if this one proves to be popular. It is only meant to be a little bit of fun and perhaps to provoke some thought and conversation. Anything that does that must be a good thing and also, reading this book and reciting a few of the tales might make you more popular - you never know. Albert Jack
From Alien to When a Stranger Calls, many films are based on folklore or employ an urban legend element to propel the narrative. Films, Folklore and Urban Legends explores the convergence of folklore with popular cinema studies and focuses on the study of urban legends and how these narratives are used as inspiration for a number of films. Beginning with a general survey of the existing literature on folklore/film, this book addresses discourses of belief, how urban legends provide the organizing principle of some films, and how certain films "act out" or perform a legend.
Between 1250 and 1350, numerous Italian city-states jockeyed for position in a cutthroat political climate. Seeking to legitimate and ennoble their autonomy, they turned to ancient Rome for concrete and symbolic sources of identity. Each city-state appropriated classical symbols, ancient materials, and Roman myths to legitimate its regime as a logical successor to&—or continuation of&—Roman rule. In Urban Legends, Carrie Bene&š illuminates this role of the classical past in the construction of late medieval Italian urban identity.
From the master folklorist and sly wit, Jan Brunvand, comes a collection of all-new urban legends. Did your cousin's wife's dentist's daughter go to the tanning parlor once too often and had her insides cooked? Has your husband's brother's nephew teacher try to make a dead rabbit look alive? If so, you've heard—or you yourself may have told—two of the seventy-plus legends in this collection. Urban legends are "those bizarre but believable stories about batter-fried rats, spiders in hairdos, Cabbage Patch dolls that get funerals, and the like that pass by word of mouth as being the gospel truth." But of course, though often told as having happened to a FOAF (friend of a friend), they aren't true. Included in this collection are legends about sex, horror, cars, business, and academia. Among them are "The Bible Student's Exam," "The Pregnant Shoplifter," "The Ice Cream Cone Caper," "Don't Mess with Texas," and "Mrs. Fields' Cookie Recipe."
