The Druid Revival Reader

Book excerpt: In the midst of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment, a handful of British intellectuals turned their backs on the social and cultural trends of their time and set out to reinvent the spirituality of the ancient Druids. The movement that rose out of this effort played a central role in struggles for cultural identity in most of the Celtic nations of Europe, provided inspiration to such world-class creative talents as William Blake and Frank Lloyd Wright, and inspired an innovative tradition of Western nature spirituality that remains active to this day. The Druid Revival Reader provides the first collection of original writings from that movement. Its selections, beginning with William Stukeley's survey of Druid theology from 1743 and ending with Ross Nichols' 1947 essay "An Examination of Creative Myth," cover two centuries in the life of an evolving tradition. Edited and introduced by contemporary Druid John Michael Greer, The Druid Revival Reader is essential for understanding the sources of modern Druid and Pagan traditions, and offers a wealth of insights relevant to the ecological and spiritual crises of our own time.