Wise Women of the Dreamtime: Aboriginal Tales of the Ancestral Powers
collected by K. Langloh Parker, edited with commentary by Johanna Lambert
Inner Traditions International, Rochester, Vt., 1994; paper.
Australian aboriginal culture is thought to have existed in its present form for 150,000 years. These stories may be the oldest in the world. At once touching and potent, they were collected and scrupulously retold around the turn of this century by K. Langloh Parker, one of those amazing Victorian women who broke all the rules and fought her way our of the prejudices of her time to an appreciation of an alien, yet wiser, culture.
Johanna Lambert's commentary is subtle, lucid, and jargon-free, placing these deceptively simple tales within the larger context of the world's great wisdom literature.
This selection concentrates upon the manifold aspects of the Cosmic Feminine. It stands as an antidote against the chronic patriarchal hubris that has brought our planet to its present pitch, but is also effective against that shrill and strident feminism that is no more than patriarchy's equally unenlightened obverse. This is an inspired and unremittingly fascinating book, and beautifully produced and illustrated, too.
-JOHN ANTHONY WEST
Spring 1995