I've always been a fan of myth and legend. In the days when I fancied myself a scholar, I read as much ancient material as I could get my hands on. Interest and academics drew me towards the King Arthur stories, but I gradually branched out into the Celtic, Icelandic, and even Finnish traditions (If you don't think the cold does strange things to people, try reading the Kalevala sometime). One character, though, in whom I never took an interest in was Robin Hood. Maybe I was ruined by Disney and Errol Flynn, but the prince of thieves never held much interest for me. Thankfully, Stephen R. Lawhead can't say the same.
Lawhead's King Raven Trilogy is one of the finest reimaginings of a classic story I have ever read. Rather than molding the tradition to suit some philosophical perspective, or focusing on some ancillary character, Lawhead starts from scratch. He rebuilds the Robin Hood mythos from the ground up, setting it in an unconventional place and time, but all the while easing it towards an ending which satisfyingly joins the familiar.
Hood (2006) opens the story in England and Wales about a generation after the Battle of Hastings. Bran ap Brychan is the no-good son of a murdered Welsh lord. After his father’s death, Bran is forced into hiding and must find a way to accept his fate, becoming the only thing which can face the Norman Conquerors: King Raven. It is a little disconcerting to get most of the way through a book supposedly about Robin Hood without actually seeing the name. Instead, Bran takes on the mantle of this half-bird/half-man character, which in Welsh is called Rhi Bran y Hud. In that name is a microcosm of the talent and intention Lawhead brings to this trilogy.
"Rhi Bran" means "King Raven," and "y Hud" translates roughly as "magician" or "sorcerer." When you throw it all together and rush through the ethnic bits (as English speakers have done for centuries), it's not much of a stretch for it to become "Robin Hood."
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