Background Resources on Dragons in Literature

Background Resources on Dragons in Literature

History & Background for Older Readers

Blumberg, Rhoda. The Truth about Dragons. New York: Scholastic, 1980. Compares Eastern and Western dragons with many details on their appearance and habits.

Colbert, David. The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter: A Treasury of Myths, Legends, and Fascinating Facts. Berkley Pub Group, 2002. The short section on dragons contains some interesting background on traditions about dragons, but the book does not contain much analysis of dragons or other elements within the Harry Potter books. For details, see Dragons in Harry Potter Books.

Gibbons, Gail. Behold . . . the Dragons! New York: Morrow, 1999. Explains briefly, with colorful drawings, the development of many myths and legends about different types of dragons around the world.

Krensky, Stephen. Dragons. Monster Chronicles. Minneapolis: Lerner Publications, 2007. 48 pp. with illus., some color. Contents: World-Famous Monsters, Dragons Get Personal, Dragons in Folklore, Dragons Take Flight.

Passes, David. Dragons: Truth, Myth, and Legend. Illus. Wayne Anderson. NY: Golden Books, 1993. Short retelling of traditional tales, mostly but not all European, with rich color illustrations.

Schaffer, Christy. Dragon Coloring Book. Dover Pictorial Archive Series. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2002. 33 pp. With an introduction and short texts on each page about types of dragons and famous dragons and legendary heroes around the world. Drawings to color from Dover Pictorial Archive.

Stallman, Birdie. Learning About Dragons. Illus. Lydia Halverson. Chicago: Children’s Press, 1981. Says they are “the first scary monsters people believed in. Of course, dragons are make-believe monsters. They are only real in stories or on TV. But don’t tell a dragon that!” Shows dragon watching TV with dragons in western, Chinese dragon pattern on chair, bones around house. Has sections on Scary Dragons; Friendly Dragons: Eastern compared to Western; Modern Dragons: Smaug, Eustace in Narnia, Reluctant Dragon, Real-Life komodo. Last page: “If you do meet a dragon…Slay it. Run from it. Feed it warm milk. But whatever you do, never ignore a dragon.”

Wyly, Michael J. Dragons. The Mystery Library. San Diego: Lucent Books, 2002. 96 pp. with illustrations from ancient documents, artworks, landmarks, and films. Compares Eastern and Western dragons, discusses possible origins of dragon lore and the komodo dragon. Includes notes, references, and an index.

Book of Dragons and Monsters. Introduction by Susan Stronge. New York: Abbeville Press/Canopy Books, 1992. First published in UK by Victoria and Albert Museum, 1992. Small books with illustrations from V & A Museum art.

Briggs, Katherine. Her reference books on folk tales and fantasy are well-researched guides.

Ciruelo, The Book of the Dragon. 1991. New York: Union Square Press, 2005. A large, lavish book from Spain on types of dragons, their history and legends, and their culture and customs, with dramatic paintings by H. G. Ciruelo Cabral (a native of Argentina).

Dickinson, Peter. The Flight of Dragons. Illus. Wayne Anderson. New York: Harper, 1979. A somewhat satiric big book of dragon history with lavish illustrations.

Johnsgard, Paul and Karin. A Natural History of Dragons and Unicorns. New York: St. Martin's, 1982.

Newman, Paul. The Hill of the Dragon. Bath: Kingsmead Press, 1979.

Rowling, J. K. Fantastic Beasts & Where to Find Them. New York: Scholastic, 2001. Published (for charity) to look like a slim textbook written by Newt Scamander and owned by Harry Potter, with comic marginalia by Harry and his friends, and a foreword by Albus Dumbledore. For details, see Dragons in Harry Potter Books.

Shuker, Karl. Dragons: A Natural History. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1995. Foreword by Desmond Morris.

Simpson, Jacqueline. British Dragons. Myth, Legend and Folklore Series. London: The Folklore Society/Wordsworth Editions, 1980. 2nd. ed. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth, 2001. 176 pp. A folklore study with several b/w illustrations. Includes songs about "The Lambton Worm" and "The Dragon of Wantley." The Laidly Worm and "Kemp Owyne" are discussed as "one story which did make the transition from medieval romance to localised legend" (58-60).

Steer, Dugald A., ed. Dr. Ernest Drake's Dragonology. Illus. Wayne Anderson, Douglas Carrel, and Helen Ward. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick, 2003. A large, lavishly illustrated book with encrusted (plastic) gems and many foldout attachments and special features. Full of fictional lore about the hunting and study of dragons. Interactive resources on Ologyworld web site.

Time-Life Editors. The Enchanted World: Dragons. Alexandria, VA: Time-Life Books, 1984.

Barnard, Mary. “A Dragon Hunt.” American Scholar 33 (1964): 422-7.

Berman, Ruth. “Victorian Dragons: The Reluctant Brood.” Children’s Literature in Education 15 (1984): 220-33.

Dunn, Margaret. “In Defense of Dragons: Imagination and Experience in the Earthsea Trilogy.” The Child and the Story: An Exploration of Narrative Forms. Ed. Priscilla Ord. Boston: Children’s Lit. Assoc., 1983. 54-60.

Evans, Jonathan D. “The Dragon.” Mythical and Fabulous Creatures: A Source Book and Research Guide. Ed. Malcolm South. NY: Greenwood, 1987. 27-58. Excellent scholarly historical overview and bibliography.

Fireside, Bryna J. "A Second Look: My Father's Dragon." Horn Book Magazine 71 (Jan./Feb. 1995): 90-91.

Hanlon, Tina L. “The Art and the Dragon: Intertextuality in the Pictorial Narratives of Dragon Feathers,” in Tales, Tellers and Texts, edited by Gabrielle Cliff Hodges, Mary Jane Drummond, and Morag Styles. London: Cassell, 2000, pp. 79-94.

Hanlon, Tina L "Dragons Forever, Dragons For Everyone," with annotated bibliography, The Five Owls, vol. 15, no. 5, Summer 2001: 97-101.

Hanlon, Tina L. “The Taming of the Dragon in Twentieth-Century Picture Books.” Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, vol. 14 (Spring 2003): 7-26. Essays from the 16th International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts (Fort Lauderdale, 1995).

Johnson, Diane. "The Dragons and Serpents of Laurence Yep." The Five Owls, vol. 15, no. 5, Summer 2001: 109-110. A critical survey of Yep's use of Chinese dragon lore in a variety of novels with fantastic and realistic settings.

Koller, Jackie French. "Conquering Dragons." The Five Owls, vol. 15, no. 5, Summer 2001: 105-6. The author of the Dragonling series describes experiences with her son that led to the writing of stories about peaceful dragons, introducing "a new kind of hero who uses his wits instead of his fists, who values justice above glory." (See page on novels for Koller's books.)

Le Guin, Ursula. The Language of the Night: Essays on Fantasy and Science Fiction. NY: HarperCollins, 1992. Includes essay “Why Are Americans Afraid of Dragons?” Le Guin writes that, although American society often rejects fantasies containing dragons, the dragon "is alive: terribly alive. . . . It frightens us because it is part of us, and the artist forces us to admit it." This essay is reprinted in Crosscurrents of Children's Literature: An Anthology of Texts and Criticism. Ed. J. D. Stahl, Tina L. Hanlon, and Elizabeth Lennox Keyser. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2006

Rahn, Suzanne. "Dragons International." The Five Owls, vol. 15, no. 5, Summer 2001: 111-12. Surveys children's books with dragon stories from many places.

Schafer, Elizabeth D. Exploring Harry Potter. Beacham’s Sourcebooks for Teaching Young Adult Fiction. Osprey, FL: Beacham, 2000. Background material and teaching guides for the first three books in the Harry Potter series, including a section “Magical Animals and Creatures.” See Norbert in the index for comments on the dragon in Book 1, and teaching guide for chap. 14 in Book 1. “The dragon Norbert is Harry’s alter ego, acting toward his foster parent like Harry wishes he could act toward the Dursleys, literally biting the hand that feeds him. Norbert is sent to safety in a create much like toddler Harry was exiled in a bundle of blankets” (p. 68). See also Dragons in Harry Potter Books in this web site.

Shastri, Hope. The Picture Book Dragon. Ph.D. Diss. Texas Women’s Univ., 1993. This library science dissertation classifies and analyzes many specific features of dragons in 151 American picture books published between 1950 and 1992. Shastri found that tame, domesticated, often self-deprecating dragons were by far the most common in these books. Shastri links her descriptions of picture book dragons to eight generalizations made by critics such as Jonathan D. Evans and Jane Yolen, confirming earlier critics' observations that dragons become “inferior and subordinate” as they become friendlier, and large numbers of modern dragons are “enfeebled and self-commiserating” (2). In the books Shastri analyzed, 22% of the dragons cry and 30% work for humans; these are larger percentages than any of the other actions she counted besides flying, talking, and breathing fire.

Stein, Ruth. “The Changing Styles in Dragons—from Fafnir to Smaug.” Elementary English 45 (1968): 179-83.

Stott, Jon. “Will the Real Dragon Stand Up? Convention and Parody in Children’s Stories.” Children’s Literature in Education 21 (1990): 219-28. Reprinted in Crosscurrents of Children's Literature: An Anthology of Texts and Criticism. Ed. J. D. Stahl, Tina L. Hanlon, and Elizabeth Lennox Keyser. New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2006, in Part 7, Satires and Spin-Offs: Reworking Classic Children's Literature. Stott discusses the teaching of traditional stories and modern parodies in elementary classrooms.

Tax, Meredith. "In the Year of Harry Potter, Enter the Dragon." The Nation. Vol. 274, issue 3. Jan. 28, 2002, pp. 30 ff. Surveys Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea books, with analysis of the changing reputations of fantasy and realistic fiction.

Tolkien, J. R. R. “Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics.” An Anthology of Beowulf Criticism. Ed. Lewis Nicholson. Notre Dame: U of Notre Dame, 1963. 51-103.

Tolkien, J. R. R. “On Fairy-stories.” Tree and Leaf. London: George Allen & Unwin, 1966. Contains Token's famous statement that as a boy he "desired dragons with a profound desire." Although he did not want them in his own safe neighborhood, he yearned for the rich "other-world" of imagination and fantasy that contained dragons.

Yolen, Jane. “Dealing with Dragons.” The Horn Book, vol. 60 (1984): 380-88.

Yolen, Jane. "Here Be Dragons," 2000. Reprinted online at http://www.janeyolen.com/essays.html. Yolen defends child readers and stories about dragons against censors who illogically think that books about dragons are satanic or stories of mythical beasts will hurt children. The essay gives examples of different ways that dragons function metaphorically in stories by different authors. Yolen writes, "If we give the dragon experience a name—give it a metaphoric shape—we also begin to give children a way to fight their own battles in their own dark caves."

Yolen, Jane. Touch Magic: Fantasy, Faerie and Folklore in the Literature of Childhood. New York: Putnam, 1981. Revised and reprinted by August House, 2000. Essays in defense of fantasy. See cover and details on Yolen's web site.