"The English Year" is a lavishly illustrated month-by-month, day-by-day guide to all the customs and festivals of England, from the national celebrations to herald the new year down to small local traditions such as the Minehead Hobby Horse or Duck Racing in Oxfordshire. If you want to know where you can get free bread and beer on any day of the year; if you want to know where Mayday comes from or why you should protect yourself on Mischief Night; or why the English go in for all kinds of arcane celebrations but can't be bothered with St George's Day - this the book for you.

Author Biography

Steve Roud has been researching British folklore for over thirty years. He is the joint author of the Oxford Dictionary of English Folklore and the author of The Penguin Guide to the Superstitions of Britain and Ireland, winner of the 2004 Katharine Briggs Folklore. He lives in Sussex.