Beyond the fields we know

Among the great writers of fantasy, Lord Dunsany was one of the first: not merely innovative, he was a stylist whose prose has been echoed but never imitated. As Baird Searles has remarked, "His constant repetition of 'the fields we know,' for instance, is not just a clever phrase. Through it and its ramifications, there is a constant pointing up of the difference between the mundane and the twilit depths of Elfland, where time stands still." And L. Sprague de Camp says: "Dunsany's stories are a priceless possession for any lover of fantasy. Like first-rate poetry, they are endlessly…