With the arrival of a Witchland envoy making demands of Demonland’s chief lords, peace between the two lands is irrevocably shattered. The chief lords Juss and Spitfire send their brother Goldry to defeat the witch king. Even though he is initially victorious, Goldry eventually is captured, leaving it up to his brothers to rescue him. So begins a fantasy adventure whose influence has endured for nearly a century. In the best traditions of Homeric epics, Norse sagas, and Arthurian myths, author E. R. Eddison weaves a compelling adventure, with a majestic, Shakespearean narrative style. His sweeping tale recounts battles between warriors and witches on fog-shrouded mountaintops and in the ocean’s depths—along with romantic interludes, backroom intrigues, and episodes of high treason. Generations of readers have joyfully lost themselves in the timeless worlds of The Worm Ouroboros.

The Worm Ouroboros is an undisputed classic of fantasy literature, and has been an avowed influence on the likes of J. R. R. Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, and Ursula K. Le Guin. Entirely immersive and written in near-Elizabethan tongue, the novel takes readers on an unforgettable ride across the plane of Mercury, flanked by soaring hippogriffs, with an exceptional ending that impresses as much now as it did almost a century ago.