"A great book... " -- Choice"... a groundbreaking work of scholarship... "Â -- Asian Folklore Studies"This extremely fascinating study opens an important chapter in the ethnography of speech, briliantly confirming the views advanced by Dell Hymes, Albert Lord and Richard Baumann." -- The Journal of Indo-European StudiesBuilding on his work in Traditional Oral Epic and Immanent Art, John Foley dissolves the perceived barrier between "oral" and "written," creating a composite theory from oral-formulaic theory and the ethnography of speaking and ethnopoetics." a groundbreaking work of scholarship that clears the path for solving the perennial problem of the interpretation of oral-derived texts. The book will be of immense value to students of folklore and literature, and to those seriously interested in the interface of the two traditionally divided disciplines." -- Asian Folklore Studies