Thomas the Rhymer
core novel 1990 Thomas the Rhymer
Record
| First published | 1990 |
|---|---|
| Original language |  EN |
| Work type | novel |
| Canon status | core |
| Reader rating | 3.88 (3,972 ratings, collected 2026-09-15) |
| Page count | 258 |
| First-edition ISBN | 9781557100467 |
Synopsis
Thomas the Rhymer is a retelling of the old Scottish ballad of True Thomas, narrated in turn by several people who know him: a fellow minstrel, a farm couple who shelter him, and eventually Thomas himself. Gifted with a talent for music and poetry and known for a boldness that borders on recklessness, young Thomas draws the notice of the powerful and capricious Queen of Elfland, who sweeps him away from the mortal world into her glittering, dangerous realm of Elfland. Bound to her for seven years by the old rules governing mortals taken into Faerie, Thomas must learn to survive the Queen's court, its beauty and its cruelty alike, and to understand what it truly means to be human, before he can be released back into the ordinary world he left behind.
Where it sits
- Universe: Thomas the Rhymer
- Series: not part of a registered series (standalone work within its universe)
- Author: Ellen Kushner
Awards (verified)
- Mythopoeic Fantasy Award (Adult Literature), 1991: won; Confirmed directly via mythsoc.org's own Mythopoeic Fantasy Award finalists/winners page: beat finalists Tigana (Kay), Tehanu (Le Guin), Only Begotten Daughter (Morrow), and The Books of Great Alta (Yolen). NOTE: a widely repeated secondary claim (sfadb, the author's own site, Wikipedia, SFE) that this novel ALSO tied for the 1991 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel could NOT be corroborated against worldfantasy.org's own 1991 award retrospective page, which lists only James Morrow's Only Begotten Daughter as that year's Best Novel winner, with no tie and no mention of Kushner or Thomas the Rhymer anywhere on the page; that WFA claim is therefore NOT registered here, per this project's strict primary-source-over-aggregator sourcing rule.
Notes
- A retelling of the Scottish border ballad "Thomas the Rhymer" (Thomas of Erceldoune), following a mortal bard taken into Elfland by its Queen.
Sources
- Wikipedia: Thomas the Rhymer (novel)
- The Mythopoeic Society, official Fantasy Award finalists list
- sfadb: Ellen Kushner
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