The word "fairy" has become so debased that when it is not being used derogatorily it conjures an image of a grotesquely twee cherub of Disneyesque "reinvention". Yet before the Christians demonised it, it was a word of power and mystery the touchstone of all that was inexplicable for centuries. For example, we still use the word "stroke" to denote the sudden and crippling effects of reduced blood flow to the brain, derived from thebelief that such victims were "fairy-struck". In Fairies, Janet Bord, a Fortean folklorist, presents a re-assessment of the subject.

The notion that we share our landscape with magical beings goes back beyond the Bronze Age and can be found in most early and archaic cultures.