Chol (Mayan) Folktales deftly combines high-quality and thoughtfully edited transcriptions of oral storytelling with translation and narrative analysis, documenting and analyzing a trove of Chol folklore. The work provides a look into the folktale culture of the contemporary Maya presented with a rare and innovative theoretical framework.

The rich Chol oral narrative tradition is represented by eleven stories, each printed in the original language of the storytellers with parallel English translations and accompanied by a brief introduction that provides the relevant cultural and mythological background. Included with eight of the stories is a link to an audio clip of the tale told aloud in the Chol language. In addition, Chol (Mayan) Folktales introduces a model for the analysis of narratives that can be used to demonstrate the existence of a tradition of storytelling applicable to other Maya lore, including Classic period hieroglyphic texts.

Creating a nuanced sense of the Mayan oral tradition and revealing a highly structured literary style, this collection provides insight into contemporary Maya culture as well as a greater understanding of Classic period society. It will be of interest to students and scholars of folklore and literature and to anthropologists and linguists.

Well-known Mesoamericanists Nicholas A. Hopkins and J. Kathryn Josserand spent almost thirty years in the field collecting the oral folktales of the Chol Maya speakers. Their research on Chol and Epigraphic Maya has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc., among others. They are the founders of Jaguar Tours and have taught anthropology at universities in Mexico City, University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and Florida State University. Nick Hopkins also taught at University of Texas at Austin.

Ausencio (Chencho) Cruz Guzmán grew up along the Tulijá River, making dugout canoes with his father and brothers. He worked for many years with Merle Greene Robertson in her project to document the art of Palenque.