[The Sword in the Stone is] a wise book and learned in many ways, and at times boldly absurd or disrespectful; but the best of it is that it creates enough illusion and makes its lore. fascinating enough so that young people will actually learn more about medieval England from it than they will from twenty schoolbooks—and, incidentally, so will the rest of us, including the authors of the books, who never lived in the thirteenth century at all. For in matters of hunting, speech, fighting, castle economy, polite society and especially the care and use of animals, Mr. White is widely and accurately informed. Not only is he to be trusted, but his humorous liberties chase the dull solemnity of history out the window (Merlin, for example, can cast terrific spells but often crosses them up or gets tangled in his beard). And its deliberate anachronisms...