List of literary cycles

A literary cycle is a group of stories focused on common figures, often (though not necessarily) based on mythical figures or loosely on historical ones. Cycles which deal with an entire country are sometimes referred to as matters. A fictional cycle is often referred to as a mythos. The Anansi tales, which center on the Ashanti of Ghana trickster spider-spirit Anansi, and its variations in the Americas as Ti Malice and Bouki in Haiti, Br'er Rabbit or John and Old Master in the Southern United States. The tales of the One Thousand and One Nights, brought together by the frame story of the tale of Scheherazade and Shahryār. The Mahabharata, the world's longest epic poem, many of whose stories deal with the lives of Indian mythological characters, most notably Krishna Nasreddin (1208-1285) is a character in the folklore of the Muslim world from the Balkans to China, and a hero of humorous short stories and satirical anecdotes. The four troubadours Bernart d'Auriac, Pere Salvatge, Roger Bernard III of Foix, and Peter III of Aragon composed a cycle of four sirventes in the summer of 1285 concerning the Aragonese Crusade. The Matter of Britain (or the "Arthurian cycle"), which centers on King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table The Vulgate cycle (also known as the Lancelot-Grail) The Post-Vulgate cycle The Matter of France (or the "Carolingian cycle"), which centers on Charlemagne and the Twelve Peers Chanson de Geste La Geste de Garin de Monglane Doon de Mayence Garin le Loherain Crusade cycle The Henriad, the four plays of Shakespeare centered on Henry V. Two examples of Japanese cycles are: the Matter of Japan (Kojiki, Nihon Shoki, etc.) and the Genji-Heike Cycle (The Tale of the Heike, Gikeiki about Minamoto no Yoshitsune, etc.). Also popular are the Soga Brothers and Forty-Seven Ronin cycles.