What are tales?

Famous quotes containing the word tales:

    Among the Indians he had fought;
    And with him many tales he brought
    Of pleasure and of fear;
    Such tales as told to any Maid
    By such a Youth, in the green shade,
    Were perilous to hear.
    William Wordsworth (1770–1850)

    The very nursery tales of this generation were the nursery tales of primeval races. They migrate from east to west, and again from west to east; now expanded into the “tale divine” of bards, now shrunk into a popular rhyme.
    Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)

    ...I had been fed, in my youth, a lot of old wives’ tales about the way men would instantly forsake a beautiful woman to flock around a brilliant one. It is but fair to say that, after getting out in the world, I had never seen this happen ....
    Dorothy Parker (1893–1967)