Howard Pyle 
The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood 

‘The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood’ is an 1883 novel by the American illustrator and writer Howard Pyle. The author compiled the traditional Robin Hood ballads into a coherent narrative. To make the book suitable for contemporary readers and children, Pyle adapted the late Middle English of the ballads into an understandable dialect. As a result, they took the subject of Robin Hood, which had been increasingly popular through the 19th century, in a new direction that influenced later writers, artists, and filmmakers through the next century.