posted on 26 Jan 2023

Gods and Mortals: Ancient Greek Myths for Modern Readers by Sarah Iles Johnston

Sarah Iles Johnston is the College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of Religion at The Ohio State University, where she teaches courses on Greek myths – so her academic credentials are impeccable. But this is not a densely referenced text aimed at students or her university peers but a gloriously accessible retelling of the Ancient Greek myths that will appeal to the interested lay-reader. She’s imagined an audience of adults and young adults who want to find an engaging route into the complexities of the Greek myths without immediately finding themselves confused about chronologies and relationships. And, she does this with consummate skill and brio.

As Johnston makes clear in her foreword, there’s no way that it would be possible to herd every one of the myths into a single volume because it would be virtually impossible to handle as a reader. Instead she has focussed on the most prominent and best known and allocated them sections of their own under their own sub-headings. You’ll find a section on the Gods, the interaction of the Gods with mortals, the more famous Heroes (Perseus, Heracles, Jason for example) and the Trojan war and its aftermath – all easy to find and given their clear context.

So, although this book can almost be read as a novel, it readily lends itself to being read in sections – almost like a reference book that leads the reader to the myth they think they’re interested in and then tempts them on to continue reading and discovering the stories you didn’t know. Johnston recognises that this will be a temptation and although her foreword encourages readers to see the book as a continuous narrative, she acknowledges that there will be readers who want to focus in on specific myths – and, I must confess, I’m one of those readers. I loved hopping from one myth to another and then going back to discover others I’ve only been very dimly aware of.

The real strength of the book is the writing – pitching it at the right level isn’t at all easy when you want it to appeal to a wide range of ages. But she does this without being patronising and without dodging complexity and that’s a real triumph. However, she does have some fantastic and exciting raw material to work with. The book's own flyleaf captures the range perfectly:

“Some of the mortals in these stories are cursed by the gods, while luckier ones are blessed with resourcefulness and resilience. Gods transform themselves into animals, humans, and shimmering gold to visit the earth in disguise – where they sometimes transform offending mortals into: a wolf, a spider, a craggy rock. Other mortals – both women and men – use their wits and strength to conquer the monsters created by the gods – gorgons, dragons, harpies, fire-breathing bulls.”

A word too for the publisher – Princeton University Press – who have produced a really lovely, substantial hardback. They’ve commissioned over a dozen black and white, full page illustrations from Tristan Johnston, who is an illustrator and graphic designer whose work includes books for children and adults.

The book is currently only available as a hardcover priced at just under £30; but, in all honesty, if you’re at all interested in the Greek myths and why they are still relevant to us in our modern world, you’ll want one on your bookshelf that you can keep and dip into over and again.

 

Terry Potter

January 2023