Mythology for beginners

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	• World Mythology Donna Rosenberg McGraw-Hill, 1994 - 584 pages average customer review:based on 12 reviews view larger image
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Mythology for beginners

I had to buy this for my college mythology class. It's a nice enough text, with many stories from many different cultures. Before each culture, we learn a little about the people and how their stories came about, which I thought helped me understand the stories more. My personal favorites were the Egyptian myths and the Greek myths, of which there were many. It also includes classics like 'King Arthur', 'Beowulf', and 'The Illiad'. It was interesting to note the similarities and differences between the cultures and their stories, many of which were being created at the same time years ago- but many miles apart.

As for the flaws this book has, there is one major one. While I'm sure the translators translated to the best of their ability, if I had to read "flooded their hearts" one more time, I think I would scream. Okay I get it, they're happy, filled with joy, ecstatic, delighted.... but really? "Flooded"? So maybe that was the literal translation, but couldn't the editors have changed it a few times so that the readers didn't die from the repetition?

Overall I would recommend this book, especially if you're interested in mythology. Just be aware that there are many different interpretations of myths, and the ones that are in this book may not be the most well known. Additionally I'm not sure if they cut out some parts because they knew this would be a school text. If you know the story of Osiris and Isis, you know that there was one piece of his body that a fish ate... that part of the myth isn't in this book- I guess because they deemed it unappropriate? There is a newer edition out however, which isn't exactly better than this one. At the very least, I had hoped they didn't use the word "flooded" so much in that one... But sadly not so. The new version is the same, with some additional stories included like: "Esfandyar", "Chi Li", "Jason and the Golden Fleece" among others. (If you need the newer version for class, you could still get away with buying the cheaper 2nd edition and then just copying certain stories from a fellow classmate's book. The newer is $43 with this one being around $13!)

(Originally reviewed for "Kathleen's Book Reviews")

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Great Price

I just recently purchased this for my daughter. The book was required for her college class and Amazon's price was about $30 less than the college bookstore.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3

This volume offers 59 of the world's great myths--including selections from The Iliad and the Odyssey, Beowulf, King Arthur and Quetzalcoatl. Each myth is accompanied by an introduction that offers historical background and suggests avenues for literary analysis.