Myths & Legends Explained || More than you ever wanna know...
Written: Nov 12 '07
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Quality paper, binding, illustrations, presentation.
Cons: Overflowing with information, names, places, and sidebar stories. Requires careful reading and thought.
The Bottom Line: A rich and varied introduction to over fifty myths and legends from around the world. A great starting point for an overview of a specific myth/legend.
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| sleeper54's Full Review: Neil Philip - Myths & Legends Explained |
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In the history of mankind many cultures have arisen, flourished, and died away, leaving their imprint on the future by embedding their stories and history, as myths and legends, in the culture of those who followed.
Perhaps best known to Western society are the tales of the long-ago-fallen Greek and Roman gods. But around the world we find creation stories, legends of great and terrible creatures, myths that define gods to be worshipped and myths that guide believers in the conduct of their daily lives.
Myths & Legends Explained tackles illustrating, in words and pictures, myths and legends from around the world. Similar to Hercules cleaning the stables of King Augeias this is a task of untold scale, well ...until you read the stories here perhaps.
A brief Introduction discusses the themes common to many myths and legends: the idea of a male 'creator' god, the concept of mythical time being cyclical rather than linear with creation occurring time and again, and the recurring theme of a catastrophic event early in the creation period (often a flood) with a god, or gods, saving his people from extinction.
Other common themes include nurturing female 'mother' gods and stories of gods encountering 'death' and the underworld, often foretelling the possible fate of those mortals that worship them.
More than fifty individual stories are told and illustrated, drawn from every continent but Antarctica. Myths and legends stemming from the Greek and Roman cultures dominate with nearly two dozen specific tales featured.
Other stories range from the endless ocean of Nun of ancient Egypt, the Norse gods, the myth of King Arthur and the Holy Grail to the lesser known legends from Africa, the Americas, the Aboriginal people of Australia, India, China, and Japan.
Published by Dorling Kindersley Limited, Myths & Legends Explained follows the DK format of high quality printing and illustrations with a concise overall explanation and an almost overwhelming amount of annotation and sidebars. The book is so packed with information that the font size shrinks at times to almost become unreadable, filling every nook and cranny of the pages.
The other danger of presenting so much information is the real risk of becoming overwhelmed by it all. It is not a book that you necessarily want to read from beginning to end. It would work well as a colorful, accurate, and captivating introduction to one specific myth or set of related myths for the older teen or adult reader.
The Bottom Line
With beautiful illustrations and photographs of ancient artifacts, reproductions of many 'classical' paintings that once educated the elite classes of medieval Europe, and a comprehensive index to locate the many names and places of these stories, Myths & Legends Explained is a great 'starting point' resource for the mature reader interested in learning the basics of any number of man's myths and legends from cultures around the world.
Certified 'lean-n-mean' review.
Recommended:
Yes
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sleeper54
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