How long would it take to adequately explain the influence of myths on culture, history, language, and identity? About thirty-nine years, say the editors at Cannongate. The British publisher has just launched an ambitious one-hundred-part series to explore myths from contemporary angles, one that’s off to an auspicious start with authors Karen Armstrong, Margaret Atwood, and Jeanette Winterson. Armstrong, the former nun behind such bestsellers as A History of God and Islam, A Short History, opens the series with the aptly titled A Short History of Myth, exploring the power of this type of story while also demystifying certain popular examples. Atwood’s The Penelopiad revisits The Odyssey through the eyes of Penelope, Odysseus’ wife, who cleverly preserved his estate while he went adventuring for a couple of decades. Winterson chose to rewrite the myth of Atlas in Weight, a sympathetic and psychological portrait of the man who held the world on his shoulders. Each year a handful of new titles penned by leading writers, thinkers, and historians will be released. Coming up: Chinua Achebe, Victor Pelevin, Donna Tartt, and David Grossman. Keep these on the shelf to hand down to your grandkids.
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