Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes, 75th Anniversary Illustrated Edition

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Since its original publication by Little, Brown and Company in 1942, Edith Hamilton's Mythology has sold millions of copies throughout the world and established itself as a perennial bestseller. Indeed this book from the 40s gives a superb view of Greek Mythology (includes also Roman and Norse).

Most of them (stories) I felt were very engaging compact retellings, but I will say some stories suffer, an example is the creation myth.

What I did, was read Fry’s retelling first (containing more in-depth retellings of stories in the first half of this novel), this novel and I will eventually read the primary texts. The majority of Hera’s misdeeds are a result of the fact that Zeus can’t keep his Jörmungandr in his pants (Yes, we’re mixing mythologies, just roll with it).

Her job is to present them as translations of excerpts, combining excerpts to give us a complete picture of the story/character (many times reminding us that this picture is reliant on what stories actually survived and from what time period).

Hector’s young Son, Astyanax and Hecuba’s daughter, Polyxena are murdered after the defeat of Troy, Tantalus kills his own son and feeds him to the Gods, Atreus feeds his brother his own children… you get the point! An easy to use contents page, lots of info on major and minor Greek mythology characters and even a very small section on Norse mythology at the back.