The Norse Myths by Kevin Crossley-Holland
I mentioned before how I love mythology, but one book I read made me realize how little I know of Norse myths, so I decided it was time to correct that. I am seeing a lot of similarities between the myths and that novel, so it's nice to see their origins.
I was very fortunate to be able to take a mythology class in college by a wonderful teacher, Merrilee Cunningham. She made you feel like you were seeing something really unique when probably it was something she's read from students throughout her teaching career. But the boon to that, at least for me, is that I wanted to keep researching to see what else I could find. One paper I wrote for her was an attempt to classify gods and goddesses by their Greek/Roman counterparts. I didn't have oodles of time, so I wasn't able to delve into the project like I really wanted to, but it was enough to see that there are similarities throughout the ancient civilizations. For instance, there's just about always a flood myth, whether it's Greek or Native American. There's creation myths and sometimes end of days myths. There's also a common Herculean figure, like Gilgamesh and Enkidu, or the unnamed mason/giant who attempts to rebuild Asgard's walls that I just discovered in this book. Whether it's Western European, Native American, Middle Eastern, African, or Asian, if you look closely at the myths of these ancient civilizations you find archetypes that truly span the globe. Archetypes we can still recognize today. Studying mythology today is like watching globalization in its infancy. Although these myths developed all on their own (with the exception of the Romans, really) fears, questions, jokes...they are universal. And each individual group came up with remarkably similar explanations. We have always been closer than we really ever knew.
I was very fortunate to be able to take a mythology class in college by a wonderful teacher, Merrilee Cunningham. She made you feel like you were seeing something really unique when probably it was something she's read from students throughout her teaching career. But the boon to that, at least for me, is that I wanted to keep researching to see what else I could find. One paper I wrote for her was an attempt to classify gods and goddesses by their Greek/Roman counterparts. I didn't have oodles of time, so I wasn't able to delve into the project like I really wanted to, but it was enough to see that there are similarities throughout the ancient civilizations. For instance, there's just about always a flood myth, whether it's Greek or Native American. There's creation myths and sometimes end of days myths. There's also a common Herculean figure, like Gilgamesh and Enkidu, or the unnamed mason/giant who attempts to rebuild Asgard's walls that I just discovered in this book. Whether it's Western European, Native American, Middle Eastern, African, or Asian, if you look closely at the myths of these ancient civilizations you find archetypes that truly span the globe. Archetypes we can still recognize today. Studying mythology today is like watching globalization in its infancy. Although these myths developed all on their own (with the exception of the Romans, really) fears, questions, jokes...they are universal. And each individual group came up with remarkably similar explanations. We have always been closer than we really ever knew.
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