Mythos - Stephen Fry (Audible)

After reading this blog if you feel the strong urge to buy this book, I recommend listening to it. Stephen Fry is hilarious. Not only does he stun with his excessive knowledge of greek mythology, he make you laugh till you pee a bit. Not just funny, he is witty; a great combination. I always thought I knew quite a bit about the Greeks, turns out I was suffering from a strong case of the Dunning-Kroger effect. He doesn't talk about all of greek mythology but picks the most interesting ones.

The storyline is predictable but its always good to hear someone's else take on it. And Fry is is thorough. From the main ones to the connecting ones and to the ones that absolutely blow your mind; he talks about all of them. For me, I am on this trip of sequence and chronology - I am obsessed. So, he helped place it all neatly and in order. And there were so many gaps in my knowledge; like Zeus marrying his sister, Hera. What? I did not know that. My gaps were huge. Also her jealousy and his blatant disregard to their marriage seemed to have created more trouble (more Gods and Demi-Gods in the process) than necessary, but mysterious were the ways of the ancient gods.

So many titbits were revealed:

Did you know, it all started with Chaos.

I never knew that Prometheus' brother was married to Pandora. And when she opened the box and let out all the troubles, 'hope' got left behind. And also Zeus was the one who egged her to open (by telling her not to) because he was angry with Prometheus for giving fire to human-kind. Zeus reminds me of a lot of people I know.

How the honeybee got its sting is another great one. Melissa makes the honey and presents it in a competition set on Zeus' wedding day. The bride and groom love it, and when given a boon, Melissa complains that other animals steal her honey so she would like a weapon. This angers Zeus, he gives her the boon but adds that once she (or any bee) attack they lose their life. Asking for a boon was tricky throughout, almost everyone got the raw end of the deal - the Gods were too clever.

Athena is my all time favourite, smart, independent, wise and kind, one with quiet strength. She is born out of Zeus' head. He would have turned her mother into a fly and swallowed her. Athena trying to get out gives him such a headache he asks for his skull to be split open and out she glides - the one that even Zeus couldn't keep down. Cool she is.

Indian mythology has been part of my life since I can remember - so nothing really surprised or threw me off. I have heard it all. Though we (Indians) have polished off the edges over the millennia and most of our myths are for a general audience. I saw many similarities between Indian and Greek myths, but I am too much of a novice to put them down on paper, maybe in a few years time.

I should have kept a notebook and drawn my maps in how they all connect but found out that there are plenty of good people who have created great ones. Here's one that I used to keep track, promise you it will help - https://ludios.org/greekgods/

A really, really great listen. If you are a serious scholar of greek mythology, it may not be for you, there is a ton of irreverence.

Fry also connects it to the influence of the myths in today's world - be it origin of words, naming of elements etc. , influence in literature etc - its a nice touch.

All in all, do listen!