Robert A. Segal

Read this review, and many more on my blog October Tune!

30 Second Mythology is exactly what it says, a book where you can learn about Greek and Roman mythology in under thirty seconds (per page/paragraph of course, you won’t get through the entire book in thirty seconds). I got a similar book last year for Christmas, 30 Second J.R.R. Tolkien, and though I liked it, I wouldn’t say it was the best biography I read about the author. Same with 30 Second Mythology.

What I liked:
Everything was divided neatly. There was a section where they talked about how the whole mythology thing happened in the first place, the ‘Creation’. Then there was a section about the Olympians; Zeus, Hera, Poseidon, etc. A section about their enemies, the monsters, like Medusa, the Minotaur and Polyphemus. There was also a part about how the world looked like, with Olympus, the Underworld, Tartarus, and so forth. A part about the heroes; Hercules, Odysseus; and a part about the ‘tragic figures’, like Oedipus, Jason, Icarus.

I liked reading about everything, but I did find the little pieces – one page per subject – a bit too short. Of course, a book like this is not the best way of learning more about mythology, but hey, I couldn’t help it. I love mythology and I would love to read every book about it (it would probably take me years and years though). My favourite parts was reading about how everyone cheated on everyone. I think almost every God and Goddess had children with either mortals, other Gods (than the ones they were married to) and even other creatures.

What I didn’t like:
Like I said before, the passages per subject were in my opinion too short. They could have easily explained it a bit more, like in the Tolkien book, and added only small pictures. Now, there was one page where you could read about the subject, and one page filled with a large picture (of a painting, a statue, etc). That was a bit of a shame.

And also my biggest dislike about this book, is that it’s only about Greek and Roman mythology. Since I’ve watched Thor, I have been a huge fan of the Norse Mythology, and I would just love to read a book like this completely about that. Unfortunately, Norse Mythology is not as popular as Greek or Roman is, but I just hope that some day people will realise that it is awesome!

Conclusion:
I liked 30 Second Mythology. It’s a good way of learning about the most important parts of Greek and Roman mythology. Of course, it’s not the best book to be learning about the Mythologies, but it gives you a good insight of what it’s like. If you want to learn more about mythologies, and you don’t know where to start (or you don’t feel like reading a big book about it), I’d suggest you pick up 30 Second Mythology!… (mere)

I found this short introduction to the major players in the study of mythology very helpful. I have dived into books by Frazer, Campbell, Bly, Eliade, and Malinowski at various times, only to find myself extremely confused and wondering what myth is. I am not the only one confused. These major figures, while falling into schools, have major disagreements with each other, not to mention huge lacunae in their own thinking which makes them confusing for someone like myself, who has a large acquaintance with the myths themselves, and is looking for big ideas to tie them together. Looks like I'll have to wait. Even Segal's own views, which he presents in the last chapter, while interesting, fails to deal with the question that is central to me, "Why these stories? Why have they been useful to us for thousands of years?"… (mere)

This is the first "Very Short Introduction" that I have found unsatisfying. It surveys a variety of 19th, 20th, and 21st c. mythologists rather than more simply _introducing_ the subject. As a survey of a field one is already familiar with, it would surely be a help, but as is seems to be too ambitious in scope to really deal with such a large number of mythologists: 33.

E.B. Tylor; J.G. Frazer; Lucien Lévy-Bruhl; Bronislaw Malinowski; Claude Lévy-Strauss; Robin Horton; Karl Popper; Paul Radin; Ernst Cassirer; Henry and H.A. Frankfort; Rudolf Bultmann; Hans Jonas; Albert Camus; Mircea Eliade [Alf Hiltebeitel's prof at Univ. of Chicago]; Wm Robertson Smith; Jane Harrison; S.H. Hooke; René Girard; Walter Burkert; Lord Raglan; Sigmund Freud; Otto Rank; Jacob Arlow; Bruno Bettelheim; Alan Dundes; C.G. Jung; Joseph Campbell; Vladimir Propp; Georges Dumézil; Louis Germet; Marcel Detienne; and D.W. Winnicott.

Indexed… (mere)