Review: Mythos

Rating: 3.5 Stars

When it comes to humour, Stephen Fry is one of the big names. Be it Black Adder or Jeeves & Wooster or A Bit of Fry & Laurie, he has always tickled my funny bone. Then there are his narrations that are as famous as his comedy. All this, and the man is also a best selling author, Mythos and Heroes being proof of that? Is there anything that he can’t do? So, it should be clear from the start that I have a bit of a bias towards him, and there is no denying that he deserves every bit of this adulation.

Mythos is a retelling of the Greek myths that have been popular for centuries. We have all heard these myths in one form or another, at some point in time. Which leads us to ask the question: why read something that we already know? I don’t really have an answer to that. For myself, I like reading all the different versions of these myths because every writer has a different take on what actually happened, and which god is better or worse.

Reading about these gods and heroes is like reading any fantasy novel, with good and evil, except that in Greek mythology, no one is all “good”. Every god, Titan, hero, demi-god, mortal, or any of the hundreds of characters, has a grey shade. You like them in one story, and you hate them in the next. Such characters are obviously attractive to writers who want to explore these shades of grey.

Fry maintains a tongue-in-cheek manner while telling his version of the stories. His research is extensive and he has proper references for the material, it’s just the dialogues that are his own. He muses about the most terrible of gods in such a way that you can’t help but chuckle at his audacity. Mind you, this is not a laugh out loud kind of book, just some smiles and a few grins.

In addition to being interesting, Mythos is quite informative too. I have to admire the effort that Fry has put into explaining the myths and the etymology associated with them.

A fun book that I thoroughly enjoyed reading.