Mythos A Retelling of the Myths of Ancient Greece

"it starts with an empty universe" I just loved this audiobook. Stephen Fry is an amazing narrator and tells the stories collected in a way that you can just stay listening for hours. This audiobook is great for those that want to learn, learn more or remember the greek mythology.

While I love this book - it's a very lively and imaginative retelling of the Greek myths - I was struggling a bit to get through it because it's so incredibly dense and is more like a short story collection, and I'm just not a fan of short story collections. Perhaps I should have a look at all those novelizations of Greek myths that are so popular now, because I think that would make it easier for me to to not lose track. Having said that, it's still a really great book that gives a great overview of the most well known myths and it's super interesting to learn more about them, because my knowledge of Greek mythology was rather superficial so far. I also found it particularly fascinating to realize how much of our modern society and our language has its origin in Greek mythology. I'll definitely read Stephen Fry's other books in this series eventually, and I think they should also be easier to read for me as they're telling more coherent stories (as opposed to the 1-6 page stories in this book).

Stephen Fry breathes new life into Greek myths in this book, giving depth and personality to mythical characters and moments like I’ve never seen before. I enjoyed this a lot!

The audiobook was great. I have been on my greek mythology wave and this has really helped explain some of the myths I have never heard and gave more insight into the myths I really enjoy.

If you are interested in Greek myths and constructs, this is the book for you. I found the narrative and prose was fantastic to read and interesting. Fry truly makes the content interesting and not dry or dense, to say the least. In many of these books, the narrative can be dry and underwhelming. You don't get the sense of "intriguing" when you read them, but I didn't get that here. It was written very nicely. The illustrations are beautiful as well.

Ce livre c’est absolument le must have de la mythologie. Qu’on soit expert ou total débutant dans le monde des mythes grecs, il FAUT le lire si on est un tant soit peu intéressé par eux. La façon d’écrire de Stephen Fry, sa façon de raconter les mythes à sa manière sans les changer ni les revisiter c’est juste dingue. Il arrive a ajouter une touche de modernité et de rire dans des mythes vieux de plusieurs millénaires. Sa façon d’écrire est incroyable et totalement entraînante. C’était mon plaisir de chaque jour de lire ce livre. Ce livre englobe absolument tout ce qu’il y a à savoir et plus encore sur les mythes qui touchent aux dieux (création à partir du Chaos, rivalités avec les humains, amours, etc…). J’ai vraiment hâte mais alors vraiment vraiment que les tomes suivants sortent afin de pouvoir compléter tout ça, puisque le tome 2 est sur les héros des mythes, le 3 sur la Guerre de Troie et le 4 sur l’Odyssée. Avec ces 4 livres on englobe de A à Z les mythes grecs !!

This book is perfect for anyone who is interested in Greek mythology. It’s also perfect for long car rides or doing chores you’ve been putting off. Many stories I knew, but there were plenty I’d never heard of or only partially knew. I also recommend the audiobook as its narrated by the author and Stephen Fry has such a great voice. I really enjoyed broadening my knowledge of the Greek myths and I have the next book in this series on standby for my next long drive.

Stephen Fry has a read knack for storytelling and retelling suck complex and detailed stories in such a compelling way. The audiobook gave me a great understanding of greek gods and the mythology around them.

Prachtige hervertellingen door de heerlijke zijdezachte klanken van Fry.

The manner in which Stephan Fry retells the Greek myths is quite charming and accessible to those who might not know the stories. I did find some parts tiresome, though. If you've read Neil Gaiman's Norse Gods you can't help but compare the two books and Gaiman's effort is superior by a stretch. Stephen Fry has made jokes that when Norse Gods got published he wanted to scrap his project thinking that Gaiman might also write a book about the Greek gods. I would have had a harder time getting through this book if I didn't go with the audio option narrated by Stephen Fry himself. One could listen to the man read the ingredients that make up shampoo and have a great time. It's not a terrible book but it's also not a great one.

While it glosses over some of the intricacies and brutal aspects of the mythology, it gains in brevity, excellent authorial voice, and a proclivity for actually landing jokes—a too rare thing. Narration from Fry is, of course, perfect. I’ve never heard a poor performance from him and this is his own material. It’s the most accessible way to consume this stuff imo.

4.5

4.5 ⭐️

Wat vind ik de Griekse mythologie toch mega interessant en leuk!! Stephen Fry schreef het leuk. Ik was ergens in het midden wel een beetje het verhaal kwijt, waardoor ik dat stuk wat minder leuk vond. Later kreeg ik de smaak weer te pakken en las ik het binnen een paar dagen uit. Ik ga zeker deel 2 lezen. Maar eerst even wat anders.

With my love for Greek mythology I had to read it. In this book Stephen Fry retells the myths in a humorous and easy to read way. It contains some of the most famous stories, but also the ones you might’ve never heard of.

★★★★½

This was probably the book that got me into Greek mythology as much as I am into it now lmaoo

A nice and quick overview of some tales in Greek Mythology! I liked the humor and learning about all of the linguistic stuff but it also feels like something was missing. I'm not really a non-fiction reader and expected something more fiction-y (for some reason) and so reaading this was a really draining experience (except some tales). Getting through the stories I really wasn't interested in also was hard, it didn't feel like there was anything inside them to make them more enjoyable. I'd even go as far and say most of the book lives because you already know certain stories and just want to read them again rather than learning new tales.

Love Greek mythology and Stephen Fry has done an incredible job of making these really interesting and fun. Listening to the audiobook could be a bit tricky since a lot of the names sound familiar, but if you have any knowledge of Greek mythology you should be able to keep up.

1. Greek mythology 2. A reteller who clearly enjoys Greek mythology 3. Plenty of asides about etymology 4. Encountering stories, or details that I hadn't previously ...obviously I devoured this.

Whether you're a Greek Mythology veteran or a newcomer, Stephen Fry gives a new and refreshing perspective on tales that have captured our hearts and most importantly, our imaginations through the ages. I read along with the audiobook, it is a must. Witty and accessible.

I love Stephen Fry and I love Greek mythology (can you tell?), so I really wanted to love Mythos, but I found it was just okay. I tried reading a physical copy myself and I was really struggling to get through it. The audiobook was a much more pleasant experience as Fry is such a talented actor and raconteur. I enjoyed that there was a story weaving the events of Greek mythology together. I feel like I understand the twelve olympians better from Fry’s description of their birth/origins and several myths related to each immortal. I found it difficult to stomach the way certain events were told, in particular stories where Zeus (among other gods) raped women and it’s just glossed over or excused away. This perpetuates an archaic way of thinking about women where their resistance is overlooked and their story not explained. So many women fled from Zeus in fear and yet he had his way with them. We can’t mistake this for anything but rape. This book is an okay starting place for first learning about Greek mythology, but be wary that it is Fry’s imagination that has added dialogue and weaved the stories together to make a larger collection of myths in the form of the book.

Between 3 and 4 stars! I learned a lot but it could have really done without the dialogue which was not good in my opinion, stuff like “mwahahhaha” etc. At least he didn’t do this all the time, it would have definitely brought the book down more if he had.