Volume 46, Number 17 · November 4, 1999
The Myth of Myths
By Jasper Griffin
Splitting the Difference: Gender and Myth in Ancient Greece and India
by Wendy Doniger
University of Chicago Press, 376 pp., $20.00 (paper)
The Implied Spider: Politics and Theology in Myth
by Wendy Doniger
Columbia University Press, 200 pp., $17.50 (paper)
Why do we continue to find myths so fascinating? The ascendancy of science and the triumphs of modern Western thought leave a large gap, an unsatisfied need, which we attempt to meet with beliefs of very different kinds and very different origins. The Hubble telescope has not killed astrology; antibiotics have to contend with herbal remedies and acupuncture; men and women are still carried off by mysterious creatures from other worlds (though nowadays in interplanetary flying machines rather than in fiery chariots) and return after undergoing experiences which ordinary language is powerless to convey. And the study of myth flourishes as never before. The word 'Western,' of course, gives a clue. We enjoy the practical benefits of those triumphs, but we flinch from the triumphalism—rational, patriarchal, colonialist—that often accompanies them, and we hope that comfort and meaning can be found in the very different wisdom of other times and other places.
Review, 5174 words
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