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Favourite Mythology?

gumboot

lorcutus.tolere
gumboot
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Jun 18, 2006
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What's your favourite myth or legend, and why?

My favourite is the Arthurian Legend, purely for the sheer scope of interpretation. There's as many different versions of the tale as there are days in the year.

As a tale, it's the ultimate tragedy of human society - the eternal, flawed, noble, doomed struggle to achieve Eden on earth.
 
I like the Torah and various related Jewish mythos.




Also Chtulhu.
 
Since I was born in Sweden, I have always really enjoyed the Norse Mythos.

BTW, my least favorite is the Abrahamistc myth. ;)
 
Romance of the Three Kingdoms, the Norse mythology and throw in Lord of Rings as well.
 
Good call tomwaits! Love that series. How long have we been waiting for the book that was supposedly mostly finished in January 2007? I guess they are ALL fictional by definition though, I just didn't consider recent literary fiction. Lord of the RIngs ranks high there too, but I bet you could tell from my avatar....
 
A Dance With Dragons should have been done a long time ago, considering he had already written a bunch of it along with A Feast for Crows. But then he decided to rewrite the entire thing and the publisher says it won't be done until April of next year. Grrr....
 
Could people be a bit more specific? :) I'd like to hear which particular tale is your favourite.
 
I like the Tolkein cosmology. The universe was created by a group of celestial beings singing a chorus. Their music created everything.
 
gumboot said:
Could people be a bit more specific? :) I'd like to hear which particular tale is your favourite.
Click to expand...

Well, I like the mythology surrounding Enoch. One tiny little passage in the Geneaology in Genesis ("21 When Enoch had lived 65 years, he became the father of Methuselah. 22 And after he became the father of Methuselah, Enoch walked with God 300 years and had other sons and daughters. 23 Altogether, Enoch lived 365 years. 24 Enoch walked with God; then he was no more, because God took him away. ") helped create an entire wealth of stories involving this person, including the notion that he became the angel Metatron.
 
Robin Hood, the ultimate hero.

And he got the chick!

Since I first read the story at age about six, I loved it.
 
Exodus 32 is by far my favorite myth.

It takes place right after the Golden Calf incident and God is so incensed that he says he is going to kill all the Israelites and start all over with Moses as the new Abraham.

And Moses basically threatens God, implying that if God does such a thing, he'll tell the world what happened and everyone will know that God smote the Egyptians with plagues just so he could lead his people out to the desert to slaughter them.

And so God relents.

It's a great passage because 1) God changes His mind (so much for omniscience), 2) Moses essentially threatens God and gets away with it, and 3) it one of those few passages in which everyone is very passionate and accessible. God's anger at the Israelite's betrayal, Moses' compassion and political acumen, even the risk to the Israelites. I group that with Isaac's wrestling with the angel, and Elijah's competition with the prophets of Baal and Asherah as my favorite Bible myths.

Anyway, other myths I enjoy are the Iliad (particularly Hector's story, who is my favorite mythical character ever created), and the Epic of Gilgamesh.

I'm not including works that the author represents as fictional, like Tolkein or Martin.
 
Sticking strictly to mythology in the classical sense, it's a toss between Norse and Greek.
 
For me, it's always been Thor and his companions in the hall of the wizard king.

Seems to me that us survivors of the 20th. century can't help but like Thor. He fails the tests, but he goes on being big, dumb, tough, hungry, thirsty, laughing, doomed Thor.
 
greek myth for me.. i have a strong fondness for the daedalos/ikaros myth.. odysseus visiting the underworld.. orpheus (heartbreaking!)..

also, perhaps one of my favorite (i don't know if this counts as "a myth" but it's certainly a scene in a mythic work).. when hektor is leaving andromache and his child is crying until he removes off his helmet...yow.

or, the description of achilles' new shield made by hephaistos.. oh yes.
 
Norse myth, absolutely. I've always loved the Eddas:

140. I know that I hung, on a wind-rocked tree, nine whole nights,
with a spear wounded, and to Odin offered, myself to myself; on that
tree, of which no one knows from what root it springs.

141. Bread no one gave me, nor a horn of drink, downward I peered,
to runes applied myself, wailing learnt them, then fell down thence.

142. Potent songs nine from the famed son I learned of Bolthorn,
Bestla's sire, and a draught obtained of the precious mead, drawn from
Odhraerir.

143. Then I began to bear fruit, and to know many things, to grow
and well thrive: word by word I sought out words, fact by fact I
sought out facts.

When I was dabbling in neopaganism it was to the runes I turned. I still have my Norse tarot.
 
Hmmm...favorite mythos? I am partial to the Norse, and to certain subsets of the Amerind and Celtic myths as well. In particular, I am interested in the Prometheus / Loki / Raven character, whom is always in Dutch with the rulers of the gods for being willing to give Cool Stuff to mankind. Not that it is, in any of the myths, a "nice guy" kind of deific power; it's just sympathetic to Mankind's low spot on the eternal pecking order.

The Firebringer is a hero to man and a turncoat to the gods--anyone want to comment on the likely connection to Lucifer, often compounded with the Serpent who tempted with the Fruit of the Tree of Knowledge?

My view of myths have changed through the years, though, because after more than a decade of playing a variant of Dungeons and Dragons, I am more familiar with the "real" deity and religion (as practiced in Erdarth, my ex's world) than with the more classic versions of the stories. Which is fine, since myth by its nature is reshaped by the telling and retelling.

But can anyone tell me WHY Zeus liked to turn into animals to nail human maidens? It's like some kind of inverse bestiality...

Cool question, I'm enjoying the answers, MK
 
Norse, absolutely. The gods/heroes of the Edda know they are going to fail - Ragnarok is going to happen, the giants are more or less going to win, and they are all going to die. But they strive against fate anyway, because the very act of fighting is considered heroic, and heroism is a virtue worth expressing even in vain.

Completely distinct from the whiny Greeks.
 
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