A myth is, of course, not a fairy story. It is the presentation of facts belonging to one category in the idioms appropriate to another. To explode a myth if accordingly not to deny the facts but to re-allocate them. Gilbert Ryle, The Concept of Mind, 1949
In one sense, myth is an idea that, while widely believed, is false – does not correspond with reality. In a deeper sense ... a myth serves as an orienting and mobilising story for people ... The focus is not on the story’s relation to reality, but on its function ... A story cannot function this way unless it is believed to be true in the community or the nation. It is not a matter of debate if some people have the bad taste to raise the question of the truth of the sacred story, the keepers of the faith do not enter into debate with them – they ignore them or denounce them as blasphemers. Professor David Ray Griffin, 9/11: The Myth and the Reality
I am not a myth. Marlene Dietrich
Myth is an attempt to narrate a whole human experience, of which the purpose is too deep, going too deep in the blood and soul, for mental explanation or description. D H Lawrence
We need myths that will help us to identify with all our fellow-beings, not simply with those who belong to our ethnic, national or ideological tribe. We need myths that help us to realize the importance of compassion, which is not always regarded as sufficiently productive or efficient in our pragmatic, rational world. We need myths that help us to create a spiritual attitude, to see beyond our immediate requirements, and enable us to experience a transcendent value that challenges our solipsistic selfishness. We need myths that help us to venerate the earth as sacred once again, instead of merely using it as a ‘resource’. This is crucial, because unless there is some kind of spiritual revolution that is able to keep abreast of our technological genius, we will not save our planet. Karen Armstrong, A Short History of Myth
cf.
Myths are fun, as long as you don’t confuse them with the truth. Richard Dawkins, The Magic of Reality 2012
The Bible myths are given a special privileged treatment. Richard Dawkins, interview Nicky Campbell, Big Questions: Is the Bible Still Relevant Today? BBC 2011
A major component of the western myth is the belief that myth is a primitive and mistaken way of thinking about the world that has been replaced by science. Commonly, the word ‘myth’ is now used to mean an illusion or a lie ... Enlightened moderns are accustomed to looking at the queer beliefs of the Mayas or the Tasaday and seeing them as mythical. But we look on our own belief systems as rational and rooted in the realities of politics and economics. As Joseph Campbell says: ‘Myth is other people’s religion.’ Sam Keen, The Passionate Life 1983
Myth is the system of basic metaphors, images, and stories that informs the perceptions, memories, and aspirations of a people; provides the rationale for its institutions, rituals and power structure; and gives a map of the purpose and stages of life. ibid.
Odin was the chief god in Norse mythology, ruler of Asgard, the location of Valhalla which is the great hall where dead warriors believed they would go to in the afterlife to feast and drink for all eternity. Dr Janina Ramirez, Treasures of the Anglo Saxons, BBC 2010
I’ve come to the island of Crete to uncover one of the most contentious discovery stories of all time. Just over a century ago a rich Briton called Arthur Evans came here in search of the truth behind the most famous Greek myth of all – King Minus and the terrifying monster known as the Minotaur he kept hidden in the depths of his palace. Janina Ramirez, Raiders of the Lost Past s2e1, BBC 2021
He didn’t find a man-eating monster but what he did find were the ruins of Europe’s first civilisation lost for nearly three thousand years. He called them the Minoans. ibid.
Zeus overthrows his elders and becomes supreme. He is now top god. Professor Bettany Hughes, Divine Women I: When God Was a Girl, BBC 2012
Zeus was wiser than any other god ... or any woman. ibid.
Aphrodite, daughter of Zeus, enchantress. Professor Bettany Hughes, Divine Women II: Handmaids of the Gods, BBC 2012
Every town has its legends. Every legend has its boogieman: a killer with a hook for a hand, the drifter who snatches children, the witch who lives in the woods. When I was growing up in Staten Island it was Cropsey, about an escaped mental patient who lived in these buildings who snatched children off the street. This urban legend turned real when five neighbourhood children went missing. Killer Legends, 2014
Maybe we need to believe because the reality is too much to bear. And so instead we create our own monsters. ibid.
The Hook is a cautionary tale warning teenagers everywhere about the dangers of sex. ibid.
This is the deity who led Greek heroes to their deaths, who Roman generals honoured with sacrifice before battle, who was the incarnation of the ecstasy and the agony of lust and love. Bettany Hughes, Venus Uncovered: Ancient Goddess of Love, BBC 2017
She is married to Hephaestus the lame blacksmith god, but is in an adulterous affair with the god of war Ares. She has mortal lovers too. ibid.
Real Greek women were second-class citizens. ibid.
I’m investigating the enduring relationship between warfare and worship by following the ancient god of war – Mars. Bettany Hughes: Mars Uncovered: Ancient God of War, BBC 2019
For the Romans he was a vital force in their drive to win and exploit an empire. ibid.
The Greek god of war was called Ares and he has prehistoric roots. ibid.
This was once the haunt of Bacchus, the god of Ecstasy and Wine. The god who blurred the boundaries between human and divine, between women and men, between the wild and the tamed. Bettany Hughes, Bacchus Uncovered: Ancient God of Ecstasy, BBC 2021
In B.C. 186 the senate of the Roman Republic had put its foot down, passing a decree punishing the worship of Bacchus throughout Roman lands. ibid.
Descriptions of Bacchus in ancient myths and Jesus in the New Testament have striking similarities. We are told both performed miracles, like changing water in wine. Both had immortal fathers and human mothers. And Bacchus was said to have been killed by Titans before being born again. ibid.
Barthes stepped into the road … He was struck down … Roland Barthes is one of the 21st century’s greatest thinkers. He questioned the assumptions of how we underpin our world. In 1957 he published a book; he called it Mythologies that looked seriously, rigorously and in detail at popular culture. A series of essays, mythologies, broke down the barrier between high art and consumerism. 21st Century Mythologies with Richard Clay, BBC 2020
… the unsexiness of striptease … for Bathes these things are myths: so commonplace we take them for granted. Yet they are packed with deeper meaning. ibid.
Barthes questioned how myths are used to shore up the prevailing power of money. ibid.
What might Roland Barthes make of the 21st century? Roland Barthes grew up looking for meaning. ibid.
Today, the myth of plastic has taken a full U-turn from the wonder material of the 1950s to poisonous waste of the 20th century. ibid.
The Myth of Money: It’s a myth, something so insistent, as Barthes put it, that we accept it without question. Once, money was worth its weight in metal; today, it’s flimsy paper at best. An abstract idea with value only because we’re so used to it being something valuable. To buttress money’s authority, banknotes are adorned with symbols of the nation state and the face of prestigious historical figures conveying a legitimacy and stability. ibid.
What happens if you subvert the myth and protest, maybe by using art? ibid.
The Myth of signs … humans have this amazing ability to create and follow conventions … ‘the sign is a visual signal of authority.’ ibid.
To Barthes, it’s the sheer scale of the repetition of things. ibid.
The Myth of Wi-Fi: To Accept. Obey. Move on. Here’s a signifier Barthes would never have seen but he might have recognised its mythic power to enchant the masses? Wi-Fi, a myth symbolised everywhere by a fan of black bars. The internet has come to signify our empowerment, how quickly we can reach information – the latest slug of news, create a meme or social media rumour. Yet there’s a deeper meaning: this connectivity runs two ways … Your emails and apps are tracking you … The myth of the internet is meshed with the myth of money. ibid.
Michelangelo’s beautiful sculpture of David … [exits shop with statuette] David: this quintessential figure of Florentine masculinity is everywhere now … David is an industry in his own right. ibid.
Images of everything from margarine to marriage were carefully confected myths, persuading women to be perfect beings. ibid.
The Virgin Mary was never depicted in her own lifetime yet her image is recognised pretty much everywhere … An image of perfection, symbol of virginity, innocence and immortality, gold-flecked and unobtainable. ibid.
The Myth of Guns in Movies: Is it true there are no bad guns, only bad people? I mean, take the Tommy Gun. Wielded by gangsters, a symbol of criminal violence; by Winston Churchill, a symbol of the bulldog defiance. ibid.