This was a 3-CD unabridged Library version. I have very mixed feelings about this book. Although I can’t deny that Ms. Armstrong did a tremendous amount of research, however I don’t see how she reached the conclusions she did based on the facts she provided. Her mantra throughout the book, was something along the line of (not an exact quote): Myths are something that may (or may not) have occurred in the past, but continue to happen even now. That’s as best I can remember it. In short, if one (truly) participates in the learning of a mythology, it lives on in that person.

The problem with listening to a book while driving up a highway is the extreme difficulty of taking notes. As such, I couldn’t begin to provide specific examples, save one near the end of the book. She claims that all of the ills of modern times, citing the attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, among several others examples, are because we have lost our ability to relate to myths. We are have lost our moral compass (my words, not hers) because nothing is sacred to us. I was of the impression that the attacks were planned and carried out by people who strongly believed in their myths. I’m glad she set the record straight for me.

Her final words are that it is today’s artists and writers, novelists primarily, that are providing the new myths that we latch on to today. I can’t argue with that, but why anyone would form a religion around one of these works is beyond my comprehension.

This book was narrated flawlessly by Sandra Burr.

I wrote the above almost two weeks ago. I’ve done a bit of research in the mean time. There is a series of books that begin with “A Short History of…” and a requirement, apparently, is that each book is exactly 150 pages in length. My guess is that Ms. Armstrong actually wrote a much larger book, and had to dilute it significantly in order to make it fit the format. That’s everyone’s loss, in my opinion. I won’t be looking into any more of this series. ( )

The first third of this book by Karen Armstrong overlaps much of the same material covered by Barbara J. King in her book Evolving God where she discusses the origins of religion from an anthropological point of view.
(link to my review of Evolving God.) King uses the word "religion" where Armstrong is using the word "myth." King used the word "belongingness" where Armstrong uses words such as "meaningfulness" to explain the human drive to create religion/myth. The following quotation of Karen Armstrong shows how her definition of mythology pretty much is the same as that which most of us think of as religion:

"... but mythology is an art form that points beyond history to what is timeless in human existence...An experience of transcendence..."

She points out that the Neanderthals left signs of ritual, as did also Paleolithic era modern humans. Evidence of ritual acts is taken to be an indication of myth making. Myth is so intertwined with human prehistory and current history that it appears to be an integral part of being human. She defends myth making as a necessary human activity that provide a means to connect our finite lives with the infinite beyond us. In other words, myth gives our lives meaning and significance in an otherwise unfriendly world.

From speculation of paleolithic myths she progresses on to the better documented neolithic era myths. Here the book truly starts sounding like a "short history of myth" where the activites of the various gods and heros are reviewed.

Karen Armstrong applies the term myth to stories from monotheistic faiths along with the tales of Zeus or Odin which I suppose could bother those deeply enmeshed in western religion. But they are all obvious instances to mythologies trying to make sense of the unknown forces and destinies beyond human understanding.

In the final third of the book Armstong explores the role of myth in the age of enlightnment and modern era. Now that science and rational thought has removed much of the mystery from our lives, can we live without myth? Perhaps, but according to Armstrong we can't achieve human fulfillment and completeness if we try. For example, if you confine yourself to only rational thinking, how do you describe the human experience of art and music? She notes that artists and novelists are the current day myth makers. She suggests mythology is a valuable tool toward achieving good mental health.

"... purely linear, logical and historical modes of thought have debarred many of us from therapies and devices that have enabled men and women to draw on the full resources of their humanity in order to live with the unacceptable. ... " She goes on to say that the role of "an ethically and spiritually informed mythology" can heal "deep-rooted, unexorcised fears, desires and neuroses."

She admits that we can't simply ignore our rational education, but we can learn to appreciate the value of myth.

"We cannot completely recreate ourselves, cancel out the rational bias of our education, and return to a pre-modern sensibility. But we can acquire a more educated attitude to mythology. We are myth-making creatures ..."

The following is my commentary (not necessarily ideas from the book):
Near the end of the book she gives a good summary of outstanding examples of 20th Century literary fiction, and she describes how the literature speaks to modern myth. It's a list of literature that most English teachers would probably support, but it's not necessarily the literature that has been widely read. Which is an observation that can probably be applied to this book as well. I'm not so sure that the view of myth presented in the book is the sort of view that can be appreciated by the population at large.

She is obviously accentuating the positive side of myth in this book. However, I can't help but think that the rise of radical fundamentalism in various faith traditions is a negative use of myth. So if our goal is to save the world's human community from militant religious fundamentalism which approach do you suppose is the more effective; A declaration that all myth is false, or a suggestion of an alternative interpretation of myth? I guess I'm suggesting that the later is the preferred approach. And this is a good reason to be informed about how myth can help us understand both ourselves and others. ( )

A look at mythology over the ages: The Paleaolithic Period, The Neolithic Period, The Early Civilisations, The Axial Age, The Post-Axial Age and The Great Western Transformation. It discusses different myths and how they have been shaped by the times and environment around them. Armstrong takes us up to modern time where science leads the way and discredits many myths.

I don't have too much to say about this book sadly. I thought it tried to cover far too much in too small a volume. I thought it would spend more time discussing what myth is and defining it and I also disagreed with some of the statements she made and how some of the myths and timepoints were interpreted. A very average read, maybe more suited to someone just dipping into mythology for the first time. ( )

An excellent essay exploring what myths are, how they evolved and why we need them. Of particular interest is the last section which discusses the corrosive results of modernity's commitment to logos where understanding myth is concerned, and the importance of the novel. ( )

From whence did myth come? What did they entail, explain, engender? When has a myth slipped into obscurity? Why are they so desperately needed? Will we be able to survive their loss?

Karen Armstrong engages these nigh unanswerable queries in her chronological overview of the mythos of humanity. While being a perhaps oversimplified progression of mythic time periods - progressing from the Palaeolithic stirrings of hunter-gatherers to the agrarian revolution of human understanding, stopping to investigate the budding civilization building and continuing to the Axial age of burgeoning human spirituality, dwelling upon the receding movement of the Post-Axial age, until arriving at what she refers to as the Great Western Transformation - Armstrong manages to ponder some ineffable matters within a short space. As an overview of periodic mythology, her short history is useful as a sort of guidepost, but it is the deeper questions she ponders that elevate the book beyond a typical mythologic atlas.

Of particular note are the open-ended musings she introduces that wonder whether the modern lack of a sustaining mythology can be partially or even fully abetted by the surge in art, and specifically the novel, as a form of mythic source. While she believes that for a myth to truly do its work it must be encountered within a sacred space, being rendered merely prosaic by profane settings, she also seems hopeful that art will 'step into this priestly role' and provide a way, as myth does and did, to enable us to see from a multitude of perspectives, to achieve a transcendent understanding beyond self-interest, to circumvent the ennui and lethargy that has enveloped the modern experience. Her short history was a stirring reminder to my personal mythos of how transportative myth has always been for me. ( )