Charlene Spretnak

Summary: a brief overview of eleven goddesses who pre-date Hellenic Greece and whose myths were transformed and absorbed into the Hellenic pantheon.

Thesis: these peaceful, life-giving goddesses were worshipped in the murky (to us) time period between the pre-historical and post-historical world. That world is believed by scholars to have been matriarchal. The goddesses were, according to the author, intentionally disempowered and made irreverent by waves of patriarchal bands of violent and show more invading Greek-speaking nomads from the north. (This is before there was such a thing as “Greece”.)

My review: Spretnak’s thesis is not her own; she draws heavily from scholars who, in the early decades of the twentieth century, began synthesizing information from literary sources, archeological evidence, art, and linguistics to make sense of pre-historical religion and culture. In that scholarship, it is proposed that the Zeus-worshipping religion that later became the classical Greek pantheon was not indigenous to mainland Greece but instead was imported over millennia, starting about 3,500 years ago, by invading nomadic warriors who absorbed the indigenous religion into their own.

Spretnak devises an effective structure - she introduces each goddess with a thematic summary, pre- and post-Hellenic, followed by a synthesis of each goddess’s pre-Hellenic myth. The synthesis is Spretnak’s own interpretation of what their myth was prior to it being polluted by the invading Zeus-worshippers. I used the strident term “polluted” intentionally because Spretnak is strident in her assertions. She writes from a strongly feminist perspective and makes her distaste for patriarchal social structures clear.

If you’re looking for a purely objective summary of pre-Hellenic religious beliefs in the Aegean region, this is probably not the book for you. However, I believe Spretnak’s book is worth reading as a beginner’s guide to pre-Hellenic scholarship, whether you agree or not with her political opinions. Through her bibliography, she introduces us to major scholars, who since the 1920s, have synthesized information from multiple disciplines to paint a picture of what religious life was like in the days long before Homer.

Spretnak’s interpretations of the myths of Hera and Persephone are particularly moving. Hera’s myth, because rather than the tropic shrew of The Iliad, we meet a loving, powerful goddess who lifts women up rather than jealously tears them down. And Persephone’s, because rather than a tale in which a woman is a tropic victim of male violence, Persephone makes a choice to give comfort to both the living and the dead and therefore give humans the gloom of winter and the joyous rebirth of spring. show less

Spretnak does a tremendous job convincing you that the subject of spirituality in modern art has not only been neglected in the art world, but actively suppressed. While she stretches credibility a handful of times (for example, her chief argument for claiming Le Corbusier as a spiritual architect is that his uncle and some of his friends were Freemasons), the number of well-documented examples she presents really live up to the book's subtitle. I recommend this book wholeheartedly to anyone show more wanting to better understand the origins of modern art. show less

This is an amazing collection of essays based on Goddess worship and feminine spirituality. The people who have been included in this book are inspirational. Merlin Stone, Carol P. Christ, and Starhawk, to name a few, each provide their own look at the Goddess. For those who want to explore a more feminized religion, or for those who are curious abot other religions in general, I would strongly recommend this book.

What a fascinating, informative and beautifully presented approach to the Classic Females who predated Homer and Hesiod's Zeus dominated versions!

Illustrations are illuminating and fun to explore.