Mythology and Modern Times

My unique voyage to India was a business trip to Bangalore a few years back. I was enchanted by the vibrancy of the city with its myriad of colors and smells. But, the thing that made the deepest impression on my was how the mythology was so real to the Indian colleagues I conversed with. For them, their gods (and nearly each individual had his own private pantheon of them) were very real. Ganesha here on the left has a multitude of stories associated with him notwithstanding the several versions how he ended up with an elephant’s hear and so forth. If you bug me, I’ll throw one story in for grins. I was also extremely lucky to arrive during Ganesha festival. During the weekend I visited the father of a friend and colleague from my years at U of F in Mysore. I had a fantastic visit while we sipped whiskey and watched a crocket test final between the Brits and the British Virgin Islands or something. Well, before the electricity was cut off that is. I learned a few months back that he passed away, but also that he had always talked about that one conversation we had even several years later.We talked about mythology a bit there as well. I was sincerely fascinated in this living mythology whereas in the West, ours is nearly dead.

I was reminded this during my review of Wrath of the Titans yesterday, but particularly during my research phase for the article landing as usual on the Google. Greek mythology is dead in the sense that no longer anyone really believes that there was ever a Cronos (thank heaven) or Zeus. However, the fact that Hollywood would fork out over $100 to make a movie about them shows that we still probably have a passive memory of these stories – or Hollywood is running out of ideas for high-budget geek flicks and chose this particular screenplay (were there others?).