{"id":442,"date":"2013-05-23T09:36:03","date_gmt":"2013-05-23T14:36:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/?p=442"},"modified":"2013-05-23T09:36:03","modified_gmt":"2013-05-23T14:36:03","slug":"ragnarok-the-end-of-the-gods-a-s-byatt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2013\/05\/ragnarok-the-end-of-the-gods-a-s-byatt\/","title":{"rendered":"\"Ragnarok: The End of the Gods,\" A.S. Byatt"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ragnarok:<\/a><\/p>\n

This is part of the Canongate Myth Series<\/a>, which has contemporary authors re-telling ancient myths.<\/p>\n

I soaked up all the Greco-Roman mythology I could get as a kid. My parents cleverly gave me a gift-wrapped copy of D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths<\/i><\/a> right before boarding a flight to Florida. That was an extremely<\/em> effective way to keep an eight year old Jared quiet for three hours.<\/p>\n

Despite an interest I've never immersed myself in other cultures' myths to the same degree. Having them actually presented as fiction like Byatt does here worked better than attempting to read about it as non-fiction. Previous non-fiction sources I've tried are either superficial or fractally labyrinthine. I think the framing story Byatt chose was a little superfluous though it does get points for lyricism.<\/p>\n

Harriet Walter's narration in the audiobook version I listened to was quite good. There were several passages of extended lists of beasts and plants and such that worked much better narrated than it would have in print. What would have been skimmed over in print had a hypnotic quality when spoken. (See lyricism remark supra.)<\/p>\n

As a whole it was certainly good enough for me to pick up other books in the series.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is part of the Canongate Myth Series, which has contemporary authors re-telling ancient myths. I soaked up all the Greco-Roman mythology I could get as a kid. My parents cleverly gave me a gift-wrapped copy of D'Aulaires' Book of … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[13],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-books","wpautop"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3sddF-78","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":287,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2013\/04\/social-networks-in-fact-and-fiction\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":0},"title":"\"Social networks in fact and fiction\"","author":"jsylvest","date":"19 April 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"The Endeavour :: John Cook :: Social networks in fact and fiction In a nutshell, the authors hope to get some insight into whether a myth is based on fact by seeing whether the social network of characters in the myth looks more like a real social network or like\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "CS \/ Science \/ Tech \/ Coding"","block_context":{"text":"CS \/ Science \/ Tech \/ Coding","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/cs\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"If you read one version of Beowulf and it's not Seamus Heaney's translation you better have a very good reason.","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/HeanyBeowulf-198x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1262,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2018\/10\/book-list-2018q3\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":1},"title":"Book List: 2018Q3","author":"jsylvest","date":"18 October 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"We Are Legion (We Are Bob), Dennis Taylor For We Are Many, Dennis Taylor All These Worlds, Dennis Taylor A sci-fi series about a cryogenically frozen software engineer thawed out several centuries in the future by a theocratic state and uploaded against his will into a von Neumann probe. I\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Book List"","block_context":{"text":"Book List","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/book-list\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/language.jpg?fit=720%2C1106&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/language.jpg?fit=720%2C1106&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/language.jpg?fit=720%2C1106&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/language.jpg?fit=720%2C1106&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1113,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2018\/01\/some-brief-book-reviews-to-close-2017\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":2},"title":"Some brief book reviews to close 2017","author":"jsylvest","date":"4 January 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"A Wild Swan, Michael Cunningham I would think we've saturated the \"modern re-tellings of fairytales, but for adults\" genre, but this was supremely good. They reminded me of Garrison Keillor in the way that some sadness or loss was mixed in to the stories without them being outright tragic. (I've\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Book List"","block_context":{"text":"Book List","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/book-list\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"wild-swan","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/wild-swan-222x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1226,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2018\/08\/book-list-2018q2\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":3},"title":"Book List: 2018Q2","author":"jsylvest","date":"7 August 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Here are the books I read in April, May and June. Since it's already August, I'm going to forego commentary on some of these and just hit publish. The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary, Simon Winchester This was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Book List"","block_context":{"text":"Book List","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/book-list\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Cover of \"The Professor and the Madman,\" Simon Winchester","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/professor-223x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1339,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2019\/07\/book-list-2019q2\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":4},"title":"Book List: 2019Q2","author":"jsylvest","date":"12 July 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"I'll call this the Wizards & Cryptarchs, Frauds & Revolutions Edition \u2014or\u2014 \"What I've been reading when I'm not prepping for lectures and wrestling with toddlers.\" Life in Code, Ellen Ullman When Ullman sticks to psychology, writing about what's like to be dealing with code, she is brilliant. No one\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Book List"","block_context":{"text":"Book List","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/book-list\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Cover of Ellen Ullman's \"Life in Code\"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/life-in-code.jpg?fit=777%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/life-in-code.jpg?fit=777%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/life-in-code.jpg?fit=777%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/07\/life-in-code.jpg?fit=777%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1219,"url":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/2018\/06\/book-list-2018q1\/","url_meta":{"origin":442,"position":5},"title":"Book List: 2018Q1","author":"jsylvest","date":"7 June 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Yes, I realize it is now most of the way through the 2nd quarter of the year. Whatever. Here are the books I read in the first three months. Sourdough, Robin Sloan I love technology, and I love baking bread. I'm pretty much right in the cross hairs for target\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Reviews"","block_context":{"text":"Reviews","link":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/category\/reviews\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Cover of \"Sourdough\" by Robin Sloan","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Sloan_Sourdough-200x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":512,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442\/revisions\/512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jsylvest.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}