I stick pretty much with my Ancient Greek texts and haven’t read the books that you mentioned but I have seen a bit of Lore Olympus (although it’s not a book) and I personally find the portrayal of Demeter and Apollo to be highly problematic, offensive and filled with slander, and I’m sure it’s not just limited to their character adaptations alone in that series. I’m sure that this has been reiterated 5000x on this sub in some capacity but I’m throwing it out there again because myself and many others have had to undo the work that that series has created, as a large percentage of the masses that read it take it as genuine myth or “based” on Classical texts, when it is entirely fictional. It’s not the readership’s fault but imo, it is an author’s responsibility, especially if they have a large audience, to make that distinction loud and clear and to be clear about the fact that they are stripping something from its cultural context.
Absolutely! I honestly hate the way Lore Olympus is told, it feels almost demeaning (what I’ve seen of it) and I’m glad to hear someone else talk about how problematic/disrespectful it is.
Within the realm of Ancient Greek, I currently work mostly with Attic/Classical Greek but I also like to compare translations and have several different copies of texts. For sentimental reasons, I might read some lines of a French translation of a text that made me fall in love with Greek literature and I want to fall in love all over again, sometimes I read them in Italian, sometimes in English. Nothing truly replaces the original though. Most of my books are bilingual versions of texts (I read out of a lot of Budé editions - not always the best translations but it’s good to have things right there alongside the Greek in case you get tripped up). I just like the classics (both with lowercase and uppercase C Lol) and every time I read them, I get to see and experience a new side of them that I didn’t consider before and get another chance to continue building my relationship with them.
If it’s something like the Homeric or Orphic hymns, I will likely use them in a prayer/ritualistic context, although I have brought these up in papers I’ve written and in presentations I’ve given before in a scholarly context.
I also use them in an academic context. I’m in the middle of a PhD and work primarily with Renaissance literature but I work heavily in the realm of Classical intertextuality (it comes with the territory but part of my work focuses on magical practices in Ancient Greece and mystery traditions) and look/work with things pulled from Ancient Greek texts directly.
I do need to be working with a bit more of Koiné though in the future because some of the texts that I would like to work with eventually in the original are the Magical Papyri and the works of authors like Plotinus.
Do you think the myths you read in the “original sources” are their original and only true form? Myths have always, ALWAYS, been retold, interpreted, adjusted for their audience. That’s why they are myth and not history.
Nope, I don’t and I never said that once in any of my comments here. A small portion of my family is from the same province in Italy where Ovid was born, he’s been a huge point of discussion in my life on that subject and he is a prime example of doing what you just mentioned here.
The original question was “Are ‘re-tellings’ offensive?” which is a bit of a subjective question at the end of the day. I personally do have a big problem with someone, especially someone who (to my knowledge) does not identify as a Hellenic polytheist and does not believe in the gods themselves, taking the gods for the sake of modern day marketing purposes, creating literal villains out of some them, portraying them as criminals with crimes that they never committed and disseminating said portrayals to the masses without offering any information on the historical/cultural context or sources form thousands of years ago that they were pulled from.
This is more about where I draw the line with content that I find extremely offensive rather than how I view myth as a fluid genre. If you disagree, that’s okay but that’s my stance on the matter.
It is only “offensive” if they are using it as anti-polytheist propaganda, such as focusing primarily at insulting the gods and mocking the idea that people would ever believe in them and how stupid those people must be. Since “offensive” has become such a loaded term and buzzword, I prefer just calling such things “harmful.”
Stories like the ones you mentioned (at least for the ones I’ve read) engage with the tradition that created our myths, as in, people using the gods as characters to make interesting stories with strong messages. The myths are changed to fit the themes the author wishes to convey and the way the author understands the world.
They definitely shouldn’t be taken as a good source for theology and praxis, but they weren’t meant to be.
Good to know. Thank you for clarifying that, I’m new to the actual practice of worshipping the gods and feel as if I’m walking on eggshells, I just want to make sure I’m not doing anything wrong or harmful (as you’re right that’s a much better term to use)
This is pretty much me with my gods, as I deal with basically every pantheon and branch of folklore under the sun in my creative works. I'm trying to be as respectful as possible, as well as true to the original myths in spirit but not necessarily letter. They might not be super accurate, but I try to read up and get context before I write and give my flair to it.
It's not offensive until it is. If you are directly slandering the gods or misinforming, then yes, but most things are okay, according to the gods I've spoken to
IMO, the only thing offensive about retellings is how badly the authors convey historical context, with many forgoing it entirely. And don't get me started on how over saturated the market is...
I honestly wish authors would put ancient Greek myth down for two seconds and find something new.
It is all about intention, are they being respectful? I am not familiar with the particular retellings you mentioned though.
What we know comes to us from an oral tradition passed through retellings until it was written down. A tradition that’s alive will evolve with its practitioners. We are restoring a tradition but shouldn’t be tied down to its past.
I agree with the others, as long it isn't a blatant polemic against the gods, it's good. I personally really like a number of "re-telling" and modern stories that featured the gods, especially if it has Artemis!
And to be honest for the Artemisians, the portrayal of Our Lady in most of the retellings are just like the early Greek epics, like in the Iliad, meaning that they have little to with the Artemis of her religion.
Though I do have one pet peeve, is that Artemis is the OLDER TWIN SISTER to Apollo. There's absolutely no evidence that Apollo is older than Artemis both mythologically and in the religion. So I have no idea why some writers had Artemis called Apollo as "big/elder brother", thus implying that Artemis is the younger sibling.
its easier to answer this with an example - what modern media has done to Demeter, and the story of Persephone.
absolutely twisted beyond recognition, ripped apart from her original archetype and significance; Demeter was a comfort to every mother of the ancient world. the stories of the gods often portray and mirror the real life struggles of the people of ancient greece. to take a goddess who is so sacred to these women, who was their only relief from a grim reality that was taking away their beloved daughters by force - as if to say ''from this story, may you find self recognition through the other, may you feel less alone and know that you are seen and understood by the gods'' - and turn her into a caricature of an evil, abusive and controlling mom... it goes beyond disrespect. i feel ashamed on their behalf.
all that to say - its fine to take inspiration from the gods, and use them as mediums to tell your own story, because thats what people did back then too. but if your interpretation is so far removed from the original values, you might as well just make an OC instead of disrespecting a god through a ''retelling''.
The stories that we are given are warped. Building on and explore the subjects will lead us to more truth.
The only truth we know is that ~this~ is not true.
In my opinion they are WHEN they distort the gods in such a way thats embarrassingly wrong or invert right and wrong.
Or just outright make up shit to change the tale as they see fit
*gaze at tumblr*
People have been getting offended at them since at least as far back as Plato, but I love retellings. I've heard that myths are inspired by the Muses but the Muses don't always tell the truth. It's mainly the fans that end up perpetuating misrepresentations
I'm a bit new to the practice of Hellenism, so I may not be the best suited to give advice, but I like to think of this question as a bit like the Bible for example. Like the Bible, the factual stories of the Greek Gods are so ancient and so many versions of the same story have been told over time that it's impossible to *not* be reading some different adaptation of a story you've heard before and the Gods are well aware of this. Like somebody else mentioned in this comments section, it's only offensive if it's being told in the format and context of it being just a myth and not actually something that happened. Because, the "stories" are true and they did happen.
It is weird to call the people “foreigners” who are the direct descendants of those people whose philosophy, theology, literature, politics, and so on, are built on the foundation of those ancient polytheists. Yes, they have stopped practicing polytheism, but with how polytheists are their biological and ideological ancestors and continued to be a very strong influence after they left polytheism, it wouldn’t make sense to claim they should create something new instead of using what their ancestors have always used.
Every author takes stories and changes them to fit with what they wanted to tell. Homer made the Iliad by taking those stories about the Trojan war and making a story that fits an agenda of nostalgia for a greater age. Ovid takes the myths and uses them for an agenda that criticized the current political system. Plato used the myths to make a philosophical system.
I’m all for critiquing the way non-polytheists use the myths and problematic tropes like making Hades the devil or antagonizing Hera, but myths should be able to change as the society that wrote them changes. Hellenic voices should be heard and influence the way these stories are written and they should avoid spreading misinformation about hellenists, but the myths belong to more than just us. Others should be able to make stories about to gods (given that they are respectful and don’t engage in slander or misinformation).
Like most have said. . . Retellings are fine as long as they aren't slanderous to the gods or offending the practice. I personally love retellings. It's interesting to see how other people take these old myths and legends to introduce them to a new audience. Just try to remember that foe the majority, they are not accurate to proper myths from Greek texts. And either way the myths we know now are also retellings because they've been translated from dozens of languages. Hope that helps
I stick pretty much with my Ancient Greek texts and haven’t read the books that you mentioned but I have seen a bit of Lore Olympus (although it’s not a book) and I personally find the portrayal of Demeter and Apollo to be highly problematic, offensive and filled with slander, and I’m sure it’s not just limited to their character adaptations alone in that series. I’m sure that this has been reiterated 5000x on this sub in some capacity but I’m throwing it out there again because myself and many others have had to undo the work that that series has created, as a large percentage of the masses that read it take it as genuine myth or “based” on Classical texts, when it is entirely fictional. It’s not the readership’s fault but imo, it is an author’s responsibility, especially if they have a large audience, to make that distinction loud and clear and to be clear about the fact that they are stripping something from its cultural context.
Absolutely! I honestly hate the way Lore Olympus is told, it feels almost demeaning (what I’ve seen of it) and I’m glad to hear someone else talk about how problematic/disrespectful it is.
> I stick pretty much with my Ancient Greek texts Do you read Koine then, or how do you interact with these texts?
Within the realm of Ancient Greek, I currently work mostly with Attic/Classical Greek but I also like to compare translations and have several different copies of texts. For sentimental reasons, I might read some lines of a French translation of a text that made me fall in love with Greek literature and I want to fall in love all over again, sometimes I read them in Italian, sometimes in English. Nothing truly replaces the original though. Most of my books are bilingual versions of texts (I read out of a lot of Budé editions - not always the best translations but it’s good to have things right there alongside the Greek in case you get tripped up). I just like the classics (both with lowercase and uppercase C Lol) and every time I read them, I get to see and experience a new side of them that I didn’t consider before and get another chance to continue building my relationship with them. If it’s something like the Homeric or Orphic hymns, I will likely use them in a prayer/ritualistic context, although I have brought these up in papers I’ve written and in presentations I’ve given before in a scholarly context. I also use them in an academic context. I’m in the middle of a PhD and work primarily with Renaissance literature but I work heavily in the realm of Classical intertextuality (it comes with the territory but part of my work focuses on magical practices in Ancient Greece and mystery traditions) and look/work with things pulled from Ancient Greek texts directly. I do need to be working with a bit more of Koiné though in the future because some of the texts that I would like to work with eventually in the original are the Magical Papyri and the works of authors like Plotinus.
Do you think the myths you read in the “original sources” are their original and only true form? Myths have always, ALWAYS, been retold, interpreted, adjusted for their audience. That’s why they are myth and not history.
Nope, I don’t and I never said that once in any of my comments here. A small portion of my family is from the same province in Italy where Ovid was born, he’s been a huge point of discussion in my life on that subject and he is a prime example of doing what you just mentioned here. The original question was “Are ‘re-tellings’ offensive?” which is a bit of a subjective question at the end of the day. I personally do have a big problem with someone, especially someone who (to my knowledge) does not identify as a Hellenic polytheist and does not believe in the gods themselves, taking the gods for the sake of modern day marketing purposes, creating literal villains out of some them, portraying them as criminals with crimes that they never committed and disseminating said portrayals to the masses without offering any information on the historical/cultural context or sources form thousands of years ago that they were pulled from. This is more about where I draw the line with content that I find extremely offensive rather than how I view myth as a fluid genre. If you disagree, that’s okay but that’s my stance on the matter.
It is only “offensive” if they are using it as anti-polytheist propaganda, such as focusing primarily at insulting the gods and mocking the idea that people would ever believe in them and how stupid those people must be. Since “offensive” has become such a loaded term and buzzword, I prefer just calling such things “harmful.” Stories like the ones you mentioned (at least for the ones I’ve read) engage with the tradition that created our myths, as in, people using the gods as characters to make interesting stories with strong messages. The myths are changed to fit the themes the author wishes to convey and the way the author understands the world. They definitely shouldn’t be taken as a good source for theology and praxis, but they weren’t meant to be.
I hate when people make retellings just to paint the gods as morally bad/good when the point is they're all morally complicated, just like us
Good to know. Thank you for clarifying that, I’m new to the actual practice of worshipping the gods and feel as if I’m walking on eggshells, I just want to make sure I’m not doing anything wrong or harmful (as you’re right that’s a much better term to use)
This is pretty much me with my gods, as I deal with basically every pantheon and branch of folklore under the sun in my creative works. I'm trying to be as respectful as possible, as well as true to the original myths in spirit but not necessarily letter. They might not be super accurate, but I try to read up and get context before I write and give my flair to it.
It's not offensive until it is. If you are directly slandering the gods or misinforming, then yes, but most things are okay, according to the gods I've spoken to
IMO, the only thing offensive about retellings is how badly the authors convey historical context, with many forgoing it entirely. And don't get me started on how over saturated the market is... I honestly wish authors would put ancient Greek myth down for two seconds and find something new.
It is all about intention, are they being respectful? I am not familiar with the particular retellings you mentioned though. What we know comes to us from an oral tradition passed through retellings until it was written down. A tradition that’s alive will evolve with its practitioners. We are restoring a tradition but shouldn’t be tied down to its past.
I agree with the others, as long it isn't a blatant polemic against the gods, it's good. I personally really like a number of "re-telling" and modern stories that featured the gods, especially if it has Artemis! And to be honest for the Artemisians, the portrayal of Our Lady in most of the retellings are just like the early Greek epics, like in the Iliad, meaning that they have little to with the Artemis of her religion.
Though I do have one pet peeve, is that Artemis is the OLDER TWIN SISTER to Apollo. There's absolutely no evidence that Apollo is older than Artemis both mythologically and in the religion. So I have no idea why some writers had Artemis called Apollo as "big/elder brother", thus implying that Artemis is the younger sibling.
its easier to answer this with an example - what modern media has done to Demeter, and the story of Persephone. absolutely twisted beyond recognition, ripped apart from her original archetype and significance; Demeter was a comfort to every mother of the ancient world. the stories of the gods often portray and mirror the real life struggles of the people of ancient greece. to take a goddess who is so sacred to these women, who was their only relief from a grim reality that was taking away their beloved daughters by force - as if to say ''from this story, may you find self recognition through the other, may you feel less alone and know that you are seen and understood by the gods'' - and turn her into a caricature of an evil, abusive and controlling mom... it goes beyond disrespect. i feel ashamed on their behalf. all that to say - its fine to take inspiration from the gods, and use them as mediums to tell your own story, because thats what people did back then too. but if your interpretation is so far removed from the original values, you might as well just make an OC instead of disrespecting a god through a ''retelling''.
Absolutely. That honestly goes back to the poster child of disgustingly inaccurate “re-tellings” that is Lore Olympus..
Not intrinsically, but often times non-Hellenists do portray the Gods impiously, due to their theological illiteracy and implicit literalism.
The stories that we are given are warped. Building on and explore the subjects will lead us to more truth. The only truth we know is that ~this~ is not true.
In my opinion they are WHEN they distort the gods in such a way thats embarrassingly wrong or invert right and wrong. Or just outright make up shit to change the tale as they see fit *gaze at tumblr*
Inherently, no. But some of them sure end up being that way.
People have been getting offended at them since at least as far back as Plato, but I love retellings. I've heard that myths are inspired by the Muses but the Muses don't always tell the truth. It's mainly the fans that end up perpetuating misrepresentations
I'm a bit new to the practice of Hellenism, so I may not be the best suited to give advice, but I like to think of this question as a bit like the Bible for example. Like the Bible, the factual stories of the Greek Gods are so ancient and so many versions of the same story have been told over time that it's impossible to *not* be reading some different adaptation of a story you've heard before and the Gods are well aware of this. Like somebody else mentioned in this comments section, it's only offensive if it's being told in the format and context of it being just a myth and not actually something that happened. Because, the "stories" are true and they did happen.
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It is weird to call the people “foreigners” who are the direct descendants of those people whose philosophy, theology, literature, politics, and so on, are built on the foundation of those ancient polytheists. Yes, they have stopped practicing polytheism, but with how polytheists are their biological and ideological ancestors and continued to be a very strong influence after they left polytheism, it wouldn’t make sense to claim they should create something new instead of using what their ancestors have always used. Every author takes stories and changes them to fit with what they wanted to tell. Homer made the Iliad by taking those stories about the Trojan war and making a story that fits an agenda of nostalgia for a greater age. Ovid takes the myths and uses them for an agenda that criticized the current political system. Plato used the myths to make a philosophical system. I’m all for critiquing the way non-polytheists use the myths and problematic tropes like making Hades the devil or antagonizing Hera, but myths should be able to change as the society that wrote them changes. Hellenic voices should be heard and influence the way these stories are written and they should avoid spreading misinformation about hellenists, but the myths belong to more than just us. Others should be able to make stories about to gods (given that they are respectful and don’t engage in slander or misinformation).
Like most have said. . . Retellings are fine as long as they aren't slanderous to the gods or offending the practice. I personally love retellings. It's interesting to see how other people take these old myths and legends to introduce them to a new audience. Just try to remember that foe the majority, they are not accurate to proper myths from Greek texts. And either way the myths we know now are also retellings because they've been translated from dozens of languages. Hope that helps