Six Myths of Our Time

Little Angels, Little Monsters, Beautiful Beasts, and More


Marina Warner


Divided into six sections:
  1. Monstrous Mothers
    Women Over the Top
  2. Boys Will Be Boys
    The Making of the Male
  3. Little Angels, Little Monsters
    Keeping Childhood Innocent
  4. Beautiful Beasts
    The Call of the Wild
  5. Cannibal Tales
    The Hunger for Conquest
  6. Home
    Our Famous Island Race

(From the jacket)
In these six dazzlingly intelligent and provocative essays, the distinguished English novelist and critic Marina Warner weaves classical mythology, pop culture, and today's headlines into a potent work of cultural criticism that is both unsettling and entertaining. Ranging from Medea to Thelma & Louise and from the myths of cannibalism to the politics of rape, Six Myths of Our Time is at once a celebration of the enduring power of fable and a welcome antidote to its more virulent manifestations in our public life.

The one quote I most want on a t-shirt (with square brackets in lieu of underlines to indicate the e2 connection, obviously):

"Oddly enough, the anticipation of cannibalism is naively self-flattering: my enemies want nothing better to eat me, because I am so delicious."