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Title: A Teacher's Opinion of the Text
Review: MYTHOLOGY is the text I was given when I first started teaching my mythology class for juniors and seniors. Boy, was I in for a disappointment. Not only does Edith Hamilton blandly summarize every story, but she leaves out many of the details that students are eager to absorb. Although I have great respect for the text since it was one of the first to bring Greek myth into an easily-accessible form, it is dated and a poor text for a high-school mythology class. Some teachers argue that the elevated language and confusing sentence structure is good practice for serious students, and it is in other contexts. But I am of the opinion that mythology should be fresh and exciting--as it was to the original myth-makers. As Thomas Bulfinch had said, "Thus we hope to teach mythology not as a study, but as a relaxation from study." When a text makes its subject nearly impossible to appreciate, it's not worth it.
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