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"Some stories keep returning, each time reimagined to fit the occasion. In some cases, we know them without having read the originals, and in a few brief sentences we can sketch the essential plot points and key characters. Robinson Crusoe, Frankenstein, Dracula, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Sherlock Holmes, Batman: their stories, Philip Ball contends, are among our modern myths. Written since Crusoe was published in 1719, these modern myths truly serve the same function as the stories of Thor and Loki, Hercules and Jason, and other ancient universal myths of creation, flood, redemption, and heroism. What is that function? Why are we still making myths? Why do we need new myths? And which are they? By posing these questions and seeking answers, The Modern Myths makes bold claims about the nature of storytelling, the condition of modernity, and the categories of literature. The themes and meanings of modern myths are decided collectively and dynamically and shift with the times. They escape the intentions of their authors because they inadvertently touch on issues that trouble and obsess us and become vehicles for exploring them. The Modern Myths takes a wide-ranging journey--discovering unexpected truths behind familiar tales, excavating strange and colorful histories, and finding hidden connections between them. The result is an exploration of how stories are created and how they evolve. And from this, Ball crafts provocative conclusions about the purposes and values of literature today and about the roles that new media and technology will play in creating the myths of tomorrow"--
About the author
Philip Ball is a freelance writer and broadcaster, and was an editor at
Nature for more than twenty years. He writes regularly in the scientific and popular media and has written many books on the interactions of the sciences, the arts, and wider culture, including
H2O: A Biography of Water and
The Music Instinct. His book
Critical Mass won the 2005 Aventis Prize for Science Books. Ball is also the 2022 recipient of the Royal Society's Wilkins-Bernal-Medawar Medal for contributions to the history, philosophy, or social roles of science. He trained as a chemist at the University of Oxford and as a physicist at the University of Bristol, and he was an editor at
Nature for more than twenty years. He lives in London.
Summary
With The Modern Myths, brilliant science communicator Philip Ball spins a new yarn. From novels and comic books to B-movies, Bram Stoker and Mary Shelley to The War of the Worlds, it is an epic exploration of literature, new media and technology, the nature of storytelling, and the making and meaning of our most important tales.
