English/ WGST/MDST 368: Mythologies
Rice University
Fall, 2001
Instructor: Dr. Jane Chance, English TTH 10:50-12:05
(Distribution Course)
Description: This interdisciplinary course will introduce students to a variety of world mythologies and mythmakers, from the beginnings to the modern period. Designed to explore the relationship between a culture and its myths as expressed in specific literary or religious works, “Mythologies” offers a means of understanding cultural difference as well as the fundamental topics of human desire and aspiration (creation and birth, the purpose of life, heroic struggle against nature and death, the hope for rebirth, etc.). Included mythologies: Babylonian, Sumerian, Hindu, Egyptian, Greek, Roman, Irish, Welsh, Old Norse, Anglo-Saxon, Finnish, Mayan, Hopi, modern (Borges, Philip Glass).
Note: Interested graduate students may enroll in this course as an English Department Directed Reading; please seeinstructor.
Reading List (all prices according to Amazon.com)
(All books will be
placed on reserve)
The Epic of Gilgamesh: The Babylonian Epic Poem and Other Texts in
Akkadian and Sumerian [2000 B.C.],
trans. Andrew George, Penguin Classics, 2000 ISBN 0140447210, $8.10
Ianna: Queen of Heaven and Earth; Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer, trans. Diane Wolkstein, Samuel Noah Kramer, HarperCollins, 1983 ISBN 0060908548 $11.20 [Mesopotamia]
The Bahagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War, trans. Barbara Stoler Miller, Bantam, 1986 ISBN 0553213652 part of longer version of Mahabarata $5.35
Awakening Osiris: The Egyptian Book of the Dead, trans. Normandi Ellis, Phanes Pr., 1991; ISBN 0933999747 $11.96
Hesiod, Theogony; Works and Days, trans. M.L. West, Oxford U. Press rpt., 1999, ISBN 0192839411, $8.95
Ovid, Metamorphoses, trans. Rolfe Humphries Indiana U. Press, 1955; rpt. ISBN 025320001-6 $
Early Irish Myths and Sagas, trans. Jeffrey Gantz, Penguin USA, rpt. 1982 ISBN 0140443975 $9.56
Mabinogion (Penguin Classics), trans. Jeffrey Gantz, Viking Press, 1976 rpt., ISBN 0140443223 8.95
The Saga of the Volsungs: The Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer (Penguin Classics), trans. Jesse L. Brock, Penguin USA 2000, ISBN 0140447385 $9.56
Beowulf: A New Verse Translation, trans. Seamus Heaney, Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2000 ISBN 0374111197, $20
The Kalevala, trans. Elias Lonnrot, Keith Bosley, Albert B. Lord, Oxford U. Press, 1999, ISBN 019283570X $11.96
Popol Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiche Mayans, trans. Adrien Recinos, Univ.Oklahoma Press, rpt. 1991; ISBN 0806122668 $10.50
Book of the Hopi, trans. Frank Waters, Oswald White Bear Fredericks, Viking Press, 1985 ISBN 0140045279 $11.16
Jorge Luis Borges, Labyrinths: Selected Stories and Other Writings, Norton, 1988 ISBN 0811200124 $ 9.56
Recommended:
James George Frazer, The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion, Penguin Putnam, 1996 ISBN 0140189319 $14.95
Joseph Campbell, Hero with a Thousand Faces, Princeton UP, rpt. 1972 ISBN 0691017840 $12.76
_______. The Masks of God: Creative Mythology, Arkana; ISBN 0140194401 1995 rpt $13.56 [Native American, modern, medieval]
Requirements: 1 short paper, 2 exams, and 1 longer paper/project.
I. Oriental and Asiatic Mythologies: Akkadian, Sumerian, Hindu
Week 1: Introduction: Selections from Philip Glass’s Koyanisqaatsi
Read: James
George Frazer, The Illustrated Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion
Week 2: The Epic of Gilgamesh: The Babylonian Epic Poem and Other Texts in Akkadian and Sumerian [2000 B.C]
Ianna: Queen of Heaven and
Earth; Her Stories and Hymns from Sumer
Week 3: The Bahagavad-Gita: Krishna’s Counsel in Time of War, part of longer version of Mahabarata
II.
Mediterranean and African Mythologies
Week 4: Read: Joseph Campbell, Hero with a Thousand Faces (read chapters 1-3)
Awakening Osiris: The Egyptian Book of the Dead
Short Paper #1 Due
Week 5:
Hesiod, Theogony
Works and Days
Week 6: Ovid, Metamorphoses, books 1-5
Read: Joseph Campbell, Hero with a
Thousand Faces (read chapters 4-6):
Week 7: Ovid, Metamorphoses, books 6-10
Ovid, Metamorphoses,
books 11-15 Exam #1
III. Northern European Mythologies: Irish, Welsh, Old
Norse, Anglo-Saxon, Finnish
Week 8: Early
Irish Myths and Sagas
Read: Joseph Campbell, The Masks of God: Creative Mythology (read chapters 7-8)
Week 9:
Mabinogion
Week 10: The
Saga of the Volsungs: The Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer
Week 11: Beowulf
The Kalevala
IV. North and South American Mythologies: Mayan, Native American, South American
Week 12: Popol
Vuh: The Sacred Book of the Ancient Quiche Mayans
Week 13:
Book of the Hopi
Week 14:
Jorge Luis Borges, Labyrinths
Read: Joseph Campbell, The Masks of God: Creative Mythology
(read chapters 9-10)
Exam #2 (or
Final)
Project/Paper
Office Hours: 3:45-4:30 TTH and by appointment
Office Phone: 713-348-2625
E-mail: jchance@rice.edu
Webpage: http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~jchance/myth.htm