Many collections, retellings, and adaptations are selective – this is often a reflection of necessity. Publishers' margins are tight, illustrations come at a cost, and some of the myths test the limits of what parents want their children to know. But writers find it hard to leave things out. *Brick Greek Myths* (2014), by Amanda Brack, Monica Sweeney, and Becky Thomas, which uses LEGO photographs to retell the Greek origin myths, is admirably comprehensive, giving young readers a satisfyingly thorough amount of information (such as a clear outline of how Zeus established the world order through a series of marriages, and fathering several sets of children18). If you pull one thread of a myth, a whole tapestry is likely to follow – so interconnected and tangled are the gods' family trees and stories, and some versions are clearer in laying out the groundwork than others. George O'Connor's "Olympians" series of graphic novels (2010–2022) retells the different gods' origin myths, and squarely faces the challenge of how to organize material. Each volume focuses on a member of the Olympians. O'Connor highlights the Olympians' family tree, and provides notes on each main figure, identifying their powers, attributes, and legacies. "Greek/Geek" notes give extra information, and a bibliography provides further reading for adults and for younger readers too. Readers working their way through this series will see how each mythical figure connects with a wider body of stories. O'Connor's conversational style highlights that the myths are complicated and contradictory, and encourages readers to think through their own take on a myth, as, for instance, here, in *Hades: Lord of the Dead* (2012):

> Page 4–5, panel 7: "The Mortal half of Heracles" – this was a subject of much debate in the ancient world – did Heracles go to Hades when he died, like a mortal, or did he ascend to Olympus, like a god? I previously showed the latter in *Olympians Book 3*, *Hera: The Goddess and Her Glory*, and, indeed, there were many worshippers of Heracles that claimed he attained godhood upon his mortal demise. However, no less a source than the epic poem *The Odyssey* attests to Heracles being a denizen of Hades – Odysseus encounters Heracles (as well as Medusa) during his own visit to the Underworld. It was ultimately decided that, since Heracles was a demigod, his immortal half ascended to Olympus, while his mortal half descended to Hades. Bad luck to be Heracles' mortal half!19

#### **Caroline Lawrence, "The Roman Mysteries" Series (2001–2009)**

Beginning with *The Thieves of Ostia* (2001), this popular series of historical novels, which includes seventeen books as well as a trio of spin-off "Mini-Mysteries", quiz books and other compendiums, introduces readers to the customs and culture of life in the Roman Empire. Set in the first century CE during the reign of Titus, the fast-paced detective stories are centred on four children who unite to solve various mysteries in their neighbourhood and wider world. Flavia Gemina is a wealthy Roman girl, the daughter of a sea captain, whose mother died in childbirth. Her neighbour, Jonathan ben Mordecai, is a Jewish boy who

18 Brack, Sweeney, and Thomas, *Brick Greek Myths*, 22–23.

19 George O'Connor, *Hades: Lord of the Dead*, "Olympians" 4, New York, NY: First Second, 2012, 71.

is secretly a Christian. Lupus is an orphaned, mute beggar boy, and Nubia is a freed slave girl from Africa. Other characters are based on historical figures, including Pliny the Elder, Suetonius, the Emperor Titus and members of the Imperial family.

The children's different backgrounds allow for exploration of the diversity of the Roman Empire, and function as a didactic device, as Flavia and Jonathan explain Roman customs and history to Lupus and Nubia. The series features extensive facts about life in Ancient Rome, which are not always integrated into the plot. Lawrence is clearly motivated to educate her audience about this historical period while simultaneously entertaining them with an exciting story.

#### **Ancient Greek Historical Fiction**

*While mythology is the predominant focus in children's retellings, a number of books instead look to bring the historical record to life.*

#### **Being Informed**

Approaches such as O'Connor's emphasize the interest that lies in piecing together the fragments we know about the ancient world, and that there is room for contradiction and complexity in the pictures presented. While many children's versions of myth and history point to received or understood ideas, many also encourage interpretation and enjoy the possibility of debate and contradiction. They enjoy the idea of learning, and of learning by reading and thinking on their own.

In a seeming paradox, most children's books are written by adults, with the intent either to instruct or delight. And even in the most delightful work, the intent to instruct is often visible. So too is the hidden adult, teaching, informing, and imposing.20 (See "C is for Childhood".) This means that children's books are often ideologically driven, imposing, or replicating whatever ideology, values, or mores are dominant at the time of composition.

As we indicate in the "Introduction" to this volume (and also in "Q is for Quality"), teachers and parents choosing material for young readers have much to think about. Every type of storytelling is an ideological act, or an act informed by an ideology. Writers retelling material from Classical Antiquity are participating in a tradition that has its own baggage. But it is also flexible, able to be modulated, and moderated, according to different contexts. (In "D is for Dealing with Difficult Subjects", we consider how sexual and violent content in the myths make them both challenging to retell, and useful to help think through difficult moments.) Retellers of classical myth and history have to think about challenging elements, such as how to represent slavery, the position of women, the treatment of animals, and the violence of ancient history. Subtler, but just as important, elements of ideology can come from the reteller's own time – assumptions about the composition of families, for instance: many books on social history assume a family will be nuclear (mother, father, two children of different genders). Many books focalize their information through a narrative construct when they use a young protagonist to filter their stories.

These are challenges that face all children's writers, not just those working with Classical Antiquity. When we choose how to represent the world to young readers, we have to think about what information is useful, what is interesting, and what is appropriate. In her poetic picture book, *Echo Echo: Reverso Poems about Greek Myths* (ill. Josée Masse; 2015), Marilyn Singer puts it like this: "These myths make sense of the world. We – tellers and listeners alike – enter these portals to gods and mortals. They can never again be closed, once our imaginations are opened".21 The myths, and our response to them, help us make sense of the world: providing information, and eliciting an informed response. Which may be a point to close with: that texts we discuss in this book showcase the power of the myths to inspire creative responses, to open our imaginations, and to help us make sense of the world.

20 See Nodelman, *The Hidden Adult*.

21 Marilyn Singer, *Echo Echo: Reverso Poems about Greek Myths*, ill. Josée Masse, New York, NY: Dial Books for Young Readers, 2015, 27.

#### **Thinking Difference: Autism and Classical Myth**

Through her work on autism and classical myth, Susan Deacy (University of Roehampton) has been investigating how children with autism engage with classical mythology, focusing on the Labours of Hercules. She has developed classroom tools and exercises which present the myths and offer ways to engage with them. With Lisa Maurice, she has established the ACCLAIM group (Autism Connecting with CLAssically-Inspired Myth) for researchers interested in exploring the potential of myth for inspiring autistic children. In her blog, *Autism and Classical Myth* (https://myth-autism.blogspot.com/), she reflects on the processes of developing this work.

#### *Our Mythical Education Database*

One component of the *Our Mythical Childhood* project concentrates on educational materials for children and young adults that engage with the ancient world. Led by Lisa Maurice and Ayelet Peer from Bar-Ilan University in Israel, the *Our Mythical Education* authors are undertaking a survey of teaching resources, including textbooks, lesson plans, and online materials. The database (http://www.omc.obta.al.uw.edu.pl/education-survey) already contains more than 100 entries, with new material being added all the time.

#### **Further Reading on Classics and Education**

Christopher Stray, *Classics Transformed: Schools, Universities and Society in England, 1830–1960*, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.

Arlene Holmes-Henderson, Steven Hunt, and Mai Musié, eds., *Forward with Classics: Classical Languages in Schools and Communities*, London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018.

Lisa Maurice, ed., *Our Mythical Education: The Reception of Classical Myth Worldwide in Formal Education, 1900–2020*, "Our Mythical Childhood", Warsaw: Warsaw University Press, 2021.

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**J** is for Journeys

**J** is for Journeys

Children's songs and stories are full of journeys: away from home, and back to it, out into the wilderness, and home again to safety. In Beatrix Potter's *The Tale of Peter Rabbit* (1902), Peter Rabbit braves the perils of Mr McGregor's garden, seeking adventure

or lettuces, overindulging in both. Peter is nearly captured, but escapes home to the comfort of his mother, sisters, and a dose of camomile tea: frightened, and chastened, but soon restored to his boyish high spirits, if his later adventures with his cousin Benjamin Bunny are any indication. In J.R.R. Tolkien's *The Hobbit* (1937), Bilbo Baggins seeks adventure he did not know he wished for, when he accompanies a group of dwarves to the Lonely Mountain to retrieve their treasure from the dragon Smaug. On their journey they make friends and combat enemies, and Bilbo finds in himself a bravery and cleverness he did not know he possessed.

#### **Quest Myths**

*Classical mythology is full of quest narratives where heroes (usually male, though not always), set out on a mission or in search of a particular goal or treasure.*

This type of journey, characterized as the "home–away–home" narrative motif by Perry Nodelman and Mavis Reimer, is one of the most common in the field: a protagonist, not necessarily a child, leaves home, seeking adventure, facing and overcoming challenges, and returning home, perhaps empowered, stronger, braver, and wiser in some regard – in some instances filled with a new understanding of the value of home, able in others to improve a broken home.1 In making a journey, the child protagonist learns about the world, encounters dangers, but is able to return to safety – or so the narrative pattern promises. Stories for adolescents complicate the pattern: their protagonists sometimes find it is at home that danger is present, and the journey-maker seeks a new kind of home – the home that is right for them, the home that they make, perhaps having forged new relationships, and made new families. Sometimes they are changed by their journeys, meaning that home is never quite the same (Bilbo Baggins, for instance, is always afterwards a little sadder and a little wiser than he had been previously).

Ancient myth is also full of journeys, and often involves leaving home and returning. Theseus and Perseus go out into the world, and return once more – sadder, wiser, changed by the trials they have endured, and glad to be back among their friends and families. Some stories complicate the relationship to home: Aeneas makes a new home, taking his son to Italy, and founding a new empire – an endeavour that is not without sacrifice and effort. For other travellers, the journey is as much the point as the return: Odysseus and Jason spring to mind – their adventures take them around the Mediterranean, and their landing places can be seen to this day. Journey narratives can be episodic good fun, involving pleasant side-diversions, such as Odysseus' time on the island of the nymph Calypso. They can include alarming episodes – such as when Jason has to navigate his ship between the terrifying moving cliffs of the Symplegades. Or they can be entertaining challenges, such as Odysseus' confrontation with the Cyclops Polyphemus.

Journeys can be physical, and they can also be mental and emotional, and stories for young readers often intertwine the two – a literal journey through a landscape is accompanied by an inward journey, in which the protagonist reflects and grows. The role of the journey in classical and children's culture is remarkably similar: involving exploration, survival, challenge, and personal growth. Maria Nikolajeva, writing about the journey motif in children's stories, notes that "journeys, both real and imaginary, discoveries, the search for identity, and survival on one's own with adults' assistance, are all important components in a young person's psychological development",2 a point that holds true for the heroes, who also develop and grow during their adventures. Hercules'

1 Perry Nodelman, *The Pleasures of Children's Literature*, 3rd ed., ed. Mavis Reimer, Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon, 2003.

2 Maria Nikolajeva, *Aesthetic Approaches to Children's Literature: An Introduction*, Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2005, 83.

Labours take him around the Mediterranean, but they also take him on a journey of repentance and endurance that confirms his greatness, and while he does not need to "come of age" in quite the same way as a child or an adolescent, his willingness to endure and do penance, show him taking a heroic inner journey. Theseus is forced to grow up when his carelessness costs his father his life – he becomes a wise and generous ruler.

When we read journey narratives, indeed, when we read any story, we also travel, going on imaginative journeys – into other places, and times, and experiences, leaving ourselves behind to some degree, but also learning about things that affect us. In *Enchanted Hunters: The Power of Stories in Childhood*, Maria Tatar describes the process, in the context of children's bedtime reading, as an "adventure" in which children begin to

> contemplate perils and possibilities, and to ponder what could be, might be, or should be. They want stories that will transport them, enabling them to discover new arenas of action and places to play, despite the darkness. And this is why we need Oz, Narnia, Wonderland, Neverland, and early on, sites like Maurice Sendak's Night Kitchen and Where the Wild Things Are. It is there that children can go at night time to exercise their imaginations. And it is there that they discover how words can take them out of familiar comfort zones, enabling breakthroughs into worlds that encode fears and desires in the safe form of symbolic language.3

In "S is for Speculation" we discuss the idea of the fantasy realm – literature as a space for exploration and imagination, stories that explore "what-ifs" and "what-might-be". Literary journeys are part of that exploration, both in terms of the child's entry into an imaginative realm, and in terms of the protagonist's story.

#### **Jason's Journey through Life**

The balance between being lost and finding one's way, between going out and coming home again, seeking danger and overcoming it – this balance is part of structures that are as old, or older, than the classical myths we discuss here. When writers and illustrators retell or adapt those myths, they are working

3 Maria Tatar, *Enchanted Hunters: The Power of Stories in Childhood*, New York, NY: W.W. Norton, 2009, 111–112.

with these ideas, using their own, and the child's imagination, to travel along familiar and strange paths. Robert Byrd's colourful picture book *Jason and the Argonauts: The First Great Quest in Greek Mythology* (2016) shows the famous hero's journey in vivid detail.

> This is the story of a hero, Jason, who lived many years ago in ancient Greece. He built a ship, filled it with other heroes willing to join him, and set out on an epic quest. His is a tale of gods and mortals, of adventure and danger, and, of course, glory.4

Byrd divides Jason's journey through life into sections, each one on a doublepage spread: beginning with Jason's childhood education in the cave of Chiron, his acceptance of the quest to retrieve the Golden Fleece, his encounters with the gods in disguise, or speaking through oracles. He constructs a ship, the mighty Argo, issues a call to the heroes who come to join him and sets sail. Each section shows a different stage of his travels – and shows him to be on a journey that is not merely about travelling through space, but is about encountering the different beings that live there. He helps the soothsayer King Phineas cope with the horrible Harpies;5 the Argonauts sail nimbly through the Symplegades, or Clashing Rocks6 with Athena's help, they frighten off the man-eating Stymphalian Birds,7 and arrive in Colchis in good style, where Jason falls in love with King Aeetes' daughter, Medea.8 More adventures follow. Medea helps Jason complete tasks to please the king, and also to steal the Fleece.9

Jason has reached the "there" of his "there and back again quest", as Byrd's imagery emphasizes in a page that forces one to slow down and look closely at what Jason has found. The Fleece (or rather the ram with the Golden Fleece) is magnificently depicted in a full-page night-time scene: its golden wool gleaming against a starry night sky, offset by the glittering scales of a golden and yellow serpent, with three flickering red tongues. Part of a journey narrative involves moments of rest and reflection, in which the hero takes stock of where

4 Robert Byrd, *Jason and the Argonauts: The First Great Quest in Greek Mythology*, New York, NY: Dial Books for Young Readers, 2016, 1.

5 For Phineus and Harpies, see Apollodorus, *Library* 1.9.21–22.

6 See Apollodorus, *Library* 1.9.22; Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 2.549–606.

7 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 2.1033–1089.

8 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 3.275–301.

9 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 4.99–182.

he has come to, before heading off on the next stage, and the visual imagery of illustrated works can contribute to that idea: the Golden Fleece is not merely a treasure, but a wondrous creature.

For Jason, finding his way back again may seem simpler, as he knows the way home, but in fact he has a more difficult task, for, as J.R.R. Tolkien knew and expressed in *The Hobbit* (1937) and his later trilogy, *The Lord of the Rings*  (1954), you can never really go home again: at least, not without finding that something has changed – either at home, or within yourself. Jason's troubles intensify: with Medea's help, he has killed her brother Apsyrtus:10 they have angered Zeus, who proclaims "his fury and disgust at Jason and Medea's betrayal of her own flesh and blood".11 Rough seas beset them as they seek the island of the sorceress Circe,12 who can speak for Zeus and pardon the duo if Medea will "relinquish her powers of evil magic".13 Together with the Argonauts, they face further challenges – the rocks and whirlpool of Scylla and Charybdis,14 a period in the desert of Libya, and a fight against the bronze giant Talos.15 Each stage takes them through another part of the Mediterranean (and gives a mythical explanation of the Mediterranean's different geographical features). They return home to Iolcus, where Jason and Medea use the promise of a magical potion that can restore youth, to trick Pelias into jumping into a cauldron of boiling water, helped by his daughters.16

Jason seems to be revenged, but the gods are disgusted at Medea's actions – she has tricked Pelias' innocent daughters into murdering their father. The people of Iolcus refuse to accept her as their queen, and so they are forced to leave. Fleeing to Corinth, they are welcomed by King Creon, but Jason now fears his powerful wife, and forgetting all she has done for him, tells her he wants to marry Glauce, Creon's daughter.17 In a rage, Medea murders the children she shared with Jason.18 Her grandfather, the sun god Helios, sends her a chariot pulled by two dragons, and she escapes – the picture shows her flying into the air as Jason fruitlessly waves his sword.

10 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 4.454–481.

11 Byrd, *Jason and the Argonauts*, 27.

12 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 4.557–561.

13 Byrd, *Jason and the Argonauts*, 28.

14 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 4.922–964.

15 See Apollonius Rhodius, *Argonautica* 4.1638–1688.

16 See Apollodorus, *Library* 1.9.27.

17 See Apollodorus, *Library* 1.9.28.

18 Ibidem.

Whatever we may think of Jason, he is devastated by this loss.

He had fallen out of favour with the gods, especially Hera, for breaking his promise to Medea. He wandered through Greece, homeless, forgotten by his friends, reliving his past glory and grieving for the tragedies that ruined him.19

Returning to Iolcus many years later, he finds the Argo beached on the shore. Sitting down under the prow of the ship, he rests in its shade.  His journeys are at an end. Byrd's retelling ends with an indictment of the gods, whose callous meddling causes so many tragedies for mere humans:

> Jason's story is a classic tale of bravery and valor, but also deceit, trickery, and vengeance. It shows how the whims of the gods played with the lives of mere mortals for their own pleasure and gain.20

#### **Jason and the Argonauts**

*The hero Jason sails on a quest for the Golden Fleece, accompanied by the Argonauts and aided by Hera and Athena. After many adventures he arrives in Colchis where the princess Medea defies her father and helps him obtain the prize. Full of monsters and magic, the story has captivated children for generations.*

*Retelling –* **Dan Whitehead,** *Jason and the Argonauts***, ill. Sankha Banerjee (2011)** A graphic novel retelling Jason's famous journey to Colchis in search of the Golden Fleece that celebrates his heroic qualities as well as his fatal flaws.

*Revision –* **Helen Mary Hoover,** *The Dawn Palace: The Story of Medea* **(1988)** Told from the perspective of thirteen-year-old Medea, this young adult novel actively challenges her role as the villain of the saga.

#### *Adaptation –* **Kevin Kneupper,** *Argonauts* **(2016)**

This novel transports the story of Jason and Medea into the realm of science fiction. Medea becomes a scientist programming the human genetic code, while wealthy, handsome Jason is a shareholder in the Argo Corporation and must accompany her on a dangerous mission.

#### *Allusion –* **Matthew Reilly,** *Hover Car Racer* **(2004)**

There are coded references to Jason's quest for the Golden Fleece in this futuristic story about the competitive sport of Hover Car Racing.

19 Byrd, *Jason and the Argonauts*, 37.

20 Ibidem.

#### **Visual Journeys**

Narrations of major journey cycles, like Jason's or Odysseus', may use visual storytelling to depict the scenes and characters of the story – the places visited, the curious, charming, or menacing beings that live there. Journey narratives can be episodic, meaning that they are filled with events and adventures, but they may not always find the time for reflection and character building. This is especially the case with picture book retellings, which pack a lot of story into a short space. Having said that, the visual splendours that picture books can present allow full play to the idea of the physical journey. And as picture book scholar Jane Doonan notes, the density and reflectiveness of images can invite a slow and thoughtful reading, one that draws the reader or viewer into the world – to do the mental work of travelling with the hero through the magnificent landscape.21 Byrd's Jason makes his way through a world that is meticulously filled in, with sweeping illustrations that present the ancient world in shades of blue and green and gold and pink: full of magic and mystery, but also lively and energetic: despite the dark underpinnings of the later part of Jason's story, he conveys a sense that the Argonauts' journey overall is one of fun, joy, and comradeship.

Other illustrators take different approaches: Errol Le Cain's lavish illustration of Walter Pater's *Cupid and Psyche* (1977) retells Apuleius' story of the princess who fell in love with Cupid, the son of Aphrodite, and who was sent on perilous journeys by her future mother-in-law, even penetrating the depths of the Underworld to retrieve the recipe for Persephone's face cream.  Images such as that of Psyche climbing into Charon's ferry reveal the fearsome nature of the Underworld. Even more so than in Byrd's reimaginings, Le Cain's artwork draws the reader into a mysterious and threatening realm, highlighting Psyche's braveness and vulnerability.

Both Jason and Psyche go on quests – journeys with a purpose – in both cases to retrieve a special object, and in order to restore troubled relationships. Jason is trying to return to his home of Iolcus, where his role as king has been

21 Jane Doonan, *Looking at Pictures in Picture Books*, Woodchester: Thimble Press, 1993.

usurped by Pelias. Psyche is trying to prove her worthiness to Eros' jealous mother, Aphrodite. Journeys are more than simply pleasurable outings; in the world of myth they require courage and fortitude. It is not a coincidence that many hero narratives involve significant journeys. (See "H is for How to Be Heroic".) The mythological journeys show the heroes travelling through space to achieve different ends. Odysseus' odyssey is intended to be a homeward journey. Aeneas makes his way to a new land and a new home. Perseus, Theseus, and Hercules travel to fulfil tasks, and make their mark on the land. Many characters journey to the Underworld, to face the ultimate terror – death (see "U is for Underworld Adventures").

#### **Up, Down, All Around**

*The shape of a journey varies, taking stories up to Olympus, and down to Hades, and all around the ancient worlds in between.*

**Odysseus** travels there and back again, from Ithaca to Troy and home once more.

**Aeneas** travels away from his home in Troy to found a new civilization in Italy. His journey is a kind of home–away–home story, which considers what it feels like to be forced out of one home, and to have to find, and establish, a new home.

**Orpheus** travels into the Underworld to find his lost love, Eurydice. But on his way home, he disobeys instructions, looking back at her before they reach the world, meaning that his journey was fruitless. He is one of many characters to perform a kind of **katabasis**, that is, a journey downward, to confront the ultimate peril of death.

**Theseus** travels around the Aegean and Mediterranean, from Athens to Crete. When he reaches Crete, he travels again, this time into the Labyrinth (a kind of round-and-round, confusing journey that he needs Ariadne's help to solve).

**Jason** and the Argonauts, his band of heroic companions (including Hercules and Atalanta), travel around the ancient world by sea. Their journey is both a quest and an adventurous outing, similar to the *Odyssey* in its episodic nature and the travellers' stops at interesting islands along the way.

**Hercules'** famous Labours take him around the ancient world too. His journey is presented as a series of tests and trials, which occur in many places, some of which can be seen today.

**The goddess Demeter** travels all around the world looking for her abducted child, Persephone – she travels over the land, and up to Olympus, before learning that Persephone is in the Underworld.

Demeter's daughter, **Persephone**, undergoes a different kind of katabasis: she is taken to the Underworld by Hades, then restored to the upperworld following Demeter's intervention. Persephone's movement, between above ground and the Underworld, creates the seasons.

**Psyche** travels throughout the world seeking her lost love, Eros. Carrying out tasks for his mother, Aphrodite, as a test of her love, she travels to the Underworld to bring back Persephone's face cream for the beautiful goddess.

**The messenger god Hermes**, with his winged sandals, is known to travel widely throughout the world, even guiding souls to the Underworld in his role as psychopomp.

**The goddess Iris**, symbolic of rainbows, also travels widely, acting as a messenger.

#### **Inner Journeys (Growing Up, Finding Oneself)**

Literature for young people, especially older children and young adults, is also interested in what happens to the mind and the character of the protagonist. So many of these narratives are about psychological journeys, and are framed as journeys of maturation. It is probably no coincidence, either, that the traditional Hero's Journey, as mapped by the mythographer Joseph Campbell, building on the work of Carl Jung, has much in common with the coming-of-age narrative, whereby a young protagonist reaches a point of maturation, by overcoming obstacles and learning about his or her place in the world.22 For the most part, the great heroic legends of the ancient world present heroes whose subjectivity is already formed – even though they may make mistakes and learn from them, they do not need to "grow up" in the way that children's narratives present. (This may be one reason why adaptations of myths often find new heroes to work with – authors may unconsciously feel that the Greek heroes are already formed in a way that makes them challenging to present as young adults – see "B is for Beasts" and "M is for Mythical and Magical Beings".)

We can see how the external journey can connect with the inner psyche if we look at contemporary young adult novels, such as Louis Sachar's adventure comedy, *Holes* (1998), in which an unconfident boy named Stanley becomes a hero by enduring the hardships of the land, as well as a situation out of his control (when he is falsely accused of theft, and sent to a detention facility in the desert). As the story begins, Stanley is sad and hopeless, overweight and unfit. But as time progresses, he grows stronger (digging holes in the desert in search of a missing treasure), makes friends with a similarly troubled boy named Zero and teaches him to read and write. When the boys run away together, they help each other cross the desert, and climb a mysterious mountain (named God's

22 Campbell, *The Hero with a Thousand Faces*.

Thumb), where they discover the missing treasure. With each step in their adventure, Stanley grows stronger – physically and mentally; his journey takes him into a new sense of himself, and through his success, he is able to restore his family's lost fortunes and sense of pride.

Barbara Dee's *Halfway Normal* (2017), set in an American junior high school (for students aged between eleven and fourteen), takes its protagonist, Nora, on a different kind of journey. Nora has been very ill, having suffered from leukaemia. She desperately wants to return to normal when she goes back to school, but finds that her friends have moved on, and developed beyond her, and that some of them are afraid of her illness and what it might mean. As she navigates the new social patterns, picking up with old friends, making new ones, and finding her way towards romance with a boy named Griffin, Nora undergoes a journey towards a new sense of normal, one in which she is able to accept her own illness as part of her life. A significant part of that acceptance comes from her class project on the story of Persephone, in which she realizes that Persephone's choice to remain in the Underworld for part of the year is similar to her own need to accept the fact that she has been ill, and that life has changed for her.

Physical and social journeys are important parts of children's literature, because they help dramatize the way that we travel through life, cope with change, embrace opportunity, or overcome threats. A great many stories for young people, especially those for young adults, dramatize aspects of the life journey, with the intention to help readers think about the challenges they may face. Overcoming, and accepting, the difficulties of life are a major part of the literary journey (see "D is for Dealing with Difficult Subjects").

Fantasy novels, such as Margaret Mahy's romantic young adult novel *The Changeover: A Supernatural Romance* (1984), intertwine literal and metaphorical journeys. In this novel, fifteen-year-old Laura Chant undergoes a magic ritual in order to become a witch, and uses her new powers to defeat a creepy man named Carmody Braque who is a *lemur*, a kind of Ancient Roman vampire that feeds on the life force of the very young. In the ritual she undergoes, Laura accepts the help of three witches who live in her neighbourhood in a mansion named *Janua Caeli* ('the doors of the sky'): a crone (Winter), a woman (Winter's daughter, Miryam), and a young man (Miryam's son, Sorenson). The ritual takes Laura on a journey inside her own psyche and heritage: it is a journey into the Underworld of the self, where she travels through a mythical forest of magical beings and of memories.

She was in a forest that was all forests, the forest at the heart of fairy tales, the looking-glass forest where names disappeared, the forests of the night where Carmody Braque devoured tiger cubs, the wood around *Janua Caeli* inhabited by yet another tiger which might have a human face behind its mask, and Laura's own forest, the forest without trees, the subdivision, the city.

Between the straight trunks of the birches, the earth-moving machines lumbered like shadowy, disinterested beasts, a distant supermarket parking lot showed like a little desert of cars. [Her neighbour] Mrs Fangboner, hair newly set, came out from between the ferns and called, "Laura – don't get into dangerous spots. Don't let yourself go." But Laura was already going.23

Laura's journey into the forests of her mind takes her into confrontation with her past – her divorced parents with their conflicting heritages (English and Māori), her life in an uninspiring suburb, babysitting her brother while her mother is at work. Mahy mixes up the magical with the mundane, blending the magic forest with the suburban carpark, and Laura pushes grimly onward with her journey, emerging suddenly into reality, changed over into a witch. Having re-emerged from her interior journey, Laura now has the power to defeat the *lemur* and rescue her brother. Journeys of this kind – which take the traveller into the innermost recesses of their soul, connect with the adolescent novel of maturation, in which a protagonist grows up, literally maturing, or reaches a point of understanding about the world and their place in it. Laura comes into her witchy powers, but also comes into her own as a person, learning about her own sexuality (the novel is subtitled "A Supernatural Romance"), and about her relationships with her mother and her young brother: growing in agency and in responsibility.

#### **Travel Broadens the Mind**

Travel broadens the mind, they say: and this certainly applies to travel in mythological and magical stories and ways of thinking. Be they internal or external travels, they take protagonists on journeys in which they face challenges, overcome trials, fulfil responsibilities, and find themselves. And as they do so, they

23 Margaret Mahy, *The Changeover: A Supernatural Romance*, London: J.M. Dent, 1984, 144.

take readers on journeys, too – into new worlds, and new ways of thinking, being, as well as into the minds and perceptions of others.

#### **Further Reading on Journeys**

Helen Lovatt, *In Search of the Argonauts: The Remarkable History of Jason and the Golden Fleece*, London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2021.

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**K** is for Kidding Around

"I came, I saw, I threw up". Surely not the kind of admission Julius Caesar might make! But in the slapstick world of Gary Northfield's *Julius Zebra: Rumble with the Romans!*, this is mild joking. Reading a funny book is a special kind of experience. Sharing one's fa-

vourite funny books is a special kind of joy. The Ancient Greeks and Romans also enjoyed a joke. The parodic poem *Batrachomyomachia* offers a travesty of the *Iliad*, recasting it with frogs, mice, and crabs. The plays of the great comedy writers Aristophanes and Plautus offer a mixture of ridiculous situations, satirical comedy, slapstick, and puns. The satirists Juvenal and Horace use fierce language and sly wit to point out the follies and vice of Rome. The fourth-century joke book, known as *Philogelos*, or the *Love of Laughter*, collects jokes on subjects ranging from foolish philosophers to wise fools. Here are two examples from *Philogelos*, quoted in *Julius Zebra: Joke Book Jamboree* (2019):

> A young student hears that a crow lives for more than 200 years. So he decided to rear one to find out if it's true!

> A young student asks her mother to lend her a cloak to go down to the country. "I have a cloak to go down to the ankle", she replies. "But I don't have one that reaches as far as the country."1

Ancient jokes do not seem so funny to us now, because contexts change and it is sometimes hard to understand another culture's sense of humour. It is challenging to tell a joke in a new language. But one thing is clear: humour and play are very important parts of the human experience.

#### **Highs and Lows of Humour**

By finding playful ways to approach Classical Antiquity, writers and illustrators of works for children find ways to cross over between cultures. Readers may not have the knowledge to understand the nuances of Horace or Juvenal.  The prolific Usborne informational books highlight this approach

1 Gary Northfield, *Julius Zebra: Joke Book Jamboree*, "Julius Zebra" 5, London: Walker Books, 2019, 9–10.

through guides to Ancient Rome, using funny characters, situations, and stories, such as in Lesley Sims's *A Visitors' Guide to Ancient Rome* (1999). Even more popular and prolific are Terry Deary's "Horrible Histories" (1993–2013), which emphasize slapstick, gross-out humour, and silly names, to draw in young readers. Concealed within that approach is a serious message: history is about ordinary people and experiences as much as about kings and conquerors. Here, for instance, Deary describes what happened when gladiators died in combat:

> It was no use faking a fight. If you were meant to die in the arena the Romans made sure you did. How? Two men came into the arena after your fight. One was dressed in a tight tunic, wore soft leather boots and mask that gave him the nose of a hawk. He carried a big hammer. [He said]: "I am Dis, god of the dead, come to claim this man."

> In front of Dis was another man with wings on his helmet and carrying a red-hot poker. [He said]: "I am Mercury, messenger of the gods."

> Mercury stuck his red-hot poker into you to make sure you weren't just pretending to be dead, then Dis made absolutely sure by smashing you very hard on the forehead. Then slaves came and carried you off on a stretcher. It was a bit like a football match today… at least that very small bit with the stretcher is.2

Using wit, cartoon images, and modern parallels, Deary vividly captures the violence and ruthlessness of Roman life, and its incorporation of mythology as part of the culture's belief – the extraordinary mixed with the ordinary.

This is the democracy of humour: cats can look at kings; children can see that emperors are wearing no clothes. So humorous approaches to Classical Antiquity have an air of bringing something often considered highbrow and elite down to an approachable level. René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo did this regularly in their satirical series of comics, *Asterix* (*Astérix* in French; continued from 2013 by Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad). The series pits a group of Gauls from a small village in the north of France against the might of the Roman Empire, headed by Julius Caesar. The Gauls have a secret weapon – a potion that gives them superhuman strength – this, and their irreverent sense of humour, makes them effective against the regimented military power of the Romans. In *Asterix and the Laurel Wreath* (published in French in 1971 as *Les Lauriers de César*; translated into English in 1974), Chief Vitalstatistix (Abraracourcix

2 Terry Deary, *Ruthless Romans*, ill. Martin Brown, "Horrible Histories", London: Scholastic Children's Books, 2003, 46.

in French) boasts to his annoying brother-in-law that he can get something money cannot buy – a stew seasoned with leaves from Caesar's laurel wreath. A chaotic and very funny plot is set in motion, in which Asterix and his friend Obelix volunteer to retrieve the wreath and infiltrate Caesar's palace by putting themselves up as slaves. In dealing with the mayhem when they are sold to the wrong owner, they are mistaken for assassins, thrown in jail, tried, found guilty and thrown to the lions in the Circus Maximus. There, they plan to use their day of fighting the lions to snatch Caesar's wreath, but on finding that he will not be there, refuse to participate. And so on. Eventually, they manage to persuade Goldendelicius (Garedefréjus), a slave with access, to switch the laurel wreath for one made of parsley, just before Caesar leaves the palace for a triumphal procession through the streets of Rome. The great emperor, looking out over everything he rules, is nevertheless puzzled to feel a bit like a fish (parsley being a traditional French garnish for fish). Something is definitely fishy.3

Comedies like *Asterix and the Laurel Wreath* play the balance between high and low for laughs: the story gives a magnificent send-up of Caesar, normally a formidable figure, famous to this day, studied for generations by historians and students of Roman culture. Despite his power and status, he is outwitted, and made a fool of, by humble villagers in the one corner of France the Roman Empire has not been able to conquer. Such comedies show young readers that ordinary people can have power, and that even in serious situations fun is possible. The *Asterix* series plays continually with the contest between the fearsome Romans and the naughty Gauls, showing the power of individuality, and the power of good fun, through situation comedy, and a host of silly puns.

Punning is common in children's comedies set in the ancient world. They are made easier in English by the fact that the English language has inherited many words from Latin and Greek, and that many Latin names in particular sound like English words that are almost, but not quite the same. Credit must be given to Anthea Bell, the masterful translator (into English) of *Asterix*, who contributes names that play on homophones and jargon: the head of a group of thieves in *Asterix and the Laurel Wreath* is called Habeascorpus; Asterix and Obelix find themselves bought at a slave auction by a man named Osseus Humerus, and his family – Fibula, Tibia, and Metatarsus.4 Young readers may

3 In the original French it is fennel (*fenouil*) rather than parsley that makes up Caesar's wreath.

4 Bell is also picking up on the punning that runs through the French original, where Osseus Humerus is called Claudius Quiquilfus. His wife is called Alpaga Quiquilfus; their daughters remain Fibula and Tibia; the son is Gracchus Quiquilfus.

not immediately recognize the puns on anatomical nomenclature, but they will recognize that jokes are being made, and may be inspired to learn more about Latin and Ancient Rome.

#### **René Goscinny, "The Adventures of Asterix" Series, ill. Albert Uderzo (Continued from 2013 by Jean-Yves Ferri and Didier Conrad)**

For six decades, these comic books have been adored by generations of young readers, and are responsible for inspiring many fans to pursue the study of Latin and Roman history. Originally published in French, the books have been translated into countless languages and adapted for the screen, and as video and board games. There is even a theme park in Plailly, France.

Set in 50 BCE, the books recount the adventures of a village of indomitable Gauls, who resist Roman invasion with the aid of a magic potion that endows them with super strength. The stories feature a host of memorable characters, whose names are often puns on their roles or personalities. The main protagonists are shrewd, compact Asterix (endowed with an enormous moustache) and his oversized best friend, Obelix, whose obsession with wild boar is overshadowed only by his love for his little white dog, Dogmatix (in the English version; in the French he is known as Idéfix). The wordplay of the written text is balanced by the slapstick violence depicted in the illustrations, with plenty of kinghits and concussions. Readers derive enormous satisfaction from seeing the all-powerful Romans consistently brought undone by the underdog Gauls.

#### **Words and Situations**

Working in the *Asterix* tradition is Gary Northfield's series "Julius Zebra" (2015– present; the name is of course a pun on Julius Caesar), a set of illustrated books that make similar puns and plays with what we know, or what we think we know about Ancient Roman culture. In *Julius Zebra: Rumble with the Romans!* (2015), the first of the series, Julius is a dreamy zebra who comes to Rome against his will when he and a group of animals from Africa are captured and taken to the circus. Initially Julius thinks he is going to *see* a circus and is excited, but when he discovers he will be *part* of the circus, he is not so keen. Julius and his friends are thrust into the centre of the Colosseum, and a gang of fierce gladiators attack them. When one of them calls Julius a "stripy horse", however, Julius is enraged, and fights back, winning a reprieve when the Emperor Hadrian decides he is popular enough to live to fight another day:

"WHAT??!" screamed Julius. "That's not a path to fame and glory – that's a path to me getting my head lopped off. I DON'T STAND A CHANCE!!" Julius started sobbing into his hooves.5

Julius and his friends undergo training and are eventually victorious. In this, and in the other volumes, Northfield shows different aspects of life in Rome, especially from the perspective of slaves, gladiators, and animals. He does not shy away from gross-out humour: in the opening of the second volume, *Julius Zebra: Bundle with the Britons!* (2016), Julius is asked by a fan to sign a parchment with a print from his hoof. He gladly obliges, dipping his hoof in what he thinks is mud, before he realizes his mistake: "I don't think that actually was mud", says Julius to his friend Cornelius the warthog, who takes a sniff, and exclaims disgustedly "Peeyoo! And that girl kissed it too!"6 Such comic moments keep the "Julius Zebra" books rollicking along, helped by simple, clear text in which written and drawn elements offer punchlines, slapstick, and occasional pathos. Serious elements occur too: such as the satirical representation of the power-hungry Emperor Hadrian (in *Bundle with the Britons* he is obsessed with the building of his big wall); or the depiction of how Julius and his friends' sympathy for the slaves of Britannia leads them to start a revolution.

Also with a kernel of seriousness at its heart, is Geoffrey McSkimming's series of archaeological adventure stories, "The Cairo Jim Chronicles" (1993– 2011), featuring an archaeologist and poet (Cairo Jim) and his group of friends, Doris the Macaw and Brenda the Wonder Camel. The series is set in the modern day, and the ancient world features in the archaeological sites around the world that the team visits, as part of a society that aims to "protect the past". Their chief adversary, Neptune Flannelbottom Bone, seeks to rule the world by searching out ancient treasures with mystical properties that will enable him to conquer all. As they travel, they connect with different aspects of the classical world. McSkimming skilfully blends information about daily life with ideas about mythology, belief, and the powers beyond. In *Cairo Jim amidst the Petticoats of Artemis* (2000), for example, Jim and the team follow Neptune Bone to Turkey, to the underground cities of Cappadocia, and the small city of Aphrodisias in Anatolia, where a statue of Artemis offers the clues to ultimate power. There, Bone seeks to reunite the petticoats of the statue with a missing belt, known

5 Gary Northfield, *Julius Zebra: Rumble with the Romans!*, "Julius Zebra" 1, Somerville, MA: Candlewick Press, 2015, 115.

6 Gary Northfield, *Julius Zebra: Bundle with the Britons!*, "Julius Zebra" 2, London: Walker Books, 2016, 17.

as the "Belt of Bountaeity". Using a combination of derring-do and good scholarship, Jim and his companions race against Bone to prevent magical objects of the past falling into the wrong hands.

The "Cairo Jim" books are popular for their combination of interesting settings, exciting action, wordplay, and situational humour. Funny names, comic characters, and strange situations are a feature. For instance, here is a scene in which Brenda the Wonder Camel quietly conducts some archaeological research in the Turkish city of Aphrodisias, using her sensitive nose to decipher an inscription:

> She didn't know what that letter would be… maybe a D or a V or a C. Maybe not even one of those. But she knew that once she found a single letter of the type used in the ancient Roman script, then she would probably find other letters. Maybe they would be right next to the first letter she would find, or maybe, if the slab containing the first letter had smashed, the other letters would be on nearby fragments of marble in the grass. If that was the case, then Jim and Doris and she would have an ancient jigsaw puzzle to piece together.

> As her sensitive nostrils moved across the marble, she concentrated – as hard as she had concentrated on anything before – and in her mind she began to see the curves and straight lines that made up the letters of the Latin alphabet.

> Carefully, with her unique Wonder Camel precision of mind, muscle and minutiae, she transferred the images in her head to the muscles of her nostrils.7

In *Cairo Jim at the Crossroads of Orpheus* (2006) we learn that as a calf Brenda swallowed the entire *Encyclopaedia Britannica*. Her knowledge and wisdom, coupled with her psychic powers (whereby she transmits her thoughts to her companions) make her a gentle straight-man (or straight-camel), providing exposition and explanation, and often doing the work while the mayhem continues around her. This scene, in which Brenda snuffles among the ruins of Aphrodisias, displaying the power of good scholarship in archaeological work, is an example of the way that McSkimming incorporates humour and learning.

7 Geoffrey McSkimming, *Cairo Jim amidst the Petticoats of Artemis: A Turkish Tale of Treachery*, "The Cairo Jim Chronicles" 7, Sydney: Hodder Headline, 2000, 130–131.

The playfulness and wit that pervade these books shows how humour and seriousness work alongside one another. They retain an educational seriousness: for the most part ancient and modern elements are clearly marked, and even if young readers might be disappointed to find out that Julius Zebra is not a real gladiator, or if there was not really a "Belt of Bountaeity" in the cult of Artemis, they may be drawn to find out more about the Ancient Romans, and discover equally entertaining and thought-provoking historical facts (see also "S is for Speculation").8

Readers may also learn about myth and the myriad ways that it can be played with, by reading books such as Paul Shipton's *The Pig Scrolls* (2004) and *The Pig Who Saved the World* (2006), which feature Gryllus, one of Odysseus' crew, turned into a pig by the sorceress Circe.9 When the others are turned back to men and leave, Gryllus, who has hidden in the bushes, remains a pig. He is found by a teenage poet named Homer and a brave prophetess called Sibyl, and goes on adventures with them, saving the world both on purpose and accidentally.

Shipton works with the source material of the ancient myths, and highlights how funny parts of them are. Indeed, the original *Odyssey* is full of wit and trickery, including puns, games, and jokes. When Odysseus famously introduces himself to the Cyclops Polyphemus as "Nobody", he not only conceals his true identity, but also plays a clever trick on the dim-witted giant. As he is being blinded, Polyphemus cries out to his fellow Cyclopes, "Nobody is hurting me!",10 thus ensuring that no one comes to his aid. It is a simple joke, one that children and adults alike can find amusing. Odysseus' wooden horse, with which he fools the Trojans into letting the Greeks behind enemy lines, is similarly amusing. But the comic potential of a wooden horse containing soldiers ready to jump out of it and cry "Surprise!" offers considerable fodder for artists and writers alike.

8 Ibidem, 202.

9 For turning Odysseus' crew into swines, see Homer, *Odyssey* 10.233–243.

10 Homer, *Odyssey* 9.408, in Homer, *The Odyssey*, trans. A.T. Murray, vol. 1, "Loeb Classical Library", London and Cambridge, MA: William Heinemann and Harvard University Press, 1946, 331, via the Internet Archive, https://archive.org/details/in.gov.ignca.913/page/n349/mode/2up (accessed 7 April 2022): "My friends, it is Noman that is slaying me by guile and not by force" (ὦ φίλοι, Οὖτίς με κτείνει δόλῳ οὐδὲ βίηφιν).

#### **Midas and the Golden Touch**

*When Dionysus grants Midas a wish, the avaricious king wishes that everything he touches turns to gold. But the gift quickly becomes a curse when he discovers he cannot eat or drink and even transforms his beloved daughter into a golden statue. With its strong fantasy elements and moralistic message, this myth is enormously popular in stories for children of all ages.*

#### *Retelling –* **Jan Mark,** *The Midas Touch***, ill. Juan Wijngaard (1999)**

A lavishly illustrated picture book version of the famous myth, which highlights the sensory delights and horrors of being granted the power to transform things to gold.

*Revision –* **Lynne Reid Banks,** *The Adventures of King Midas***, ill. George Him (1976)**

This chapter book begins with the traditional tale, but introduces witches, magicians, and other fantasy creatures into King Midas' search for a way to transform his daughter, Delia, back.

#### *Adaptation –* **Annie Sullivan,** *A Touch of Gold* **(2018)**

This young adult novel expands the character of Midas' daughter, recounting her swashbuckling adventures with pirates as she seeks to retrieve her father's special golden objects, which have been stolen from him.

#### *Allusion –* **Ryan North,** *The Midas Flesh***, ill. Braden Lamb and Shelli Paroline (2014)**

A graphic novel space-adventure in which the notion of the golden touch is transformed into a weapon that everyone wants to have power over.

Many of the Greek myths are not funny at all, of course. It is hard to laugh at tragic figures, such as Philomela or Daphne, robbed of their futures by vicious men or gods. And children's writers know when to leave well alone, avoiding tragic and brutal stories, and working instead on funny elements in narratives that may seem more sympathetic to young readers. Sometimes this means the Minotaur is transformed from a brutish beast into a cuddly unfortunate. See, for instance, Alexander Matthews and Wilbur Dawbarn's very funny graphic novel, *Useleus: A Greek Oddity* (2017), in which the bumbling hero of the title is mentored by the Minotaur, now "retired from Labyrinth duty". Sometimes this means that Icarus, instead of tumbling into the sea is caught by his inventive father (see Lisl Weil's *King Midas' Secret and Other Follies* [1969]*,* discussed in "E is for Emotions"). Some myths attract funny retellings, such as the tales of King Midas, known for his "golden touch", and for gaining donkey ears when he praises the wrong god in a talent display.11 (Weil shows the humour of a blushing Midas trying out inventive haircuts and headdresses to hide his ears.) The story of the golden touch

11 For Midas' ears, see Ovid, *Metamorphoses* 11.172–193.

has its tragic side, and comes with a moral realization about the nature of value (see, for instance, Nathaniel Hawthorne's influential retelling, in which Midas' daughter, Marygold, is turned to lifeless gold at a crucial moment). But the comic potential of the story is such that many illustrators and writers enjoy showing the different effects of the Midas touch. Rosemary Wells's *Max and Ruby's Midas: Another Greek Myth* (1995) shows a bunny-rabbit Midas figure turning everything he touches into jelly (see "B is for Beasts"); Patrick Skene Catling's *The Chocolate Touch*, illustrated by Mildred Coughlin McNutt (1952), revises the story into a fable about a boy who likes chocolate a bit too much. That they contain clear morals does not hurt these retellings' chances of publications – parents love funny books with messages (and indeed so do children).

Other stories about greed and chaos invoke, allusively, the spectre of Erysichthon, the King of Thessaly, who was inflicted with a hunger so all-consuming that he ended up eating his limbs and body, consuming himself. Don Gillmor and Pierre Pratt present the story as *The Boy Who Ate the World and the Girl Who Saved It* (2008), a picture book in which a boy named Herman is so hungry that he eats the entire world. As he does so, he grows larger and larger, and also more and more lonely. The only thing he has not eaten is a girl named Sarah. When he tells her that he is "stuffed", she jumps into his mouth. He bursts, and the world is restored. Reunited with her dog, Sarah "watched the moon come out, which looked like Herman's face. It was smiling".12 The message of greed and restraint is clear; however, stories like these appeal to young readers, who are learning about boundaries and self-control, but enjoy the idea of doing what they want, and being out of control.

#### **Play and Performance**

*Comedy and drama were essential elements of life in the ancient world, and a number of storytellers have adapted the classical myths into play scripts, often intended for classroom work.*

12 Don Gillmor, *The Boy Who Ate the World and the Girl Who Saved It*, ill. Pierre Pratt, Toronto: North Winds Press, 2008, 28.

#### **Gross-Out, Madcap Myth Books**

*Often written for juvenile boys, these books use slapstick and gross-out humour and funny elements from the ancient world to capture their interest.*

Stella Tarakson's "Hopeless Heroes" (2017–2020) series and John Dougherty's *Zeus* (2004–2011) series of illustrated chapter books offer a different side of mythical comedy and ideas about chaos. This time, the gods are out of control, and serious and careful children are given the task to keep them out of trouble. In "Hopeless Heroes", Tim, a boy whose father has died, finds that the great hero Hercules is trapped in an antique vase in his mother's living room, put there by a plotting Hera, whose dislike for the hero will stop at nothing. Mayhem ensues.  In Dougherty's *Zeus* series, a mild-mannered boy named Alex is startled when a cardboard temple he has made for a school project turns into a portal for the king of the gods, Zeus. True to form, Zeus is hard to handle, being mischievous, bad-mannered, and unruly. As Alex and his friend Charlie solve the problems Zeus sets in motion, they re-enact in the schoolyard different elements of Greek myth, such as the Trojan War, where Charlie smuggles Alex into the school inside a vaulting horse from the gym; or the Labours of Hercules, in which a bully named Eric Lees (a pun on Heracles) is forced by Zeus to carry out a number of tasks. Here, the gods are comic foils to serious children who feel worries and responsibilities. And this leads us to a final point: comedy helps us look at things differently, to see things from different perspectives, to solve problems, by laughter. The great gods and heroes may be great, but just as cats can look at kings, so children can help the gods get home to Olympus, their dignity more or less intact.

**Figure 7:** The *Brick Greek Myths* use witty LEGO depictions to present a comprehensive and entertaining version of the Greek myths. Cover of Amanda Brack, Monica Sweeney, and Becky Thomas, *Brick Greek Myths: The Stories of Heracles, Athena, Pandora, Poseidon, and Other Ancient Heroes of Mount Olympus*, New York, NY: Skyhorse Publishing, 2014. Used with the Publisher's kind permission.

Kidding around offers a way for the smallest of us to bring great things down to size – be they gods, or heroes, or seemingly unsurmountable problems. Punning and parody, slapstick and gross-out humour all have their place in children's literature, allowing laughter to break in. Notably, stories like "Hopeless Heroes" and *Zeus on the Loose* give children a sense of power and agency – not only using humour to help them handle their own difficulties, but also to engage with the classical world.

#### **Further Reading on Kidding Around**

Kerry Mallan, *Laugh Lines: Exploring Humour in Children's Literature*, Newtown: Primary English Teachers Association, 1993.

Julie Cross, *Humor in Contemporary Junior Literature*, London and New York, NY: Routledge, 2010.

**L** is for Labyrinth

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**L** is for Labyrinth

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#### **First, We Must Approach the Maze**

What does a Labyrinth look like? It depends on who is doing the looking – and who is illustrating the famous maze. For some it is rectangular: Gary Northfield's

*Julius Zebra: Grapple with the Greeks!* (2018) presents it on a tattered map, with one corner "chewed off due to stress!": a loosely sketched maze scattered with skeletons ("skellybobs") and eyeballs, "sad" mice, "nice" spiders, an "ordinary" bull, and a Minotaur lurking in the middle, waving his sword.1 For others it is circular: Sara Fanelli's Labyrinth in *Mythological Monsters of Ancient Greece* (2002), "designed by Daedalus",2 showing a doe-eyed Minotaur wrapped, as it were, by layers of walls in a huge circle – suggesting that he is as much trapped as his victims. In Frank Sikalas's *Theseus and the Minotaur: Birth of a Hero* (2017), illustrated by Anna Manolatos, the Labyrinth is figured in blacks and greys, with skulls in various dead-ends, and a blue-and-black Minotaur crouching in its midst. Manolatos's images are accompanied by Sikalas's words, emphasizing the ominous and threatening aspects of the maze and the beast at its centre: as Theseus walks, with the Athenian sacrifices cowering next to him, "the DIRTIER, DARKER, and SMELLIER it got. There was a growling and snoring sound close by".3

But not all Labyrinths are quite so fearsome. In *Greek Myths* (1991), Marcia Williams frames her Labyrinth with golden columns, showing a cartoonish Theseus progressing through a series of "cold, dark passages",4 seen from above like a map, and from within, with cute bats, ghosts, and lizards observing his progress. Each page of Juliet Rix's *A-Maze-Ing Minotaur* (2014), illustrated by Juliet Snape, features maze puzzles and invites readers to play an active role in the adventure: the back cover exhorts readers to "Follow Theseus on his quest, through the Labyrinth, and see if YOU can spot where the Minotaur is lurking, and see if you can follow the thread and help Theseus escape?" Snape is known for her books of mazes, which are set around the world, and the genre is quite popular for young readers: including wipe-clean books that can be traced again and again by small fingers, or with washable markers.

1 Northfield, *Julius Zebra: Grapple with the Greeks!*, 122–123.

2 Sara Fanelli, *Mythological Monsters of Ancient Greece*, London: Walker Books, 2002, 18–19.

3 Frank Sikalas, *Theseus and the Minotaur: Birth of a Hero*, ill. Anna Manolatos, Underwood: Frank Sikalas and In House Publishing, 2017, 23.

4 Marcia Williams, *Greek Myths*, Cambridge, MA: Candlewick, 1991, 28.

Books of labyrinths allow for the fun of getting lost, and finding oneself multiple times, in all sorts of locations. Jan Bajtlik's splendid large-format collection of complicated labyrinths, *Nić Ariadny. Mity i labyrinty* (2018; translated into English as *Greek Myths and Mazes* [2019]) presents the stories of the Greek myths as stages in different labyrinths, suggesting that the myths themselves form a kind of labyrinth of meaning. Its blurb urges readers:

> Find your way through the Labyrinth of Greek mythology! Pick a path through the twists and turns of winding tracks, among gods, heroes, fantastic creatures and extraordinary events… Lose yourself in this book to find yourself in the Greece of thousands of years ago.5

Tracing the epic journeys of Jason and Odysseus, Prometheus and Heracles in this manner, roaming through bestiaries, boats, palaces and amphitheatres, Bajtlik suggests that we all travel through labyrinths, and that far from being places to get lost in, they are a means to travel, to seek and find.

What one finds in the Labyrinth, of course, is the question. In Nick Butterworth's picture book *Percy the Park Keeper: The Secret Path* (1994), a gardener called Percy gets lost in a botanical maze when his small animal friends loosen the string he tied to the entrance. A playful story like this, aimed at very young readers, is less about facing the inner darkness, and more about the delight of a good joke, and readers are encouraged to help Percy find his way out, by tracing his path on a large fold-out map of the labyrinth. Instead of a fearsome beast lurking at the centre of the maze is a pleasant garden, while a cuddly Minotaur statue guards the maze's entrance.

#### **Maze and Puzzle Books**

*The puzzles of mythology (mazes, mythical beasts, games, and contests) inspire writers and readers to play with the stories, ideas, and creatures of the ancient world.*

5 Jan Bajtlik, *Greek Myths and Mazes*, trans. Zosia Krasodomska-Jones, Somerville, MA: Candlewick, 2019 (ed. pr. in Polish 2018).

#### **Meeting the Minotaur**

Most Minotaurs, however, are not cuddly: they are symbols of fierceness and monstrosity. Theseus is brave and strong to take on this terrifying beast, as many retellings emphasize.

*Brick Greek Myths* (2014), by Amanda Brack, Monica Sweeney, and Becky Thomas, shows Asterion, the child of Queen Pasiphae and Poseidon's bull, becoming "wilder and wilder, like his father. He began devouring people, and the people of Crete were afraid for their lives".6 This comprehensive book that uses images of LEGO reconstructions of well-known Greek myths is often surprisingly frank (see also "D is for Dealing with Difficult Subjects", "I is for Being

6 Brack, Sweeney, and Thomas, *Brick Greek Myths*, 114.

**Figure 8:** Frank Sikalas and Anna Manolatos show the fearsome qualities of the Labyrinth. Frank Sikalas, *Theseus and the Minotaur: Birth of a Hero*, ill. Anna Manolatos, Underwood: Frank Sikalas and In House Publishing, 2017, 23–24. Used with the Authors' kind permission.

Informed", "O is for the Olympians"). It takes the Minotaur at face-value, viewing it as a fierce beast, and showing LEGO Theseus braving the Labyrinth, tearing off the sleeping Minotaur's horn, and using it to stab the beast through the heart,7 before the narrative moves briskly on to the next part of the story.

Works like these, which emphasize adventure over introspection, are of course less likely to explore the Minotaur's inner workings. Rick Riordan's "Percy Jackson and the Olympians" (2005–2009) series of young adult adventure-fantasy novels recasts many of the Greek myths in a loose retelling

7 Ibidem, 118.

of the Perseiad. The books feature a Brooklyn teenager named Percy Jackson, who discovers he is a son of the god Poseidon, and joins in a battle against the forces of darkness. In the early stages of *The Lightning Thief* (2005; the first novel in the series) Percy encounters the Minotaur in Brooklyn. It attacks Percy's mother, dissolving her in a shower of gold. Enraged, Percy fights what he refers to as the "bull-man", tearing off one of the Minotaur's horns:

> Rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got both hands around one horn and I pulled backwards with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then – *snap*!

> The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife.8

This Minotaur "only had one gear: forward",9 and when he charges and Percy stabs him with his horn, he roars in agony, and disintegrates "like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind".10 Percy, of course, is a reincarnation of Perseus, not Theseus, but, in discovering he is part of the world of the Olympians, he finds himself facing monsters from various myth cycles. He later learns that the Minotaur is not dead: "Monsters don't die, Percy. They can be killed. But they don't die", explains his friend Annabeth (herself a child of Athena).11

In Riordan's work, mythical beings' primal power can be seen in the way they can re-form and be faced again and again. Despite his terrifying qualities, this Minotaur is not the worst monster Percy can face: as part of a series structure that pits the "good" forces of the Olympians against the "bad" forces of the Titans, this Minotaur is merely a servant of the dark, not a force of darkness himself. Another such Minotaur appears in Myke Bartlett's young adult novel *Fire in the Sea* (2012) set in Perth, Western Australia.

He might have made an imposing statue with his thick legs cast from bronze. Every muscle was clearly sculpted, from the broad biceps to his calves. Sparse hair embellished his weight-lifter's chest. A heavy, rusted lock hung from a chain around his neck. His feet were bare and blackened, the skin thick and crusted, and long, dark nails curled from his gnarled hands. Still, nobody was looking at his hands. All eyes were on the matted fur of his head, the exposed and bloodied teeth, and the horns. The head of a bull, the body of a man, the teeth of a lion.12

Despite his ferocity, this Minotaur is an unwilling henchman: a slave in fact, whom the novel's heroine, Sadie, liberates during the novel's denouement. Looking deep into the beast's eyes, Sadie sees the suffering soul inside, and she loosens his chains and allows him to slip away.

For Bartlett, the Minotaur's monstrosity masks something deeper: interior feelings and consciousness making the beast a tragic, as well as a fearsome and grotesque, being, hinting at reflection about the viciousness of slavery, and encouraging a sense of empathy for this creature who is the monstrous result of others' actions. In general, the novel emphasizes emotions and personal growth: Sadie's ability to feel empathy for the Minotaur is an important part of her development. This approach is generally important in young adult novels, and can be seen in their treatment of the Minotaur myth. David Elliott's verse novel *Bull* (2017) delivers the story of the Cretan tragedy through a series of dramatic monologues, spoken by the key players (Poseidon, King Minos, Queen Pasiphae, Theseus, Ariadne, Daedalus, and Asterion, that is, the Minotaur). Many of these players find themselves trapped in impossible situations: Pasiphae goes mad; Ariadne betrays her brother by giving Theseus the thread to the Labyrinth; Daedalus is filled with revulsion at King Minos' demands. Asterion in particular is the greatest victim of the Labyrinth: trapped within the design executed by Daedalus to the King's instructions, seeking deliverance, he is killed by a jeering Theseus. Asterion faces his fate bravely: his final words a reproach to the story that has trapped him:

> HELL… … is not the pushing of a boulder up a mountainside to watch it roll

12 Myke Bartlett, *Fire in the Sea*, Melbourne: Text Publishing, 2012, 107.

back with broken back and broken shoulder. HELL is the numbing of the soul. HELL is not an unfulfilled desire. It's colder. Nor the thirst that takes its victims whole.  Who chooses to be monstrous? What does it mean to be a monster, and what does it mean to be locked away, to function as a figure of fear and torment, and in turn to be tormented? Furthermore, who decides what is monstrous? The parallels with the casual cruelties of life and society are myriad, and invoke all sorts of reflections on winning and losing, and on good and bad deeds. For Elliott, Asterion/Minotaur is entirely a victim. A similar approach can be seen in Jennifer Cook's young adult romance, *Ariadne: The Maiden and the Minotaur* (2004) set in "the time scholars of Classical Studies refer to as Ancient Greece. Actually it was way before that, in a time that the scholars are still struggling to give a name to, apart from the terribly vague but romantic-sounding 'Mythical Greece'".14 Here, the Minotaur is not half man, half bull, but a deformed child, the product of Pasiphae's affair with Pistrades, a priest of Dionysus. King Minos is enraged and ashamed. He traps the boy (known as "Taurus") in a fearsome Labyrinth, designed with mechanisms that kill all other entrants. It is the Labyrinth, not the bull, that is monstrous, but a disoriented Theseus loses Ariadne's thread and confused by the Labyrinth kills the innocent child instead of helping him. (In this version, Ariadne is only too happy to be left on Naxos by Theseus, as she is able to reunite with her true love interest, a young acolyte of Dionysus named Pleides, who has tried to help protect Taurus, and live a quiet life in a fishing village.) Even more than in *Bull*, Taurus is an innocent victim of adult drama: his mother's infidelity; his father's jealousy and pride; Theseus' brash overconfidence; even Ariadne's attempts to help. Perhaps this resonates with

13 David Elliott, *Bull: A Novel*, Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2017, 167–169.

14 Jennifer Cook, *Ariadne: The Maiden and the Minotaur*, Melbourne: Lothian Books, 2004, 7.

the idea, common in children's literature, that children often suffer because of adult mistakes (to varying degrees).

This idea has much resonance, of course, and connects interestingly to non-classical situations. For example, writer-artist-composer Matt Ottley explores this idea further in *Requiem for a Beast* (2007), a multimedia exploration of the Australian treatment of the Aborigines by European settlers. Here, the Minotaur is an innocent animal: a magnificent Brahman bull, one that has evaded muster for many years. It is rounded up and killed by the novel's protagonist, an unnamed boy in his late teens who has run away from his problems in the city and is now working as a cowboy in the Australian Outback. As the boy confronts the bull, he also confronts his memories of his childhood and teenage years, memories that connect with his own father's shame (at complicity in the death of a young Aboriginal boy), and the Australian national shame at its treatment of the Aborigines. The Minotaur figures in the boy's mind as a symbol of his own depression – caused partly by his father's shame, and by his own spiralling into drug-use and cheating. In full-page illustrations, the Minotaur towers in cloud formations, and looms in the boy's dreams, until he faces the "beast" in real time, in the form of the bull, whom he chases into a labyrinth-like ravine, where it falls and injures itself. The boy then has to perform a mercy killing of the unfortunate beast, a killing that enables him to grow up, and to shed some of the intergenerational bad faith that has haunted him.

The Labyrinth of *Requiem for a Beast* is the Australian landscape, and its history, which Ottley depicts in mythological terms: connecting men on horseback (cowboys or soldiers from the settler era) with the idea of the centaur, a vicious creature neither human nor animal. He further connects the hybridity of such beasts with the hybridity of adolescence – lost in the labyrinth of emotions, the boy feels as if he himself is transforming into a horrifying monster. It is only when he faces the bull, and also when he faces the sins of the past, and acknowledges them on behalf of his culture, that he is able to begin healing, helped by an Aboriginal Ariadne – an old woman (and the ghost of her past childhood), who unlocks his memories with the thread of her words.

*Requiem for a Beast* is an unusually rich application of the Labyrinth myth, and its socio-political emphasis, combined with its vivid images, hymn cycle (connecting the *Dies irae* with songs from the Bundjalung People of Northern New South Wales), and multiple modes of storytelling (monologue, memoir, graphic novel), demands a concentrated and deep engagement. Indeed, it is a kind of crossover text, one that appeals to audiences of varying ages – perhaps evoking a Labyrinth of meanings.

#### **Many Kinds of Minotaurs**

*Minotaurs appear in comedies, tragedies, novels, cartoons, and picture books, each time slightly differently. Sometimes they are fierce, sometimes they are cuddly, sometimes they are simply misunderstood.*

#### **Theseus and Ariadne**

*Theseus travels to Crete as part of the annual tribute to the Minotaur. Aided by the princess Ariadne, he navigates the Labyrinth to defeat the bull-headed monster.  This powerful story is one of the most retold of the Greek myths, raising questions about courage, fear, betrayal, and what it means to be a hero or a monster.*

#### *Retelling –* **Robert Byrd,** *The Hero and the Minotaur: The Fantastic Adventures of Theseus* **(2005)**

A detailed, lavishly illustrated retelling of Theseus' exploits, which incorporates his backstory and other heroic deeds.

#### *Revision –* **Jennifer Cook,** *Ariadne: The Maiden and the Minotaur* **(2004)**

This first-person narrative for young adults encourages readers to question the traditional heroes and villains of the famous myth, highlighting a strong emotional connection between Ariadne and her half-brother, Taurus.

#### *Adaptation –* **David Elliott,** *Bull* **(2017)**

Written for a young adult audience, and recounted in the ambitious form of a verse novel, *Bull* presents the perspectives of the multiple players in this famous mythic saga.

#### *Allusion –* **Margaret Mahy,** *The Tricksters* **(1986)**

A young adult novel about ghostly visitors to a New Zealand summer house, who reveal the metaphorical minotaurs at the heart of the family that holiday there.

#### **Finding Our Way Out Again**

Even when the hero gets out of the Labyrinth, those meanings remain complicated and require navigation. In some ways, Theseus is a simple hero: he has one job; he does it effectively, and he returns in a kind of triumph. In other ways, he is more complicated. He needs help to do that job – receiving it from Ariadne, the daughter of his enemy, King Minos. He rewards her by helping her flee her father's kingdom, but promptly abandons her on the island of Naxos. He returns home in triumph, but forgets to change the sails on his boat to let his father know that he has survived, and this error causes his father to kill himself in despair. Perhaps chastened by the knowledge of his carelessness, Theseus becomes a wise and temperate king.

This tension between the simple and the complex, which marks the Labyrinth and the Minotaur, thus carries over to Theseus, and many retellings and adaptations reveal their writers' mixed feelings about this hero whose flaws reveal at the least a lack of sensitivity. Some writers, such as Robert Byrd in *The Hero and the Minotaur: The Fantastic Adventures of Theseus* (2005), attempt to explain Theseus' actions. In his version, Dionysus follows Ariadne to Naxos, and Theseus feels he has no choice but to leave her with the god. So exhausted and troubled is he by this and his recent encounter with the Minotaur, that he forgets to change the sails, and is devastated by his father's death. Marcia Williams in *Greek Myths* (1991) explains Theseus' actions as pragmatic: "Theseus, unwilling to marry his enemy's daughter, left her sleeping on the sand".15 For other writers, such as Geraldine McCaughrean, Theseus is more than a little vapid and "ungrateful".

> Just then, Ariadne came and sat at his feet, gazing up at him. "How wonderful!" she sighed. "To be free of my wicked father and to be married to a brave prince!"

> "Married?" said Theseus, turning rather pale. He suddenly realised that just because Ariadne had saved his life, she expected to marry him! He studied her face. That nose was *very* big. And those eyebrows were *very* thick. "Mmmm", he said. "How wonderful".16

Theseus hastily drops Ariadne off at an island to get supplies, and sets sail while she is buying bread and wine. "He was in such a hurry to get away that he

15 Williams, *Greek Myths*, 29.

16 McCaughrean, *The Orchard Book of Greek Myths*, 65.

quite forgot to change the black sail for a white one".17 And McCaughrean is not alone in finding Theseus to be vain and selfish. In David Elliott's *Bull*, Theseus is a muscular braggart, who delights in tormenting Asterion before killing him.  You, princess, should be the bride of a god":19

> Ariadne listened in wonder to this speech. The tears dried on her cheeks as she basked in the radiance of the immortal who offered her his love. Theseus, whom she'd loved and risked all for, was gone. He cared nothing for her. But Dionysus had recognized her worth. She did not notice the arrow that Eros shot into her heart, but when Dionysus held out his hand to her, she stepped forward and took it.20

Margaret Mahy's *The Tricksters* (1986), a young adult novel that draws on ancient myths to comment on modern family situations, shows a contemporary Ariadne, a teenage girl named Harry (Ariadne) Hamilton, who confronts the metaphorical Minotaur in her family: the secrets and lies surrounding her father's infidelity, and the child resulting from it. This strange work of magical realism draws on the Minotaur myth to explore the way that trouble and shame can hide and fester. As Harry, who wants to be a writer, explores the labyrinth of emotions lurking in her family, finally forcing a confrontation that reveals all, she grows up, transitioning from Harry to Ariadne, the girl whose perceptions act as a clew to the maze. Theseus does not appear in this novel, but the writer Ovid does, in the form of a sinister ghost who is haunting the Hamiltons (along with his brothers, Felix and Hadfield), and Harry finds herself in competition with Ovid to uncover the secrets (or write them?) safely. If the baby from her father's affair is a kind of Minotaur, it is a harmless one: what is harmful is the desire to hide the truth and to bury emotions, which metamorphose and become destructive. *The Tricksters* suggests that in offering the clew, or clue, or key to the labyrinth, Ariadne is heroic and powerful – and in this version of the story she is not abandoned, making love with Felix before he disappears with his brothers, and reuniting her relieved family. The clew to the symbolic

17 Ibidem.

18 Ann Turnbull, *Greek Myths*, ill. Sarah Young, London: Walker Books, 2010, 64.

19 Ibidem, 67.

20 Ibidem, 67–68.

labyrinth – in this case, the labyrinth of a family with secrets – can only be wielded by someone with the right measure of sensitivity and determination: in this case, a modern Ariadne.

#### **Archaeological Adventures in Knossos**

*Archaeological sites provide inspiration for all kinds of adventures. The Cretan palace of Knossos is one example of a site that appears in a number of children's books.*

#### **Getting Lost, and Getting Found**

It sometimes seems as if the Labyrinth is at the heart of all the myths and stories we are thinking about in this project. It is a journey, a puzzle, a katabasis. It is a battle, a love story gone wrong. It is a symbol of family shame and family pride. It is the result of catastrophic mix-ups in royal houses; a symbol of entanglement and interconnectedness (like the myths that surround it). It goes round and round, and down, down, down into the dark, where dangers lurk. When you go into a Labyrinth you are in danger of getting lost forever, of losing your life, of losing your identity, but also of becoming something new – a hero or a villain or a terrible monster. No one comes out of a Labyrinth entirely the way they went in.

This all sounds rather fanciful. But consider the Labyrinth's role: in the story of the great creator Daedalus, and his son, Icarus, its connection to the wicked but wounded King Minos, his wife Pasiphae and her tragic son, the half-man, half-bull Asterion, to say nothing of Poseidon, the god who instigated some of the tragedies of the Cretan story, and Theseus the Athenian prince whose actions resolved much of the tangle but set off other disasters. It starts to seem as if much of Greek myth is a huge, interconnected Labyrinth, and as if the Labyrinth is almost as alive as the people and monsters who walk between its walls.

To put it another way: the Labyrinth lurks at the centre of a whirl of stories, whose connections all lead to this: a lone hero, braving the darkness to conquer a beast that lurks within. And its solution is also absurdly simple – a thread to trace his path and find the way out again. Even though the hero faces the Labyrinth alone, he gladly receives help at crucial moments.

The power of the Labyrinth reaches beyond the myths, having resonance as a psychological symbol. Dreams, emotions and past experiences can be labyrinthine, causing the individual to become lost in a multitude of confused and confusing feelings and memories. But treading the path of the Labyrinth can also be akin to the soul's journey towards self-understanding and authenticity. Meditative labyrinths provide winding paths for solace and reflection as we tread their lines. We can also enter the Labyrinth to escape the self – seeking thrills and confusion at amusement parks and public gardens.

We can find labyrinths everywhere we go – in shopping malls or busy streets, in forests or even in libraries, which offer seemingly ordered but confusing winding paths. We can get lost in those libraries, seeking meaning and clarity, but finding only intrigue and distraction – even more so if we open the books – all texts are labyrinthine too, interlaced with meaning and allusion, each leading to another, taking us in directions we had not intended, leading us perhaps to the Minotaur of self-doubt, or shame, fear, or loss, or confusion. The Minotaur eats humans, but perhaps they are already chewed up by their time in the Labyrinth.

The meanings and metaphors of the Labyrinth story are many and various, and as we have said, approaching it feels like an invitation to being lost. In children's books, the act of being lost is a necessary precursor to finding oneself again: doing what the story tells us to, or finding one's way out once more. In "J is for Journeys", we discussed the idea of the home–away–home journey, in which a protagonist ventures out from familiar territory in search of adventure before returning. The Labyrinth story is a version of that pattern, though one in which the journey is darkly interior. But the essential elements of the story (hero, beast, maze, helper) can be found in many stories, in many different ways, showing a profound influence over literature – for children and for adults.

#### **Further Reading on the Labyrinth**

**M** is for Mythical and Magical Beings

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**M** is for Mythical and Magical Beings

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**M** is for Mythical and Magical Beings

Sarah Fanelli's lively picture book *Mythological Monsters of Ancient Greece* (2002) promises a dramatic experience for the reader who is brave enough to enter its pages: "Watch out for their huge teeth. / Beware their many heads. / Count their eyes. / Imagine their

powers… if you DARE!"1 Fanelli depicts fourteen monsters: Argus, Medusa, Pegasus, Sirens, Harpies, Scylla, Cyclops, Minotaur, Cerberus, Centaurs, Satyrs, Hydra, Sphinx, and Echidna – possibly the best-known of the Ancient Greek mythological bestiary, certainly some of the most exciting. Fanelli's presentation is likewise exciting, using collage, sketching, painting, doodles, and snippets of text in quirky fonts to give short, fragmentary summaries of each beast's story, and to highlight its signature characteristics.  Scylla, "The SEA-Monster with the UGLY temper who GOBBLED up all the SAILORS who dared to sail past her",3 has curiously elegant shoes on some of her twelve feet, and a list is provided that numbers her many appendages: "12 feet, 6 heads, 6 necks, 6 mouths (each with 3 rows of teeth)".4 They are creepy and slightly worrying monsters, even Pegasus, normally an endearing figure, is a hybrid of beast and machine, with a propeller for a tale, and wings made out of sheet music.

How attractive these monsters may be to children is unclear: in some ways this picture book seems more likely to appeal to older readers, who already know something about mythology, and might appreciate the way Fanelli plays around with ideas about the figures.5 Indeed, Fanelli strikingly deconstructs the idea of monstrosity, using an array of styles and *trompe l'oeil* trickery to reveal

1 Fanelli, *Mythological Monsters*, 5.

2 Ibidem, 6.

3 Ibidem, 15.

4 Ibidem, 14.

5 See Barbara Weinrich's analysis of Fanelli in "The Metanarrative of Picture Books: 'Reading' Greek Myth for (and to) Children", in Lisa Maurice, ed., *The Reception of Ancient Greece and Rome in Children's Literature: Heroes and Eagles*, "Metaforms: Studies in the Reception of Classical Antiquity" 6, Leiden and Boston, MA: Brill, 2015, 85–104.

that the mythological beings of Ancient Greece are fascinating because of their strange components: their many legs and oddly placed eyes, their teeth, their heads, their roaring and devouring mouths, their eating habits, their extreme strangeness. These are not cute and cuddly monsters, but in the way that each is taken out of its story, and considered as part of a group, they are collectible and countable. Fanelli ends with a summary of each figure, and with questions that could reinforce a child's learning: "Who needs 12 socks?" "Who needs 9 scarves?" "Who likes honey cakes?" "Who sings sweetly to sailors?"6 All of the questions are written on a page resembling a school notebook, suggesting a play on the traditional "educational" qualities of how children are encouraged to approach myth and the ancient world.

#### **Mythological Monsters**

*The strange and scary creatures of classical mythology appear in many collections, which highlight their fearsome aspects but also their magical qualities and their beauty. Often, they are lavishly illustrated, allowing illustrators free play in imagining what these creatures may look like.*

John Harris and Mark Todd take a similar approach in *My Monster Notebook* (2011): a similar postmodern pastiche that presents itself as a teenager's notebook about mythology, with drawings and notes, collage and found objects, emphasizing the strange and humorous aspects of the monsters. "Hello, my name is HORROR" is the name tag accompanying the faceless images of the Graeae, who shared between them only one eye and one tooth.7 A sign saying

6 Fanelli, *Mythological Monsters*, 25.

7 John Harris, *My Monster Notebook*, ill. Mark Todd, Los Angeles, CA: Getty Publications, 2011, 30.

"Do not remove, thanks" points to the plug in the giant automaton Talos' ankle (which releases the ichor that animates it).8 The fictional student who owns this notebook seems to find the creatures' strangeness amusing, and through the book's sardonic humour, Harris and Todd may be encouraging the "reluctant" reader: the child who is forced to read about topics that adults have decided are good for them, and who may (will) enjoy subverting and challenging their tasks (this is an approach that has worked well for Terry Deary, whose "Horrible Histories" (1993–2013) are written with the aim of subversion – see "I is for Being Informed" and "K is for Kidding Around").

#### **Monstrous Ladies – Harpies**

*Harpies are savage and mischievous bird-women, known to torment and tease their victims. Sometimes these victims deserve it, as for example King Phineus of Thrace, who blinded his own sons. Zeus punished him with visitations of Harpies who stole his food, or rendered it uneatable. During their voyage to acquire the Golden Fleece, Jason and his team of Argonauts rid Phineus of the Harpies, when the sons of the wind god Boreas best them in a flying competition.*

8 Ibidem, 33.

Despite their signature features (the wings of Pegasus, the snakes of Medusa's hair, the horns of the Minotaur), no one really knows what the monsters of the ancient world look like, and so they offer a delightful challenge to illustrators interested in depicting them, who take a huge range of approaches to their work. They can be lushly beautiful: in *Mythological Creatures: A Classical Bestiary. Tales of Strange Beings, Fabulous Creatures, Fearsome Beasts, and Hideous Monsters from Ancient Greek Mythology* (2008) Lynn Curlee presents each figure as a carefully framed emblem, seen at twilight or sunset, with lush, bright-colour palettes and polished representations. A simple retelling accompanies each image, and the tone of the whole book (visually and verbally) encourages readers to take a reflective, lingering approach. Rather than relishing the strange and funny details of the myths, here the ancient world, with its monstrous or magical figures, is beautiful, but also violent and sometimes tragic. The presentation, for example, of the Cyclops Polyphemus shows him holding two of Odysseus' soldiers in his hands, blood streaming down his wrists, his mouth open in what could be a snarl, but could also be a howl of sadness. Such lapidarian depictions of the myths, which freeze key players in stylized positions, emphasize the monumentality, influence, and repeated resonance of the stories, which offer succinct introductions to the tales.

Mythical beings can be cute: in their board book *Little Master Homer: The Odyssey. A Monsters Primer!* (2017), Jennifer Adams and Alison Oliver introduce the monsters to extremely young readers. They reduce the story to only a few of the beings Odysseus encountered: a dreaming Calypso, clothed in purple – "I keep Odysseus here with me, since I saved him from the wine dark sea", she says.9 A pale-pink Ino, the sea nymph, offers Odysseus a kelp-green veil to protect himself.10 Pink, blue, and green Lotus Eaters are cuddly monsters munching on flowers – "Nom nom" says one as it stuffs the flowers into its mouth.11 Perhaps the most endearing-looking of the group is a languid coralcoloured Cyclops, leaning on an elbow while he reads *The Joy of Cooking Humans*, and two cuddly sheep rest on his outstretched legs.12 Again, though this book is attractive, its strongest impact in terms of classical knowledge is likely upon the grown-ups who know the myths and delight in passing on their knowledge to their babies. But as Sonya Nevin notes, its multicoloured and inclusive

9 Jennifer Adams, *Little Master Homer: The Odyssey. A Monsters Primer!*, ill. Alison Oliver, "BabyLit Primers", Layton, UT: Gibbs Smith, 2017, 1.

10 Ibidem, 3–4.

11 Ibidem, 5.

12 Ibidem, 7–8.

#### **M** is for Mythical and Magical Beings

approach, featuring characters of different ethnicities and backgrounds (a Gypsy soothsayer, Telemus, for instance, closes the book by gazing into his crystal ball and saying "I told you all these things would come to pass"13), encourages a sense that the stories are open to many cultures, and it offers babies a familiarity with magical beings from the very cradle.14

**Figure 9:** A friendly Cyclops – or is he? From Jennifer Adams and Alison Oliver's board book for babies. Jennifer Adams, *Little Master Homer: The Odyssey. A Monsters Primer!*, ill. Alison Oliver, Layton, UT: Gibbs Smith, 2017, 7–8. Used with the Publisher's kind permission.

Mythical monsters can also be grotesque: as in the works of Fanelli and Harris and Todd. They can be fearsome: see, for instance, Selene Nicolaides's hyper-real monsters in *Gods, Heroes and Monsters: Discover the Wonders of the Ancient Greek Myths* (2016), massive creatures that dominate the heroes who fight them, and loom very large on the page. Emphasizing their size and splendour is key, here: and illustrators enjoy taking the opportunity to depict figures in lavish detail – see, for example, Christina Balit's imposing illustrations for the *National Geographic*'s *Treasury of Greek Mythology* (written by Donna Jo Napoli; 2011).

13 Ibidem, 20.

14 Sonya Nevin, "Entry on: *Little Master Homer. The Odyssey* by Jennifer Adams", peer-reviewed by Susan Deacy and Elżbieta Olechowska, *Our Mythical Childhood Survey*, Warsaw: University of Warsaw, 2018, http://www.omc.obta.al.uw.edu.pl/myth-survey/item/323 (accessed 17 November 2021).

#### **Collecting and Caring**

How well collections of myths introduce these beings to young readers is open to debate: perhaps the point is that many of the mythical monsters and magical beings that populate ancient stories are so generally known that introduction is not always necessary. Instead, writers and illustrators work with a familiar set of icons and signature features, enabling them to experiment and play. This is especially the case in texts where magical beings feature "en masse", as it were: as part of collections and series. As with the Olympians, mythical creatures are highly "collectible", and appeal to young readers for that very purpose – like superheroes, they have powers, strengths, abilities, and key attributes which can be listed and counted, or even looked after and cherished.

#### **J.K. Rowling's Mythical Beasts in the** *Harry Potter* **Series and** *Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them*

In creating the world of the *Harry Potter* novels, J.K. Rowling draws on many mythical and folkloric traditions. Creatures from Greek myth live alongside English elves and Scottish boggarts. *Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them* provides a guide to the mythical creatures of her world. Some come from recognized tradition, and some have been created by Rowling. The volume purports to be written by a great scholar of "fantastic beasts", Godric Grindelwald, friend of Harry's headmaster, Albus Dumbledore. Spin-off volumes like this are common in fantasy literature, especially that which creates alternative worlds or belief systems. They are presented as if they are accurate documents providing guidance to the fictional worlds, and are popular with fans eager for more information about the worlds of their favourite stories.

In the *Harry Potter* series, mythical creatures are part of the framework of the "wizarding" world that Harry finds himself a part of. They range from the beautiful to the deadly. Harry and his friends learn to fly a hippogriff, an attractive flying horse with the head of a griffin. They fight the deadly basilisk, a giant snake that lives beneath the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And they take counsel from mysterious mythical creatures, such as the centaurs, whom Harry meets in the forest near the school. The centaurs, who are both wise and fierce, offer a mythical perspective on the contest between light and dark that Harry is a part of: as ancient beings, they have seen it all before, and can read the signs of the upcoming battle. Rowling draws her mythical creatures from classical sources, and also from post-classical tradition (hippogriffs, for instance, are a Renaissance invention, attributed to Ludovico Ariosto, combining the attractions of the flying horse with the fierce qualities of the griffin).

#### **Fantastic Flying, Fishy, and Furry Friends**

*Some mythical beings seem tailor-made for friendship.*

**Pegasus** – The singular flying horse, born from the blood of Medusa, becomes a cuddly best friend, with a taste for mischief and – sometimes – a sweet tooth.

**Sirens/Mermaids** – Part of a long heritage of Siren myths that go back to the classical world, mermaids can be frightening, but they can also be alluring. Mermaid stories often involve exploring and curiosity – about the world and about the self.

**Centaurs** – Centaurs can be violent and fierce, but they can also be wise guardians and guides.

Fantasy novels, such as Lucy Coats's "Beasts of Olympus" series (2015– 2018), appeal to the collecting and nurturing instinct among children, offering stories that can themselves be collected. In *Beast Keeper* (2015), the first of the series, Coats's hero, Demon, a son of Pan, looks after the "Stables of the Gods", and finds that looking after the mythical creatures is more work than expected. Coats is sympathetic to otherwise fearsome monsters, who need to be cured and cared for after heroes such as Heracles have done with them, using a magical box of cures provided by Hephaestus, helping the Nemean Lion to regrow its skin, dropping medicine into the Stymphalian Birds' beaks, to help them regrow their feathers, restarting the Cretan Bull's internal fire, and becoming increasingly infuriated with Heracles:

> "If that Heracles comes anywhere near my beasts again, I *will* stab him," he said. "Even if he does have muscles like tree roots."

> "You're all right for a half-god human, really, Pan's scrawny kid," the griffin said to him. "At least you do seem to hate that horrible Heracles as much as we do."15

Stories like *Beast Keeper* promote a message of looking after, rather than killing, the otherwise fierce mythical beasts that heroes normally fight. And this message of caring pervades much children's literature: perhaps because a major rule of the field is that heroes should only fight beings that deserve their enmity. Especially in works for younger children, an association with animals (see "B is for Beasts") carries over in treatments of magical beings.

#### **Pals with Pegasus**

Some magical creatures seem ready-made to be friends with kids. The purewhite winged horse, Pegasus, is a prime example: offering a singularly beautiful dream of animal companionship. And while there is only *one* Pegasus in Greek mythology,16 in children's adaptations there are many variations, from the ridiculous to the sublime. In *The Legend of Kevin: A Roly-Poly Flying Pony Adventure* by Philip Reeve and Sarah McIntyre (2018), the titular flying pony Kevin is blown out of his nest into the town of Bumbleford, and helps his new friend

15 Lucy Coats, *Beast Keeper*, "Beasts of Olympus" 1, ill. David Roberts, London: Piccadilly Press, 2015, 62.

16 For Pegasus' birth, see Hesiod, *Theogony* 280–283.

Max (who looks after him and feeds him biscuits) to save the town from a terrible flood. Sally Sutton's "Miniwings" (2017–2018) chapter books about a group of winged-horse toys that come to life when grown-ups are not around, feature mischievous creatures with names like Moonlight and Oceana, who take their owners Clara and Sophia on a series of "heartwarming and hilarious glitter-twinkly adventures", as the books' blurbs announce.

There is a long tradition, in children's literature, of stories about girls and their horses, and Pegasus stories fit neatly into the pattern of the "pony book", featuring themes of friendship, caring, loyalty, and adventure. Kallie George's "Wings of Olympus" series (2019–2020) are aimed at readers aged eight and up, and feature the adventures of a foundling named Pippa, who is the only mortal chosen to ride in a magical winged-horse race on the slopes of Mount Olympus. With her steed, an undersized Pegasus named Zephyr, Pippa has to learn how to race, and to work for success in an academy full of petty rivalries and feuds, the two proving together that "love is greater than might".

For slightly older readers is Kate O'Hearn's fantasy series "Pegasus" (2013– 2017). In the first of the series, *The Flame of Olympus* (2013, ed. pr. 2011), thirteen-year-old Emily discovers that the real Pegasus has crash-landed on the roof of her Manhattan apartment, and becomes involved in a cosmic battle between the Roman gods and a race of four-armed stone warriors called the Nirads. Pegasus (or "Pegs", as Emily calls him) is a glowing-white winged stallion, who has come to Manhattan to find her. Emily, who is grieving the recent death of her mother, takes care of the wounded creature, applying ointment and feeding him ice cream as the closest substitute for ambrosia she can find. She shares an instant bond with Pegasus:

> "It's really you, isn't it?" she whispered softly as she fearlessly stroked the soft muzzle. "You're Pegasus, aren't you? I mean the really real Pegasus." The stallion seemed to pause for a moment. Then he nudged her hand, inviting another stroke. In that one rain-drenched instant, Emily felt her world changing.

Forever.17

Emily, it turns out, is the "heart of living flame" of the cult of Vesta: her flame has been dimmed by grief over the recent death of her mother, meaning that Olympus is vulnerable to invasion by the forces of darkness. With help from her friend Joel, who knows a lot about ancient myth, she keeps Pegasus safe

17 Kate O'Hearn, *The Flame of Olympus*, "Pegasus" 1, New York, NY: Aladdin, 2013, 30.

from the Nirads and from a sinister government agency that is looking to exploit Pegs's magical powers. A sub-theme of this action-packed story is the treatment of animals: in one scene, Emily and Joel (joined by the goddess Diana, who has come to find Pegasus), release a group of abused carriage horses, and the novel includes reflections on the tragedy of cruelty to animals. (Later volumes of this series further develop the theme of slavery – the Nirads turn out to be a benevolent race, unfortunately under the control of the Gorgons Euryale and Stheno.) As in many versions of the myth, O'Hearn's Pegs is a wise, brave, and noble creature, driven by good instincts, and drawn to Emily by an understanding that she is not only the chosen one, but also has a good heart. Magical beings like Pegs, then, have all sorts of interesting abilities, such as intuition and strength – and of course his ability to fly is key among them. And what is most striking about Pegasus, especially the noble versions that are closest to the mythical origins, is his combination of goodness and beauty.

#### **Monstrous Feminine: Medusa the Mean Girl and More**

At the other extreme is Pegasus' mother: the Gorgon Medusa.  Perhaps the message is one of hope: that beauty can spring even from the most horrific of places and stories. As Stephen Fry comments in *Heroes: Mortals and Monsters, Quests and Adventures* (2018), "something so transcendentally beautiful [was] born of something so appallingly foul".18 But Medusa, routinely described as horrifying, vicious, or foul, was initially a beautiful young woman, until the events that led to her transformation to a Gorgon. According to Ovid, she was seduced by Poseidon in Athena's temple: the goddess, angered that her sacred site was defiled,19 turned her into a monster.

Medusa is known for her horrifying appearance: her hair made of snakes; her basilisk stare that turns those who meet it into stone. She seems to symbolize fear itself (in contrast with her children: Pegasus, who symbolizes joy and beauty, and Chrysaor, who wields a golden sword and becomes the king of Iberia). Mythical beings, then, can function at different ends of the symbolic spectrum.

18 Stephen Fry, *Heroes: Mortals and Monsters, Quests and Adventures*, London: Michael Joseph, 2018, 34.

19 For this version of the myth, see Ovid, *Metamorphoses* 4.794–801.

Though she may be horrifying, Medusa is one of the most vividly popular of the mythical beings. Instantly recognizable, fun to draw and write about, with terrifying and pitiable characteristics and a backstory that encourages more sympathetic rewritings, Medusa's story fits into a variety of scripts, especially about women's roles: from mean girl, to monster, to victim. In school stories, such as Joan Holub and Suzanne Williams's "Goddess Girls" (2010–present) series of mythological school stories for young readers, she is the "mean girl": snarky, petty, aggressive, and competitive, who makes the kids around her uncomfortable. Ross Collins's coming-of-age story *Medusa Jones* (2008) takes further the idea of bullying at school, showing a teenage Medusa suffering from bullying by the nasty "Champions" at her school, until she and her friends (known collectively as the "Freaks") prove their worth by saving the Champions during a storm. In contrast, Neal Shusterman's romantic horror novel *Dread Locks* (2005) presents Medusa as a powerful figure – an ancient being who relishes her power, and who seduces the novel's protagonist, Parker, into becoming a Gorgon like her.

Some find Medusa beautiful, such as the Poseidon depicted in Donna Jo Napoli's *Treasury of Greek Mythology* (ill. Christina Balit; 2011). Her Poseidon is weary of the chaos of war between the Olympians and the Titans, and glad when his brother Zeus gives him dominion over the seas. Enjoying roaming the seas, aiming to help the vulnerable as an "antidote" to the war, he is drawn to Medusa:

> Poseidon found her mortality that much more alluring. She was vulnerable. How amazing to know someone vulnerable. He put his arms out and let the serpents of her hair swarm around them. Good! Those serpents could bite and poison – good protection. He gingerly touched the wings that jutted from her shoulder blades. Good good! Those wings could carry her far from an attacker. He stroked her scales. Ah, very good indeed! They were harder than armor. And most assuring of all, she had a special power: Anything mortal that looked directly at her face would turn instantly to stone. That should do it. And so Poseidon felt almost safe in loving Medusa.20

No word on whether Medusa felt safe loving Poseidon! This early romance does not prevent Medusa losing her head by the sword of Perseus, who does not find her at all attractive:

20 Napoli, *Treasury of Greek Mythology*, 44.

Never had he imagined such ugliness. Their serpent hair curled around them, making their whole bodies seem scaly. Long sharp porcine tusks protruded from their lower jaws. Gold wings sprouted from their backs, and their hands were bronze. The god Poseidon called Medusa his jewel, yet how he could bear being near her was beyond Perseus.21

This Perseus seems less to be staring into the face of fear, than to be eliminating an unpleasant pest, using the shield of Athena to protect him from Medusa's petrifying gaze.

Napoli captures the dualism of Medusa – expressed through beauty and danger, through emotional need and revulsion, but she remains here essentially mysterious – viewed through others' eyes. Those writers who attempt to explore the interiority of this monstrous being, find other ways to engage.

Marilyn Singer's book of "reverso" poems, *Echo Echo: Reverso Poems about Greek Myths* (ill. Josée Masse; 2015), in which the same lines can be read differently backwards and forwards, captures Medusa's dual quality:22

Making the point that there are "two sides to every story" (cover note, *Echo Echo*), Singer points to an essential dualism running through the myths: and indeed, the myths revel in the paradoxical qualities of the gods, heroes, and monsters. Perhaps with the exception of "good" figures like Pegasus, very few of the mythical and magical beings are entirely consistent – embodying contradiction.

21 Ibidem, 131.

22 Singer, *Echo Echo*, 20.

This means that myths like that of Medusa invite many different interpretations – and some writers go back for more, as in Holub and Williams, whose extensive "Goddess Girls" series (currently at twenty-seven volumes) explore the pantheon. In *Medusa the Mean* (2012), readers are given insight into Medusa, who in previous stories has functioned as the archetypal "mean girl". Holub and Williams show her to be a lonely outsider figure, whose meanness comes from defensiveness, and who feels isolated and unworthy at Mount Olympus Academy. Amusing touches, such as the naughty snakes in her hair, which make faces at Medusa's antagonists, and shoplift when she goes shopping, symbolize her rebelliousness, and also the difficulty of subjugating one's personality to fit in.

Overall, the sheer variety and number of mythical and magical beings mean that they offer fertile ground for writers playing with the concepts they offer. Taken as a whole, they provide a wide range of ideas to think about – ideas of collecting, of variety, of monstrosity, and of beauty. Taken singly, these ideas are focused through concepts close to the heart of young readers – adventure, coming of age, and finding oneself. The Medusa myth in particular offers us a mirror for thinking about what frightens us, but also offers us ways to think about what frightens us about ourselves. If we looked at ourselves in Athena's shield, what might we find that could be frightening? And would that shield help us look at our fearsome qualities close up? Mythical beings can be marvellous or monstrous. As Jeffrey Jerome Cohen suggests, they stand at the crossroads of desire and revulsion.23 If we want to know a culture, we may know it by its ideas about beauty and about danger. And children's texts are part of a culture. There may be more to it still: in teaching children about monstrosity and beauty, children's texts teach them what to admire and aspire to, and what to avoid – both as external objects, and as internal objects. Monsters can be warded off, but also welcomed in.

#### **Further Reading on Mythical and Magical Beings**

Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, ed., *Monster Theory: Reading Culture*, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1996.

Debra Mitts-Smith, *Picturing the Wolf in Children's Literature*, London: Taylor & Francis, 2010. Liz Gloyn, *Tracking Classical Monsters in Popular Culture*, London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2019.

23 Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, "Monster Culture (Seven Theses)", in Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, ed., *Monster Theory: Reading Culture*, Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1996, 4.

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**N** is for Nature

**N** is for Nature

In *Fish Girl* (2017), a graphic novel by illustrator David Wiesner and writer Donna Jo Napoli, a pre-teen mermaid is held captive in an old building on the shorefront of a seaside town. Her captor is a fisherman who found her in his net when she was a baby; sensing a financial opportunity, he has put her on display in a large tank, where she lives with fish, and a friendly octopus. Posing

as Neptune for the tourists who come to see the show, he introduces her as the greatest of a collection of marvels:

> Here you'll find specimens from the farthest corners of the earth. Strange beasts from the deepest darkest depths, where no human has ventured – but where I, Neptune, travel with ease! Creatures that are fearsome!… beautiful!… grotesque! Creatures to amaze and delight child and adult alike! […] Nowhere else will you see such extraordinary sights. Only here at Ocean Wonders! And yet, as incredible as these denizens of the deep are, one transcends them all… the Fish Girl!1

The mermaid's job is to flit around the tank, just enough out of sight that visitors cannot be sure if she is really a mermaid, or only a side-show of the kind common in holiday towns. It is a lonely life. Fish Girl, who does not speak until the end of the story, is alone in her tank with the fish, and her best friend, an orange octopus. She dreams of being friends with the children who come to see her. And when she accidentally reveals herself to Livia, a girl her own age, who names her Mira, and becomes friends with her, the desire to break free grows stronger. She discovers how to get out of the tank, finds that when she is in the air her tail transforms into legs, and she is able to leave the building at night to visit the nearby carnival. Eventually, the sea destroys the tank-building in a mighty storm and takes back all its creatures, all except Mira the mermaid, who stays on the land and becomes part of Livia's family. In order to have a human family, however, Mira has to leave behind her Fish Girl self, and turn her back on the sea. Does this suggest that to be human, one has to leave behind one's natural self? Are humanity and nature compatible, or at odds?

1 David Wiesner and Donna Jo Napoli, *Fish Girl*, New York, NY: Clarion Books, 2017, 4–6.

We might think so, especially where Poseidon is concerned. The fierce god of the oceans, protector of sea creatures, was the very embodiment of wild nature for the Ancient Greeks. Poseidon's ancient battle with the goddess Athena suggests an ongoing tussle between human civilization and the forces of nature, both of which have to be appeased, and to co-exist. This uneasy balance makes itself felt in a great deal of children's books. It is likely not a coincidence that Mira, the mermaid of *Fish Girl*, appears to be on the cusp of puberty; her transition from natural child to mature member of society is a common focus in children's books.

#### **Children as Part of Nature**

Thinking about nature in children's books reveals the power and fragility of the world we inhabit. It also reveals our connections with, and disruptions from, nature. Indeed, children remind us that we are part of nature; as they (we) grow, however, they become more allied with society. Famous picture books, such as Maurice Sendak's *Where the Wild Things Are* (1963), show this dichotomy through a fantasy in which a naughty boy, sent to bed without supper, dreams himself (or finds a way to go) into a place where the "wild things are".  He wants to go home to where "someone loved him best of all", back to the safe (but confining) comfort of his bedroom, where his supper is waiting for him "and it was still hot".2 Classical mythology does not much feature in *Where the Wild Things Are*, though one wild thing looks a little like a Minotaur. But the story's elemental force is important, for it shows how children (in books and in life) feel both like part of nature, and separate from it. Max, the little boy of the story, is wild, but he also needs to grow up to be part of human society, represented by the walls of his bedroom, and by his mother's cooking. This is a dichotomy explored again and again by children's writers: J.M. Barrie's *Peter Pan* (1906, 1911, 1928), for instance, lives in his own kind of place where the "wild things" are – the forested island of Neverland, a place of eternal childhood, set apart from the society that forces most children to grow up, and to take their places in appointed roles.

The joyful qualities of *Where the Wild Things Are* come from the fun of seeing a child fully at play, finding his way to a (fantasy) natural space, before

2 Maurice Sendak, *Where the Wild Things Are*, New York, NY: Harper & Row, 1963, 37.

willingly returning to civilization. Such ideas are as ancient as the myths. Peter Pan is a child version of the nature god, Pan, protector of small animals and shepherds, who rules over a natural fantasy-space called Arcadia, a place not unlike idealized visions of childhood, away from urban society, and away from the pressures of linear time. The concept of Arcadia, which draws on the poetry of the Arcadian region of Greece, dominates pastoral literature (fiction, poetry, drama) – in which the action is set in a pleasant natural space, where humans and animals live in harmony. Many famous children's fantasy stories exploit this idea, most notably Kenneth Grahame's *The Wind in the Willows* (1908), a story about animals who are more or less civilized, living in a pastoral space (see also "C is for Childhood"). Presiding over them, not always noticed, is Pan, who symbolizes the power of Nature, and the call of the wild. The animal protagonists, being adults, do not always heed the call, but occasionally venture into Pan's spaces, as for instance when Portly Otter, the youngest of Otter's brood, goes missing, and Ratty and Mole spend the night rowing on the river looking for him. At dawn, they hear the call of Nature, and find the baby otter curled up, asleep, at the foot of the great god, Pan. Here, we see Mole witnessing Pan's power:

> Trembling he obeyed, and raised his humble head; and then, in that utter clearness of the imminent dawn, while Nature, flushed with fulness of incredible colour, seemed to hold her breath for the event, he looked in the very eyes of the Friend and Helper; saw the backward sweep of the curved horns, gleaming in the growing daylight; saw the stern, hooked nose between the kindly eyes that were looking down on them humorously, while the bearded mouth broke into a half-smile at the corners; saw the rippling muscles on the arm that lay across the broad chest, the long supple hand still holding the pan-pipes only just fallen away from the parted lips; saw the splendid curves of the shaggy limbs disposed in majestic ease on the sward; saw, last of all, nestling between his very hooves, sleeping soundly in entire peace and contentment, the little, round, podgy, childish form of the baby otter. All this he saw, for one moment breathless and intense, vivid on the morning sky; and still, as he looked, he lived; and still, as he lived, he wondered.3

This quasi-ecstatic response to the power of nature is typical of literature written around the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, which offsets Arcadian and pastoral concepts of nature against concerns about industrialization

3 Grahame, *The Annotated Wind in the Willows*, 174–177.

and the rat race. As *Where the Wild Things Are* shows, these approaches continue into contemporary children's literature – and continue thinking about how to balance the idea of the child as part of nature, and the child as part of civilization.

#### **Pan**

*Son of Hermes, the nature god Pan has the hindquarters and horns of a goat. The god of the shepherds and flocks, he is credited with the invention of the panpipes and associated with wild, rustic music and moments of panic. He often appears in literature that reflects on the nature of childhood, and children's association with nature.*

#### *Retelling –* **Mordicai Gerstein,** *I Am Pan!* **(2016)**

A colourful, entertaining introduction to the chaotic figure of Pan, bringing together his various appearances in mythology.

#### *Revision –* **Donna Jo Napoli,** *The Great God Pan* **(2003)**

Pan is cast as the hero of this young adult novel, which attempts to fill some of the gaps in the mythic record and brings together the goat-legged god with Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon.

#### *Allusion –* **Ellen Booraem,** *The Unnameables* **(2008)**

A dystopian young adult novel, set in an isolated utilitarian community, and featuring a horned-headed Goatman who wreaks havoc for the artistic protagonist, Medford Runyuin.

Pan appears in children's stories in different guises – perhaps most notably as a Pied Piper figure, whose appeal to children is seen as a threat to adults. Sophie Masson has shown how this figure appears in Australian children's books – Joan Lindsay's *Picnic at Hanging Rock* (1967), Ursula Dubosarsky's *The Golden Day* (2011), Christopher Koch's *The Doubleman* (1985): in these works, she argues, Pan is responsible for drawing children away from home and into the wild.4 While children may understand his allure, adults find it frightening, just as nature is both beautiful and deadly. Like all the gods, Pan has a duality – his kindness can turn to menace, his fun-loving qualities can go over the top, as Mordicai Gerstein shows in his lively picture book

4 Sophie Masson, "Fairy Tale Transformation: The Pied Piper Theme in Australian Fiction", *M/C Journal* 19.4 (2016), https://doi.org/10.5204/mcj.1116.

#### **N** is for Nature

*I Am Pan!* (2016). Depicted in bright colours, and shimmering lines, Gerstein's Pan explains his story, gives a tour of Arcadia, and leaps about so much that it is clear he is a figure who is hard to pin down. Some versions of the King Midas myth show Pan, or his alter ego Dionysus, visiting the greedy king and giving him the dubious power of turning all he touches to gold – an act so unnatural that it is of course a punishment rather than a boon. It is better to keep on Pan's good side, just as it is better to keep on Nature's good side. As we discuss in "B is for Beasts", keeping on Pan's good side involves looking after his animals – for instance, Lucy Coats's "Beasts of Olympus" series (2015–2018) shows Pan's son, Demon, taking a job caring for the magical animals damaged by the heroes of mythology, in a series that suggests writers are increasingly concerned with animal welfare, and also dubious about the powers and wisdom of the gods.