T White

1 month ago | fivebooks.com | Colm Toibin |Madeline Miller |John Gardner |T White

What is the appeal of mythological retellings, as a reader and as a writer? For both a reader and a writer, the plot is not the point. We know that Iphigenia is going to be sacrificed; we know that the Greeks are going to win the war in Troy; we know that Clytemnestra is going to kill Agamemnon. So the point, and the reason these stories have survived, is that these are modern retellings. These are modern interpretations. Obviously, our age has different interests than previous ages.