Gods & Men

“The crags of Olympus stand silent and bare, scoured by the icy winds. The halls of the gods are as if they had never been.” This sequel to ‘The Gods of Olympus’ takes the reader from the birth of mankind to the passing of the ancient religion of the Greeks. Names and events which have become a part of the western world’s identity are brought to vivid life in these pages: how Prometheus brought the gift of fire to men; the tale of Pandora’s box; the story behind ‘the Midas touch’; the boy on the dolphin; the origin of ‘tantalize’; the sad end of Icarus, who literally burnt his wings; how the Peloponnese came by its name and Europa gave hers to a continent. Here are love’s labours lost in the tragic myth of Orpheus and his Eurydice, and love lent wings in the story which has given us our ‘halcyon days’. The gods of the Greeks may have vanished in the mists of time, yet their legacy lives on undimmed.

Menelaos Stephanides