Published April 1, 2022 | Version v1
Book chapter Open

New Hope for Old Stories: Yiyun Li's Gilgamesh and Ali Smith's Antigone

  • 1. University of Pennsylvania, USA
  • 2. Haverford College, USA

Contributors

  • 1. Faculty of "Artes Liberales", University of Warsaw, Poland

Description

Myth may be a source of hope for children and young adults, but children may themselves be envisioned as myth’s best hope: fresh readers whose engagement with stories grants those stories continuing life. This hope is at the heart of the “Save the Story” series, in which noted authors rewrite literary works for children. Two books in the series retell ancient myths: Yiyun Li’s The Story of Gilgamesh and Ali Smith’s The Story of Antigone. Both writers produce stories they hope will help their readers grow into admirable adults. Li recasts Gilgamesh as a child, his journey glossed as progress towards adult understanding; Smith uses animal intermediaries and flashes of irreverence to temper a story she presents as terrible yet nourishing.  Their hope is that readers will so value stories that have made them who they are that they will in turn perpetuate those stories, keeping them safe from oblivion.

Notes

Book chapter in the volume: Katarzyna Marciniak, ed., Our Mythical Hope: The Ancient Myths as Medicine for Hardships of Life in Children's and Young Adults' Culture, in the series "Our Mythical Childhood", Warsaw: University of Warsaw Press, 2021, 836 pp. Open Access https://www.wuw.pl/product-eng-16830-Our-Mythical-Hope-The-Ancient-Myths-as-Medicine-for-the-Hardships-of-Life-in-Childrens-and-Young-Adults-Culture-PDF.html This project has received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under grant agreement No 681202 (2016–2022), Our Mythical Childhood... The Reception of Classical Antiquity in Children's and Young Adults' Culture in Response to Regional and Global Challenges, ERC Consolidator Grant led by Katarzyna Marciniak. Project's Website: www.omc.obta.al.uw.edu.pl. The publication is licensed under (CC BY 3.0 PL) (full license available at: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/pl/legalcode).

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SMurnaghan and DHRoberts NEW HOPE FOR OLD STORIES YIYUN LIs.pdf

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Additional details

Funding

OurMythicalChildhood – Our Mythical Childhood... The Reception of Classical Antiquity in Children’s and Young Adults’ Culture in Response to Regional and Global Challenges 681202
European Commission