M is for Mythology
Here is a topic that is sometimes hotly debated, on which I can argue both sides effectively! In consulting with families and facilitating community around Ms. Mason’s ideas – I have found that this is one of the places where families may hold very different convictions.
As with any area pertaining to the raising of children, the role of the parent is sacred, and the nudges the Holy Spirit gives a parent are supreme, even if they can’t be articulated with words and reason. There is a quote from Middlemarch that I love, “We must not inquire too curiously into motives. Ms. Brooke knows that they are apt to become feeble in the utterance: the aroma is mixed with grosser air. We must keep the germinating grain away from light.” Sometimes, we as parents have reasons that shouldn’t require utterance, and that is that. About various topics I certainly have mine, and you are entitled to yours.
But since Charlotte Mason recommended mythology as part of a well-rounded curriculum - and since I have seen fit to follow her advice, I would like to offer an apologetic as to why.
I will begin by telling you that mythology is something I grew into. In the early years, this was not a region I found worthy of our time. My reasons were partly temperament; I tend to be a biography/ non-fiction kind of person, and to me, myths seemed a little silly and pointless, mingled with a slight apprehension about the appropriateness of reading false stories about pagan gods and their doings to my young children.
About the time my youngest was in 4th grade – I had a change of heart, probably the combination of two elements. One, I was teaching High School English to a wide range of students and saw first-hand the disadvantage of the students who were not familiar with the classic myths. Second, my own wide reading around theology and apologetics had put me into contact with some of the great defenders and articulators of the Christian faith – who also had a curious interest in mythology!
In teaching what I considered “valuable” literature I began to see that much of it was predicated upon an understanding, or at least acquaintance with, mythology. These seemingly ridiculous stories about this and that form an underpinning of thought that cannot be compensated for. Robin Finley goes so far as to say that the entire body of Western Literature rests on a 3-legged stool: one leg being Greek & Roman Myth, one being the Arthurian Legends, and the third the King James Bible. They may seem strange bedfellows, but we don’t make the rules; we simply seek to understand things as they are.
The fact is that much of classic and modern literature, reference, and lecture are lost if you don’t have all three as context. It would seem that mythology, as simple and frivolous as it sometimes seems, forms a significant portion of the alphabet required for reading Western thought.
At our house, education isn’t a thing to be done but a state to enter – and we enter together. And so, as my kids cycled through history and scientific dilemmas, I was beside them reading at my own level. Thus, after some years of wide reading around church history, I began to find that the authors who were the clearest, the most compelling, and the most articulate in their clarifications and defense of the Christian faith were also the authors who understood mythology the best. And shock of shocks – still valued it!
My apprehension with some of these myths was that they would somehow cloud the spiritual waters for my children and confuse them about what was true and what was false. On the contrary, I have found there to be a clarifying element in layering the readings of mythology alongside the reading of The Living Word of God. It is almost as if the one shines a light on the other – and only truth can hold up to that sort of scrutiny. The authors who wrote the most lucidly about pivotal elements of the faith seemed to have benefitted from this relief effect.
For these two reasons, we dove in. No one argued me into it. I was perfectly fine ignoring Ms. Mason’s encouragement on this point, but something about the real-life testimony of these two events was the nudge I needed.
My kids never thought that they were real. I didn’t have to critique them or “point the moral” or use them as some sort of contrast. I simply let them read them, gave them space to genuinely enjoy them and out popped all sorts of interesting conversations and connections and comparisons that wouldn’t have been prompted otherwise. One of my daughters made a 3x3 family tree of the Greek Gods to track who was who. (Something that I will admit struck me at the time as amazingly pointless when you could map your own family tree, the Kings of England, or… anything else real!!) And we still have it to this day!
I can’t tell you how many references in books and movies my kids pique at because they know the mythology in them! And now, when they read those great Christian apologists, they are right there with them. They understand the pieces placed and then carved away so that the truth stands out.
Mythology may or may not be for your family, and your insight into your own born persons trumps anyone’s insistence and any aspect of child-rearing. I didn’t think mythology was for us for a time - but in hindsight I see the wisdom of Ms. Mason’s inclusion of it. She grasped a panorama that I couldn’t see at the time. And though I eventually caught up in time to catch the view – precious moments, and I am sure connections, were lost.
So, what is your stance on mythology? I recommend we take Ms. Mason’s advice—shake out some of the ideas around this topic and hear all sides. She encourages us not to take up easy “catch phrases” or “ready-made” views but to hold definite, well-thought-out opinions while being mindful to hold them loosely. (Definite because they will be our own, and loosely because they are, after all, only opinions.) The links below will help with this.
Sara Timothy 2024
For Further Reading in the Volumes:
Most of Mason’s mentioning of mythology was under literature: AO Topical CM Series
For Further Learning:
Episode 60: Why Read Pagan Myths – The Literary Life
Editor’s Corner Picks (These are extra items we use in our own homes):
A Wonder Book for Girls and Boys
Bulfinch's Greek and Roman Mythology
D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths
D'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths
Mythos *used senior year
Prose Edda *used senior year