Our Mythical Nature: The Classics and Environmental Issues in Children’s and Young Adults’ Culture

The volume presents the results of one stage of the programme “Our Mythical Childhood”, supported by an ERC Consolidator Grant. It tackles the reception of the motif of Nature through the filter of Classical Antiquity in regard to a variety of themes featuring in children’s and young adults’ culture: the myth of the Golden Age, the idealized landscapes of the motherland, the role of encounters with Nature in education, Nature in difficult clashes with history, the mythologized landscapes of other parts of the world as interpreted through the classical code, mythological constellations, transformations of human beings into plants and animals, natural disasters, ecological utopias and dystopias, as well as the contemporary ecological crisis as reflected in the mirror of mythology. The international team of scholars approaches these themes from the perspective of diverse disciplines, genres and cultural backgrounds, thus providing engaging reading for academics active in various research fields, for students and a wide audience.

Keywords: nature, ecology, ancient Greece, ancient Rome, children’s and young adults’ culture, classical reception studies, classical antiquity, children’s and young adults’ literature, coming of age, mythology