ABSTRACT
By the early nineteenth century, Romantic writers were celebrating and co-opting myths from all over the globe, partly in a reaction against Enlightenment disdain for non-rational thought, partly in search of an alternative to more repressive forms of Christianity, and mainly out of pure enjoyment of the sensuous and exotic. This chapter presents the analysis on several of the most productive modern ways of thinking about Classical myths. It discusses two forms of continuity overarching the centuries: the view of myths as symbolic; and the notion that they have something to say about society. The major gain which Freudian psychology offers for the study of myth lies in the detailed analogy drawn between myth and dream as processes. Structuralism was a key inspiration for the work of the so-called Paris School, a group of scholars studying ancient myth in the 1970s and 1980s.
