“Mythographer was suggested by the man who made my website, actually. I do write a lot about myth and I do feel it's a bit pompous to state it that way, but it does distinguish me from other writers. When it was first on the web, people began to use it in an ironical and satirical way. Now, however, people tend to use it straight.” PeopleMenWayFeelsWritingFirstsDoeMadeStatesUseBitsHe ManMythWebsiteSatiricalPompous Author:Marina Warner
“I have always argued that we can't live by or be made to exist outside of mythology, and that every group and nation has, possibly unacknowledged to themselves, some myths by which they live. It remains important to revisit them, understand them and possibly retell them - or at least own up to them - and then it becomes possible to move something. If it's obscure or invisible to you, you can't budge those understandings.” IfsMadeImportantMovingNationsUnderstandingGroupsRemainsMythMythologyInvisibleLive ByObscure Author:Marina Warner
“For example, John Law's Mississippi Company venture printed shares, and the money had gone up in smoke when it had been inscribed objects. The inscription made it magic and changed its meaning. That's how objects become charmed in The Arabian Nights, and they are often originally ordinary objects. The carpet is an ordinary, paltry object. The lamp is a rusty old lamp, and the bottles jinns are imprisoned within are old bottles. They are changed by the magic and the jinn's presence, and the jinn's presence is often embodied in the seal or inscription.” MadeLawNightCompanyGoneMagicShareExampleObjectsChangedOrdinaryMade ItSmokeBottlesVentureLampsCarpetPrintedSealsMississippiCharmedInscriptionsArabianJinnArabian Nights Author:Marina Warner
“I think that a true economics thinker or a Marxist thinker would make nonsense of my argument, although I have given massive seminars and no one has demolished it so far. I did think that this idea from an artisanal and trading perception of the auratic quality of goods when they are given character and inscription, made the stories of phantasmic wealth read more powerfully in the 18th and 19th centuries than the stories of Cinderella's wealth, because they are conjured out of nothing by these magic means.” ThinkingMeanMadeIdeasCharacterStoriesGivenWealthQualityMagicCenturyPerceptionEconomicsArgumentNonsenseMassiveGoodsThinkerTrading19th CenturyMarxistInscriptionsSeminars Author:Marina Warner
“Creating simplicity often makes the heart leap; order has been restored, the crooked made straight. But order is understanding that things cannot be made simple, that complexity reigns and must be accepted.” HeartHas BeensMadeOrderUnderstandingSimpleCreatingSimplicityAcceptedComplexityLeapReignCrooked Book:Joan of Arc: The Image of Female Heroism Source: Joan of Arc: The Image of Female Heroism