Six Myths of Our Time

Even among great feminists with their critical theory, it is still hard to find someone who touches those corners of literature and pop-culture and inverts their underlying message with brilliant ideas you couldn't think of randomly. Warner looks at The KingKong movie in a way that no one might have imagined in the late 20th century and she deconstructs all the accepted myths and looks at them differently. Her mastery in mythology brings us the details of stories she presents, and their adaptation in today's visual and pop culture, which leads to the suggestions she is trying to imply and ofcourse, without sentimental projection. I have to confess that some chapters, like the Island Race wasn't an easy read for me, however, the whole experience of this reading was absolutely worth it. She almost delves into different issues such as children via literature and fairy-tales, women and she-beasts of Jurassic Park and how they are presented to meet the needs of a male look, how the nationalist idealism can end up with vengeance and racist illusionaries, etc. Warner was the second woman who had a chance to participate in Reith lectures of BBC those times, which she stated frankly at the beginning of the lectures.
I put one excerpt from the book, chapter 4, “Cannibal Tales, The Hunger for Conquest”

“Cannibalism helped to justify the presence of the invader, the settler, the trader, bringing civilisation. The centre has to draw outlines to give itself definition. The city has need of the barbarians to know what it is. The self needs the other to establish a sense of integral identity. If my enemies are like me, how can I go on feeling enmity against them? Cannibalism is used to define the alien but actually mirrors the speaker.”

She also has greater words and references in the first chapters where she talks about the contemporary ideas on women and female-ness. Can't focus enough on how this book is a must read and precious source for anyone who is following today's pop-culture and has a bit of taste for pop-culture myths, movies, and games.