Title of the work
Country of the First Edition
Country/countries of popularity
Original Language
First Edition Date
First Edition Details
Shlomo Abbas, Meitav Sipurei Hamitologia l’Yeladim. Hod Hsharon: Agur Publishing, 1997, 100 pp.
Genre
Illustrated works
Instructional and educational works
Myths
Short stories
Target Audience
Children
Cover
We are still trying to obtain permission for posting the original cover.
Author of the Entry:
Ayelet Peer, Bar-Ilan University, ayelet.peer@gmail.com
Peer-reviewer of the Entry:
Lisa Maurice, Bar-Ilan University, mauril68@gmail.com
Elzbieta Olechowska, University of Warsaw, elzbieta.olechowska@gmail.com
Picture taken from the author’s website (accessed: July 5, 2018), courtesy of Araian Abbas.
Shlomo Abbas
, b. 1948
(Author)
Shlomo Abbas is one of the leading and most prolific children’s authors in Israel. He wrote and edited about 170 books. He was born in Nesher, in the northern of Israel and later moved to Jerusalem. He studied anthropology at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Beside his original literary contributions, Shlomo travels the world in order to gather local tales from different countries. He collected and edited many volumes of fairy tales and fables, local and from around the world, like the fables of the brothers Grim and Greek mythology.
Sources:
Official website (accessed: July 5, 2018).
Profile at the library.osu.edu (accessed: July 5, 2018).
Bio prepared by Ayelet Peer, Bar-Ilan University, ayelet.peer@gmail.com
Danny Kerman (Illustrator)
Danny Kerman is an Israeli illustrator and satirist. He illustrated in newspapers and in children’s books. He won numerous awards and also taught in several colleges in Israel.
Source:
Official website (accessed: September 25, 2018).
Bio prepared by Ayelet Peer, Bar-Ilan University, ayelet.peer@gmail.com
Summary
This book is a collection of several stories from Greek Mythology, including illustrations. The stories are specially adapted to young children. This volume is a part of the "exemplary literature" (“sifrut mofet”) series, which aims to reveal, to the young Israeli reader, various stories from the pinnacle of local and world literature. This series also aims to encourage reading in children from the third to the fifth class. Thus the stories are specifically adapted and written in a manner that would be suitable for young children.
Analysis
The collected stories emphasize moral themes, for example, the stories of King Midas and his donkey ears, Pandora's box, Oedipus and the Sphinx and others. Each story has a moral lesson the readers can learn. As Maurice (2016) 325 states, Abas' "love is more for storytelling in general than mythology itself, and the stories and style are in keeping with this."*
* Maurice, Lisa, “Greek Mythology in Israeli Children’s Literature,” in Katarzyna Marciniak, ed., Our Mythical Childhood... The Classics and Literature for Children and Young Adults, Leiden: Brill, 2016.
Further Reading
Maurice, Lisa, "Greek Mythology in Israeli Children's Literature", in Katarzyna Marciniak, ed., Our Mythical Childhood... The Classics and Literature for Children and Young Adults, Leiden: Brill, 2016, 307–332.
