The Greek God

[big_cane_sugar]

Ares and Aphrodite always seemed a better pairing than Mars and Venus. Mars and Venus are kind of boring, but Ares is a legit badass and Aphrodite is a hot mess.

 

[SouthernCrossfire]

I studied the Greek gods when I was younger and know a lot of the tales, but most Lit readers aren't going to know more than the basics, if that. Be careful if you try to get too deep into the weeds because you risk turning readers off.

For lit writers and readers, Eros, the god of love and desire, is most important.

I agree and have used Eros and the Amorini in my 2021 Valentine's Contest story. Cupid/Eros had two types of arrows, one for love and one for aversion, but readers didn't accept the important part that aversion played in my story, despite the reference information in the notes. Some also complained it was in the Romance category rather than Sci-Fi/Fantasy, despite being in a modern setting where Eros and the Amorini still existed in the corporate world.

 

[NaughteeDragon]

To address the original question, American readers can be assumed to have a very basic knowledge since Greek mythology is intrinsic to our cultural and philosophical history. Expecting anyone to be able to pull out specific knowledge (who are Perseus’ parents, what is the relation between any two gods, etc) is a stretch. If specific knowledge is important to your story, include it, but don’t go unnecessarily deep.

 

[SimonDoom]

Is anybody else bothered by the fact that the Disney movie used the Roman name Hercules but the Greek name Zeus for his dad?

 

[storyteller92]

I've been thinking of writing something using a Greek god, goddess, or several of them. But my ideas aren't working well yet.

Give it time. Some of the best ideas take a little breather

 

[TheRedChamber]

Is anybody else bothered by the fact that the Disney movie used the Roman name Hercules but the Greek name Zeus for his dad?

No, I haven't seen the movie and theres a million more important things Disney does to be bothered by.

But Heracles has always just sounded like a variation of Hercules to me, and I prefer to use the set of names for Gods that arent planets so either way they fixed it would probably bother me fractionally more.