KAZANTZAKIS, Nikos - At the Palaces of Knossos - (Hardcover in Wrapper)

Usual library goodies - library closed down, so not a reject - 1st English Edition.   >>>  I enjoyed this very clever retelling of the Theseus/Ariadne/Minotaur myth. Written originally for a Greek youth periodical, this seems like one of Kazantzakis' minor works; I don't feel it reaches the stature of his internationally famous works.   I did get a sense of Kazantzakis' talent and creativity. He also mixed in some of the Daedalus/Icarus and Phaedra myths. How Ariadne hit upon the idea of having Theseus' retracing his steps from the labyrinth was ingenious. I liked the portrayal of the Minotaur; although he was a monster, I felt sorry for him. I understood the main theme of the story to be the old civilization [Minoan Crete] giving way to the new [Golden Age Athens]: the Bronze Age yielding to the Iron Age. One of the translators included a few pages at the end devoted to a short history of Crete from the its origin till the 1913 unification with Greece, valuable for this non-Hellene.  (Jane on Goodreads) 

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