9 h 3 minAudiobook14 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 9 h 3 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What happens to the gods when the world no longer needs them?
In The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales, Richard Garnett brings ancient pride face to face with change. In the title story, the rise of a new faith leaves the old divinities facing an uncertain place in the world. Their habits and worries become material for dry comedy.
Elsewhere in the collection, figures from Greek and Roman myth, early Christian history and old legend meet life's awkward demands. Philosophers, scholars and men of religion find wisdom colliding with desire or chance. Writing in the tradition of Lucian, Garnett gives these encounters a quiet wit with a dark edge.
What you’ll discover
- Gods with human worries Meet ancient divinities whose pride and habits make their uncertain future sharply comic.
- Wisdom meets ordinary life Watch lofty ideas lose their footing when desire and chance enter the picture.
- A sting beneath the wit Discover dark humour that works quietly, leaving serious questions beneath the joke.
- Old legends, odd situations Find familiar worlds of myth and belief turned toward strange, dryly funny encounters.
- Learning worn lightly Enjoy exact words and balanced sentences that carry irony beneath their calm surface.
Who will love it
Readers who enjoy witty retellings of myth and history, devilish bargains, scheming bishops and clever fables will find a lively companion here. So will anyone who likes learned jokes.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- A Titan wakes up as a mortal
- A saint, a princess and the fallen gods
- Religion is damaged by those who serve it
- Wise men and priests behave like everyone else
- Bargains with oracles, dead poets and devils
- Inventions, chess, poisons and a poet in trouble
- Legends turned toward love, vanity and folly
- Short fables and sketches that sting
- What the collection says about belief and power
- How Garnett tells these tales
Who’s who
- PrometheusThe Titan unchained when his eagle dies, who finds himself mortal, learns to live among Christians and wants to stay near Elenko.
- ElenkoThe last priestess of Apollo, quick witted and in love, who will lie to a whole province to protect the stranger.
- GerbertA scholar who rises to be Pope Silvester the Second with the devil's help and then has to settle the bill.
- PlotinusA mystic philosopher who asks the Emperor for a city of sages and struggles to keep them from quarreling.
- AnandaA Buddhist apostle who is forbidden to work miracles and slips, one clever step after another, into a worse position.
- MantoA prophetess of Mantua who persuades her city to choose the dead Virgil as ruler and wants to keep it free.
- MithridataA kind young woman raised on poisons by her father, who wants to love without harming anyone.
- EuschemonA small, cross-eyed saint who leaves Paradise to defend his bell and meets a most unexpected companion.
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- Hardcover
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- Large print hardcover
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The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales
by Richard Garnett · 1888
When his eagle dies, a chained Titan falls from a crag, and a church leader proclaims a miracle.
Challenging5–10 hours to readEnglish
Excellent
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In short
What happens when a chained Titan wakes in a world that no longer believes in his gods, and the first people he meets are a priestess in flight and a mob with hammers? Richard Garnett begins his collection with exactly that scene.
The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales at a glance
- Reading time
- About 5 h 20 min4 h 15 min fast, 6 h 20 min slow
- Length
- 76,200 words
- Library level
- Challenging long sentences, a rich vocabulary
- First published
- 1888by Richard Garnett
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A Titan wakes up as a mortal
The title story opens in the fourth Christian century, high on the Caucasus mountains. An eagle swoops at the chained Prometheus, as it has done every day for thousands of years. This time it drops dead from a clear sky, and his shackles snap.
He meets Elenko, the last priestess of Apollo in a land that has abandoned the old gods. She has fled a mob that is looting her temple, and she is shocked to hear a man who speaks the language of Homer scorn Zeus. Prometheus tells her who he is, and she believes him. The child mightier than Zeus was Man, he says, and his reward for loving humanity is to have become human himself.
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Which edition is right for me
- 15-minute summary
- The key ideas of the whole book in about 14 minutes. A good first look, or a refresher.
Details
- First published
- 1888
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 5 h 50 min
- Level
- Challenging
Cite this edition
Garnett, Richard. The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-twilight-of-the-gods-and-other-tales.
Garnett, R. (2026). The twilight of the gods, and other tales. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-twilight-of-the-gods-and-other-tales (Original work published 1888)
Garnett, Richard. The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-twilight-of-the-gods-and-other-tales.
@book{garnett2026twilight,
author = {Garnett, Richard},
title = {The Twilight of the Gods, and Other Tales},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-twilight-of-the-gods-and-other-tales},
note = {First published 1888}
}
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What is The Twilight of the Gods and Other Tales about?
It is a collection of short satirical stories by Richard Garnett. They retell myths, legends and episodes of history, such as a freed Prometheus, a devil who becomes Pope and a saint's bell, to poke fun at belief, vanity and power.
Who is Prometheus in the title story?
He is the Titan of Greek myth who was chained on the Caucasus for helping humanity. Here the chains fall off in the fourth Christian century, and he finds himself mortal in a Christian world, where he meets the priestess Elenko.
Is The Twilight of the Gods a true story?
No, it is fiction. Garnett uses real settings and figures, such as Gallienus, Plotinus, Pope Silvester the Second and Nonnus, but the events are invented satire. It was written in the late nineteenth century and has a playful, learned voice.
The author
Richard Garnett
1835–1906 · British scholar and writer
British scholar, librarian, biographer and poet.
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