The story of Jason and Medea, in the larger story of the Argonauts, was another one I had seen in class, but never read myself completely. If you're unfamiliar with the story though, this might not be the best place to start as it sort of starts in the middle and these Little Black Classics have a tendency not to bring you up to speed but rather throw you right into the story.

 

That being said, I enjoyed it a lot and it made me want to read the full thing.

 

~Little Black Classics #18~

Apollonius of Rhodes was a 3rd century BCE librarian and scholar who wrote the epic Greek poem The Voyage of Argo. E. V. Rieu, who translated the story, was a classicist and initiated the Penguin Classics books.

Jason and Medea is a small segment of The Voyage of Argo, focusing on the god-imbued love Medea feels for Jason, whom had arrived to take the Golden Fleece. He is set a task by Medea's father, King Aeetes, to sow teeth that grow in to giants and slay them all. An impossible task, unless one had help from a witch named Medea...

The other story concerning Jason and Medea is Euripides's play Medea, which focuses on her rather more than Apollonius does here. It is a nice story and one that all fans of Greek myth should encounter at some point, but unlike Euripides, Apollonius is not sympathetic towards women at all, though he begrudgingly accepts that goddesses have powers, too.