Slavic Gods and Heroes Literature Book Review Essay

Slavic Gods and Heroes Book Review
Authors: Judith Kalik and Alexander Uchitel
Place of Publication: New York
Published by Routledge
Pages: 199
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Slavic Gods and Heroes Book Review
The book Slavic Gods and Heroes gives a detailed account of the gods and heroes that the Slavic people had in the ancient days. The authors of the book have talked about how the Slavic people began to worship their gods and indicating that some of the gods were invented by their leaders, for example, the gods of Vladimir I who reigned over Kiev and established a new pantheon of six gods. The author also establishes that whenever a certain era has passed, they tend to change the gods of that they worshipped like after the era of Vladimir they changed and started worshipping other gods. The is giving an account of the history of their social lives and religion. The book has given into detail the gods that the Slavic people used to worship and the heroes that they had in those times. The author has confirned his research and writing about the Slavic people just getting to know their religion and their heroes. The authors have used a chronological type of presentation in which he has talked about the gods how they began and also being phased out after a while then creating other gods and then after a while; they stopped worshipping them after the introduction of Christianity in the area (Qalîq & Uchitel, n.d.). After writing about the gods, he also writes about the heroes that were in those tribes and clans of the Slavic people. The title of the book is perfectly aligned with what has been written in the book by the authors.
The organization of the book Slavic gods and heroes enables the reader to easily follow what the reader is going to talk about. the book is divided is divided into three parts which contain a total of twenty-three chapters. The parts that it is divided into are the ancient Slavs, gods, and lastly heroes. It begins by telling the reader that the Slavic mythology does not exist; hence the reader knows the stand of the author about what they are writing about. The book then progresses explaining how the they filled the vacuum of Slavic pagan religion because there were ancient texts to support them in the introduction. Then later gives the Slavic languages and their neighbours the firsrt chapter, then talks about their gods, giving each god its chapter then lastly talks about the ancient Slavic heroes and also giving each of the heroes a chapter on which they are talked about.
The authors of the book do not believe in the existence of the mythological aspects of the Slavic people. Although, there is evidence to support the fact. So, he decides to write about the ancient Slavs and their neighbours which he believes existed and there is evidence to support the fact at the beginning of the book and then writes about the gods and the heroes of the Slavs in the...