Acknowledgements I have first to thank Tim Carroll, the Artistic Director of the Shaw Festival Theatre in Niagara-on-the-Lake, Ontario, Canada. We first became friends in 2013 when he directed me in a production of Twelfth Night in London and New York. Aside from being a distinguished and acclaimed theatre director, Tim Carroll is a man who reads Homer in the original Greek for pleasure. He was naturally the first person I thought of as a collaborator when I hit upon the idea of presenting on stage Mythos, the book on Greek myths I had written in 2017. We met and talked and somehow out of our discussions came the notion of not one show, but three. The first would cover the same ground as Mythos (the primordial deities and Titans, the birth of the gods, the creation of mankind and some of the earlier myths in which gods and mortals mingle), the second would be dedicated to the Heroes (the book you have now in your hand, on your screen or in your ears) and the third would follow the story of the Trojan War and its aftermath. We presented the
Mythos trilogy at the Shaw Theatre in Niagara-on-the-Lake in the early summer of 2018. The heroes who featured in the second show were Perseus, Heracles and Theseus. For this book I have added Bellerophon, Jason, Atalanta, Orpheus and Oedipus. I owe Tim a huge amount: his instinctive, intelligent and imaginative grasp of story-telling, chronology and point-of-view taught me a great deal about theatrical narrative. Much of what I learnt from him has found its way, one way or another, into the book. Naturally he cannot be held accountable for infelicities, but you may take it on trust that his benign influence has helped the book enormously and for that and for his friendship, wisdom, wit and breathtaking cacolalia, I thank him. Other thanks go to all at Michael Joseph, the imprint of Penguin Random House that publishes my books, and most especially Managing Director Louise Moore and editor Jillian Taylor. Without their warmth and passion, enthusiasm and encouragement, diligence and support this book could never have been come into being. Particularly deserving of thanks and acknowledgement is the brilliant and wise Kit Shepherd, copy-editor of this book and its predecessor. His knowledge and fearsome eye for narrative inconsistency have been of immeasurable value. If there are chronological, source or historical errors here, they exist because I have chosen to ignore or override his suggestions for the sake of my own wild preferences. A special word of thanks to Roy McMillan, the director, actor, producer and sound engineer who makes the recording of audiobooks so pleasurable. His deep knowledge, patience and surefire instincts are beyond price. Anthony Goff of David Higham Associates brings authors and publishers together in amity and mutual respect like no other literary agent and I always benefit from his wisdom and experience. Nothing can happen in my life without the wonderful work of Jo Crocker who knows me better than I know myself. And of course I owe all things always to my beloved husband and hero of heroes, Elliott.