July Events For Myth Lovers
Vilhelm Petersen’s A Beach by the Sound (1872 – 1876) is in the public domain.
Virtual Events
On July 20, learn a meditation technique that can give you a feeling of peace comparable to that of a near-death experience.
On July 20, learn how to draw monsters, aliens and fantasy creatures.
On July 25, Ayana Gray will discusses her latest work, Beasts of Ruin, about a young warrior Ekon desperately trying to track down the daraja Koffi, who has been kidnapped by the god of death
Whenever you want, listen to the free audiobook sample of The Book of Gothel by Mary McMyne, a retelling of Rapunzel from the witch’s perspective which is scheduled for release in July.
On August 9, you can join a virtual discussion about The Valkyrie’s Daughter by Tiana Warner, a book scheduled for release this July that is based on Norse mythology.
Gustav Klimt’s painting The Kiss is in the public domain.
New York City Events
On July 20, Ingrid Rojas Contreras will talk about her new novel The Man Who Could Move Clouds, which is about a woman in Colombia who must come to term with her family’s magical legacy.
On July 23, you can celebrate Haitian culture and vodou at the Festival Minokan in Brooklyn.
On various dates and locations in the city this July, you can see an afrofuturistic version of Twelfth Night.
From July 29-31, the 43rd Annual Thunderbird American Indian Powwow will be at the Queens County Farm Museum.
On August 4, watch a series of surreal short rooftop films, including one about a guy who sees cucumbers everywhere and another about a girl who finds an eyeball growing on her arm. Includes live music and a Q&A with filmmakers.
On August 23, fantasy writer R.F. Kuang will discuss the release of her new book Babel: Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution. Joining Rebecca in conversation is acclaimed author of the Daevabad Trilogy Shannon Chakraborty.
Free Sbakespeare in the Park begins on June 17 this summer and will feature productions of Richard III and As You Like It.
On any day other than Monday or Tuesday in June and July, you can pretend to have a more interesting life by participating in an interactive experience that puts you in the center of a Stranger Things story.
In June and July you can go see The Fans Strike Back, an exhibition featuring more than 600 official items from the Star Wars Universe.
Explore the life and works of the surrealist artist Magritte in a new virtual reality exhibition.
Participate in the immersive theater experience Sleep No More, which portrays Shakespeare’s classic Scottish tragedy through the lens of suspenseful film noir. Tickets are available any night other than Tuesday.
Go to Gotham City, where top scientists are missing and Batman and Batgirl need new recruits. Gather intelligence, dodge lasers and communicate with some Gotham City characters in an interactive experience.
Any day you want you can go to Beetle House, a restaurant that takes inspiration from Tim Burton, Alfred Hitchcock, Bram Stoker, Washington Irving, Edgar Allen Poe and many more. The menu includes, Blood Bags, Hautned Lemonade, Bio-Exorcism’s, among other things. Dining in only, which adds a new COVID element to the scare show.
Check out the dragons, kings, pirate ships, Merlin’s flying machines and other spectacles at the new Legoland in Goshen, New York.
Get Butter Beer at the new Harry Potter-themed store and bar at 935 Broadway near the Flatiron Building.
Miss going to the movies? Watch a socially distanced one outside with your friends at Sidewalk Cinema on Thames Street in Brooklyn.
Check out the images of buddhas, bodhisattvas, tantric deities, protectors and more at the Rubin Museum’s Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room.
U.S. Events
"Myth.Slide1.16" by c.a.francese is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
From October 21-23, Harry Potter fans will hold a Wizard Retreat weekend in Chester, Connecticut, where (apparently) magic can happen.
World Events
On July 1, 2, and 3 the mythic fiction author Natalie Haynes, the indie duo Smoke Fairies, circus people, and many others will perform at Timber, an artist’s festival that takes place somewhere in the woods in the U.K.
Recurring Virtual Events
Every year in the secret realm of Bunnyville, magical creatures from around the world gather for their annual summit. This is supposed to be a time to reconnect with old and new friends, but this year someone (or some creature!) has stolen the Easter Bunny’s magical golden egg! Kids and adults can both enjoy this enchanted game featuring creatures like fairies, dragons, mermaids, and of course the Easter Bunny!
If you would rather be in France right now, view a selection of thematically-themed works from the Louvre online, including the ones in the Sully Wing, which includes major works of Greek and Egyptian art such as the Venus de Milo.
Take an online course with Stanford research scholar Adrienne Mayor in which you will “uncover the natural origins of stories about dragons. . .; ponder whether the Amazon horsewomen-archers of myth existed; consider the dilemmas of using poison weapons in myth and ancient historical times; and marvel at robots and other science fiction tales from the time of Homer.” $120.
Take an online mini-course about Rome, seeing how it exists not only in brick and mortar, but also in the realm of ideas, and through the eyes of locals and visitors. Topics will include Rome’s urban and architectural development, as well as its representation in maps and artworks from across the city’s exceptionally long lifetime. $99.
The NY Mythology Group, which is associated with the Joseph Campbell Foundation, holds presentations and discussions about mythology related topics ranging from the Greek goddess Hecate to Carl Jung. Their events usually take place on Tuesday evenings at 8 pm EDT, and have been online since the pandemic started.
BSFW, or Brooklyn Speculative Fiction Writers, meetings take place mostly online currently, but pre-pandemic were in the homes of writers mostly in Brooklyn but also on occasion Manhattan or Queens. Check out their calendar on meetup to attend their numerous writing workshops, social gatherings, meetings with editors/agents/authors, book clubs, and more. The group includes many published writers and has its own audio fiction magazine, Kaleidocast. If you post about your fetish for Olympian gods on their Facebook group feed, they (probably) won’t judge.
EREWHON BOOKS, a publisher focusing on novel-length works of speculative fiction: science fiction, fantasy, and related genres, holds readings usually on the second Thursday each month virtually for now and in a pre-apocalypse world at its high ceilinged office of many windows in Manhattan.
Fantastic Fiction at KGB is a monthly speculative-fiction reading series held on the third Wednesday of every month virtually for now, and in a pre-apocalypse world at KGB Bar in Manhattan. Ellen Datlow and Matthew Kressel host the event. As one might expect from a communism-themed bar, admission is free.
The NYC Greek Myth & Classical Lit Meetup meets every third Thursday of the month at the Cloister Cafe in the East Village to discuss the work of mostly long dead authors (e.g. Aristophanes, Dante.) The group has existed for more than a decade, so the long-term participants have already earned their unofficial classics PhD’s, and we already know that anybody who would do this for fun is as hip as a person can get.
Marcantonio Raimondi’s “A Bacchanal”. CC01.0 Public domain.
