July Events For Myth Lovers
"Cat lady" by Zemlinki! is licensed under CC BY 2.0, and Peter Glyn’s photo of a 13th Century Castle on the banks of Loch Ness is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication.
Virtual Events
On July 3, learn about Yogic Mythology, the Hindu Gods and Goddesses, as well as the yogic practices aligned to them.
On July 6, Elizabeth Lim will chat with Brigid Kemmerer about her young adult novel Six Crimson Cranes, in which a girl with forbidden magic in her blood searches for her brothers.
On July 7, Sarah Henning will speak about her new YA fantasy adventure inspired by The Princess Bride, in which a princess must rescue her stable boy true love.
From July 10-11, you can attend online writing workshops, play role playing games, and more at the science fiction convention Shore Leave.
On July 14, the witches at Catland Books will be doing more online yoga.
On July 16-18, the Association for the Study of Women and Mythology will hold an online symposium.
On July 27 YA author, Erica Waters will chat with Wendy Heard about her new book The River Has Teeth, in which the protagonist tries using magic to her find her sister.
On July 29, learn about the legend of the Dog Man: a humanoid beast with canine features that can talk.
Luis Ricardo Falero’s painting Witches on the Sabbath is in the public domain.
New York City Events
On July 2, you can watch Carmen in Bryant Park. The performance is free and open to the public on a first-come, first serve basis for those who can prove they were vaccinated.
On July 5, watch Guillermo del Toro’s Oscar winning film Pan’s Labrynth outdoors at The Hudson, located at Dyckman Marina in Inwood Hill Park.
From July 6 through September 18, you can see the Merry Wives set in South Harlem at the Delacorte Theater’s Free Shakespeare in the Park. To get a free ticket, enter a lottery through the Goldstar app or on this website in the morning each Tuesday and Friday, one week prior to the next week’s scheduled performances.
On the Thursdays July 8 and July 22, you can bring your favorite book (mythology, of course!) and share it with a group of fellow readers at Lunch & Lit on Randall’s Island, led by their writer in residence Elizabeth Howard.
From July 15th through August 8th, Broadway stars will integrate their live performances into the movies Chicago, West Side Story, The Wizard of Oz, Little Shop of Horrors, or In The Heights at the AMC Empire 25 Theater in Times Square. Then you can go to an outdoor party on the AMC rooftop. Tickets from $24 to $109.
On July 24-25, the New York City Poetry Festival takes place on Governor’s Island.
On Monday July 19 and July 26, you can watch the movies Toy Story and Miracle, respectively at The Greens on the Rooftop at Pier 17. Reserve tickets one week in advance.
"NORMAN MILLS PRICE (American, 1877-1951), 'The Great God Pan'" by sofi01 is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
On July 30 and 31, you can tour the allegedly haunted Kreischer Mansion on Staten Island and hunt for ghosts afterward.
On July 31, you can watch an outdoor performance of Twelfth Night on Staten Island.
Get Butter Beer at the new Harry Potter-themed store and bar at 935 Broadway near the Flatiron Building.
Until October 31, see Yayoi Kusama’s exhibition Cosmic Nature, which features monumental sculptures such as “I Want to Fly to the Universe” at the New York Botanical Garden.
Miss going to the movies? Watch a socially distanced one outside with your friends at Sidewalk Cinema on Thames Street in Brooklyn.
Watch a string quartet perform the soundtracks from movies such as Aladdin, the Little Mermaid, Cinderella, and more in candlelight at the Mondrian Hotel Terrace. Tickets available on different days.
Check out the images of buddhas, bodhisattvas, tantric deities, protectors and more at the Rubin Museum’s Tibetan Buddhist Shrine Room.
U.S. Events
On July 2-4, you can attend the science fiction convention InConJunction 40 in person in Indianapolis.
From July 9-11, ConGregate 7 & DeepSouthCon 59 will take place in Winston-Salem, N.C.
Readercon, a conference in Boston for readers and writers of science fiction, takes place virtually July 9-11, 2021.
On July 15-18, the Spacefest convention takes place in Tucson, Arizona.
DisCon III, the 79th World Science Fiction Convention, no longer takes place August 25-29, 2021. Instead, it will be held at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington DC on December 15-19, 2021, with both virtual and in person components.
The conference Anime Los Angeles 17 has been postponed for a year. Instead of this month, it will take place from January 6-9, 2022, in Long Beach California.
"Myth.Slide1.16" by c.a.francese is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
World Events
From July 2- July 4, the Australian Discworld Convention will take place in Sydney.
Fantasy Forest, which takes place 16-18 July 2021 in Cheltenham, England, will be set in Sudeley Castle and Gardens.
FantasyCon will take place on September 24- 26 in Birmingham, the United Kingdom. It is the national fantasy convention run by the British Fantasy Society.
Recurring Virtual Events
Nina Allender’s 1915 cartoon “Fairy Godmother Wilson: 'The pumpkin shall be a coach; the mice will be the horses to pull it; and YOU shall go to the polls!'" is in the public domian.
Starting May 1 until November 22 at 7 pm U.K. time, twice a month you can attend Fairy Tales and Therapy: “group discussion spaces exploring fairytales and mythology stories to expand our understanding of individual and collective psychology.” £17.50
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.
On Sunday mornings, Krista Lea will present an online meditation class that uses sound, aroma, poetry, and goddess mythology to focus on the archetype of the Divine Feminine. Tickets $11
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.
.jpg){kind=link}
