Thomas Bulfinch, a Boston bank clerk with a scholar’s reading, retells the stories of gods and heroes largely after Ovid: Prometheus and Pandora, Apollo and Daphne, Phaeton, Midas, Proserpine, Pygmalion, Cupid and Psyche, Cadmus and many more, with chapters on Norse and Eastern myth and on the poets who drew on them. Plain prose and generous quotation make it easy to read straight through.
First published in 1855, it has been the standard American handbook of classical mythology for generations. Download the free EPUB.