Sarah Iles Johnston received bachelor’s degrees in Journalism and Classics from the University of Kansas, a place she loved for many reasons but especially because of the wonderful professors who fostered her love of myths. She went on to receive her doctorate in Classics from Cornell University, where she studied ancient Greek myths and religions.

After her doctorate, she joined the humanities faculty at The Ohio State University, where she is now the College of Arts and Sciences Distinguished Professor of Religion and Professor of Classics. She teaches courses in ancient Greek myths and religions, the history of European beliefs in witchcraft, comparative religion, and ancient Greek poetry. She has held several academic fellowships and is the author or editor of many scholarly books and articles on ancient myths and religions.

Her most recent book, The Story of Myth, explores the ways in which the vivid narrations of myths in ancient Greece helped to create and sustain the Greeks’ beliefs in their gods, their heroes and the possibility that those gods and heroes would intervene in the lives of the ordinary mortals who told and listened to those stories. To do so, she uses what experts know about the way that we engage with novels, ghost stories, films, television shows, comics and other modern narratives.

Her new book, Gods and Mortals: Ancient Greek Myths for Modern Readers, draws on what she learned by writing The Story of Myth, as well as her many years as a scholar of ancient myths, to offer an entrancing narration of ancient Greek myths for adults and young adults. It is her first book for the general public. She is now working on a book for for the general public that talks about why myths were important to the ancient Greeks—and why they are still important to us.

She is also studying ghost stories from the 1830s to the present day, trying to understand why they frighten us and how those fears affect our religious beliefs. Her first essay on the topic is due out soon in the journal Numen. It looks at M.R. James’ “Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You My Lad” and Stephen King’s Revival.

She lives outside of Columbus, Ohio, with her husband, who is also a scholar of ancient myths and religions, and their dog, Circe, a mutt who is a lively cross between a chihuahua and a poodle. To her delight, three of her eight grandchildren live around the corner. When not reading one thing or another, she enjoys knitting, sewing, cooking and gardening.