Almost nobody reads the Old Testament voluntarily, for pleasure, today - the institutional layout, the notes, the pious paper and binding, the moralistic associations. I wanted to make a book of stories rooted in the Old Testament that would exhilarate everyone, not by taking away its poetry, a modern idea which is to me absurd, but by first taking away the religious and political and sociological manipulation; and then building not only on the stories themselves, but on the loving, fanciful improvisations that through centuries have been woven by learned and unlearned people, over them - rather like jazz.
Early in my research I came across a Staff, a Staff of sapphire, blue as the sapphire sky - a Cloak, which had pictured on it every animal, bird and insect in the world - a Book, that had in it all knowledge worthy to be told, including the song of the sun and the thoughts of the rain. In legend these gifts were given to Adam and Eve to protect them when they left the Garden of Delight, and then handed down through the ages. I decided to make them my framework, and to write the book only about the characters who in legend had been given them.
Following Jewish folklore, I made God male and female together, and the first human being male and female together, since it was made in God's image. It was also in legend made all colours, so that it could live happily and freely anywhere in the world. And the earth in legend belonged to God and was to be respected. Today we call that respect for the environment. So many things in these legends are things we are talking about now. That is how myths are."
Leila Berg