The Witch of Aiaia

When the 2019 Women's Prize shortlist was released last year, I was intrigued by two novels that were feminist retellings of ancient myths.  Pat Barker's The Silence of the Girls and Madeline Miller's Circe were quickly added to my monstrous 'To-Be-Read pile' but Miller was the first one I tackled based on recommendations from my friends in the Twitterverse.

Ancient myths have always intrigued me. As children, my brother and I spent many lazy weekends watching the Clash of the Titans (1981), marvelling at Ray Harryhausen's visual effects, cheering on Perseus as he battled Medusa and the Kraken. As I got older, my interest waned as mythology always felt so patriarchal, with women portrayed so superficially, largely as immoral or manipulative.

The retelling of myths, with a more sophisticated view of women, has reignited my interest and I began my adventure with Madeline Miller's Circe.

Circe is the daughter of Helios, the powerful Titan and god of the sun. Unlike her siblings, Circe is seen is inferior and stupid, dismissed by her father who revels in all that glitters. What she lacks in charisma she makes up for in curiosity, learning how to use herbs to make potions and master her sorcery.  She has a deep empathy for mortals and when she falls in love with Glaucos, a local fisherman, she tries to use her witchcraft to make him immortal so they could be together forever. Instead, Glaucos turns into a god, dumps Circe, and becomes infatuated with the sea-nymph Scylla. In a jealous rage, Circe turns Scylla into a hideous monster, and is exiled by Zeus to the island of Aiaia to live out her days in solitude.

Circe makes a home on Aiaia and masters her witchcraft;  necessary to fend off the seafarers and marauders that seek to violate and steal from her. Over the course of the novel, Circe meets Prometheus, befriends Daedulus and his ill-fated son Icarus, and beds Odysseus. She crosses paths with Jason, Medea, the Minotaur, Penelope, and many more.

Writing from a first person perspective allows Miller to let readers inside Circe's mind, to discover how she thinks and feels. Her admirable resilience and fortitude, her generosity and wit, and her longing for connection are very real. Circe was a minor character in Homer's Odyssey, but here she is fully formed and realised. Miller is a gifted writer, breathing life into an ancient tale.

I absolutely loved this novel and am now on a mission to track down Madeline Miller's previous book, The Song of Achilles (2011), and read Pat Barker's The Silence of the Girls (2018).