Review of Circe by Madeline Miller
Who didn’t have a Greek phase as a kid? All of us at some point have been fascinated by these long, gone cultures with their gods, heroes, and customs. Madeline Miller gives us a bit of that world we have always wanted to live in through her stories. I loved the Song of Achilles and I adored Circe.
I had never really looked into the famous Greek witch, my favourite of the so-called evil women of Greek mythology has always been Medusa. But reading this book makes me want to look up everything about her, every theory, and myth, and story.
Circe has just the right level of tragedy, empowerment, and all kinds of love. I empathize with Circe at a deep level, from the way her family scorned her for being different, to her loneliness and kindness, and her anger. Circe was human before she even realized it, feeling things at a level no god let themselves feel since she was a child. We sometimes don’t feel that deep in modern times.
When it comes to feminism, Circe gives us another example of women being villainized for their power and how women are capable of being evil without the need of villainization, it also shows us women being pushed to do things simply to survive. Pasiphae, Artemis, Athena, Penelope are just a few of the women we meet in the book that represents this. Miller shows us all different shades of women because we don't all come in the same flavor, women are not born good or evil, there isn't a certain sisterhood. The book reminds us that we chose to back each other up, to be there and chose to support each other.
As someone who lives in still dominantly misogynist society, what Circe lives through with her family, as well as during the events of the book, is something I have seen, heard, experienced, and always fear at the same time, to suffer what she has to suffer.
Circe's innocence at the beginning and how she grows is entailing. We get to see her experience the world on her island, the good and the bad, we get to see her try and be kind and get angry and hurt as she gets her revenge. Her kindness is thrown back in her face over and over again, the world keeps trying to bring her down and eventually almost does for a bit until she remembers some of the good and finally gets the possibility of a happy ending.
The parts I liked best definitely were when she defied those that tried to suppress her, when she looked at her family and saw them for what they were: sad.
The fact her ending is one of romance and family is not an encouragement for women to fall in love and marry. Circe gets the ending she has always yearned for, but not with a hero, not with some man that wants glory, and that’s the best part of the story. She makes a choice for freedom and happiness.
Greek heroes rarely get a happy ending, but Circe never wanted to be a hero, she just wanted to live, be free, happy, and explore. The story ties in beautifully with the idea that when you go seeking glory for the sake of glory, for a prophecy, you will rarely get it.
Books like the Percy Jackson series were my childhood, but I have always hated how they represented many of the female myths. Madeline Miller delivers a beautiful story of a witch that never asked to be a goddess. She gives us a hero we can empathize within today's day and age without ever taking her out of Ancient Greece.
