Department of English and American Studies the Iliad
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Masaryk University Faculty of Arts Department of English and American Studies English Language and Literature Bc. Eva Baliová The Iliad and The Odyssey as Seen through the Eyes of Female Writers in the 21st Century Master’s Diploma Thesis Supervisor: prof. Mgr. Milada Franková, CSc., M.A. 2021 I declare that I have worked on this thesis independently, using only the primary and secondary sources listed in the bibliography. …………………………………………….. Author’s signature Acknowledgement I would like to thank my supervisor, Milada Franková, for her spirit-lifting counsel and kind words of encouragement. Also, I would like to thank Hannah, for making a feminist out of me and for showing me fresh perspectives in our never-ending discussions about feminism, Greek mythology, and everything else really. I am sincerely grateful for all the support and help that these two intelligent women gave me. Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2 2. Feminism 6 2.1. Defining Feminism 6 2.2. The Male Tradition 12 2.3. Equal Pay 13 2.4. Rape Culture 14 2.5. Marriage 17 2.6. Abortion 19 2.7. Victim Blaming 19 2.8. Reconstruction of Human Society 22 3. Homer’s the Iliad and the Odyssey 24 3.1. Epic Cycle 26 3.2. The Rape of Troy 31 4. Heroines 38 4.1. Helen 40 4.2. Briseis 51 4.3. Penelope 64 4.3.1. Twelve hanged maids 74 4.4. Circe 79 5. Conclusion 91 6. Bibliography 96 7. Summary 99 8. Resumé 100 1 1. Introduction The Trojan War has always been a fascinating topic for artists. Ever since Homer wrote his timeless heroic works, the Iliad and the Odyssey, there have been a great number of writers, painters, and sculptors who adapted this theme according to their own values and talents. My thesis focuses only on written work and a key point to remember is that only a handful of those writers dealt with the women who figured in the original story. These works, Euripides’ The Trojan Women, Hecuba, Andromache, or Ovid’s Heroides, gave a voice to those who were silenced, and they are, up to this time, praised for their unique approach. Nevertheless, these writers belong to the antique period and there were not many works that would follow this approach until the end of the 20th century. With this in mind, there is, in the last two decades, a noticeable outbreak of works in which the authors rewrite Homer’s epic poems from the points of view of heroines who tell the story as perceived by them. In addition, the majority of these novels are written by females. The main goal of this thesis is to examine this resurrection of coming back to the roots. Female writers, by recreating the topics from the Iliad and the Odyssey, bring fresh perspectives into the ever-lasting works of Homer, and they prioritize different aspects than the bard himself. Therefore, they create a link between the antiquity and literature of today and my thesis will focus on the new ideas and approaches that these stories bring. The novels in question are Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad, Pat Barker’s The Silence of the Girls, Natalie Haynes’s A Thousand Ships, and Madeline Miller’s Circe. The heroines who figure in and dominate these stories are namely Briseis, Circe, and Penelope, all of whom appeared in Homer’s the Iliad or the Odyssey. Another novel by Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles, will also be analyzed but it 2 differs from the other works because it tells the story of the Trojan War from the perspective of a male protagonist, Patroclus, who provides an interesting and thought-provoking view on Briseis. This thesis strives to identify connections and differences between the works of the above-mentioned female writers and Homer’s epic poems. By consulting books such as Classical Mythology by Mark P.O. Morford, which provides a number of variations of every myth and tale, it will be easier to see which stories actually do bring a historical value in its core and which are written mostly to please the general audience who do not care about historical accuracy. In addition, the thesis will explore the links that connect all works together. As far as my research is concerned, no work with this particular focus and scope was ever done before. As novels by the writers that are primarily analyzed are all contemporary, there are not many studies devoted to this field. Be that as it may, a close reading of primary works will be applied during the process to analyze the themes in the novels, so they can be organized and categorized as suitable, and the research questions can be answered in its entirety. In my thesis, I will apply the gender criticism approach as I focus on the aspects of feminism that can be traced in these works and how the authors use the female voices to express their dissatisfaction with the lack of its representation up until today. In contrast, the literature that discusses Homer, his writings, and the period he lived in is a highly researched area with a great number of valuable studies already done. Therefore, an extensive study is not in need, the knowledge taken from a carefully picked literature will be sufficient for the required background. One such book is Jonathan Gottschall’s The Rape of Troy: Evolution, Violence, and the World of Homer that introduces a new approach to the study of Homer’s works, “Homeric society” and it attempts to reconstruct the world as it was when the epics emerged. Furthermore, the text uses many extracts from the Iliad and the Odyssey 3 themselves, creating useful links for the thesis. Finally, and most importantly, the book deals with the females of Troy and their mistreatment by soldiers who were driven by their evolutionary drive for reproduction. Their behavior results in many cases of violence towards these women that is also one of the main themes that this thesis studies. Furthermore, as mentioned above, the main interest of my research lies in the feminist studies that are still in its progress. As this thesis deals closely with the female writers who published their works in the 21st century, the latest feminist theory will be elaborated on and put into contrast with Homer’s age. In here, books such as Invisible Women: Exposing Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Perez, Men Explain Things to Me by Rebecca Solnit and Feminists Don't Wear Pink (and Other Lies): Amazing Women on What the F-word Means to Them put together by Scarlet Curtis, will be helpful in a great measure. These volumes offer a collection of problems and issues that affects and influences women in their everyday lives. As the silencing of women, violence against, and inequality towards them are matters present till today, it is easy to imagine that in the past, these problems were even more pressing, but women did not have the courage or possibility to speak up. They lived in the world ruled by patriarchy and it was the heroic action of men that were passed from generation to generation; women were mentioned only in connection with great warriors and big battles. At the present time, women fight against these patriarchal norms that rule the society and strive for equality. They write novels that reflect this pursue, hence, my thesis acknowledges this progress and analyses how is it reflected in the studied literature. The limitations of my thesis lie in the selected primary literature. Another line of research worth pursuing further is to examine other Homer-influenced novels written by contemporary female writers and how they fall under the analysis. Also, it may be interesting to study works in 4 this field that are written by men and compare them with those that are written by women; there may be visible differences in the approaches that they take. 5 2. Feminism 2.1. Defining Feminism Feminism, a social movement surrounded by lies, fallacies, and untrue assumptions because it differs from the patriarchal norm that our society lives by. In a nutshell, feminists are considered to be angry, hysterical women who do not wear make-up and high heels, they burn their bras, they never shave, they are all lesbians and, of course, as it is not enough to make them look like they came out of a cave, they hate men. These mistaken beliefs are supposed to prevent women to join the movement and fight for their fundamental human rights. Thankfully, there are books that comment on and correct these assumptions, such as We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, or Feminists Don't Wear Pink (and Other Lies): Amazing Women on What the F- word Means to Them curated by Scarlett Curtis. Here, Scarlet Curtis puts together an inspirational collection of essays written by fifty people, and in this way, each story is personal and unique and at the same time, they manage to be interconnected in its totality. This book takes a refreshing path of not trying to be a textbook and explain the whole history of feminism. The essays are not written by professors of women’s studies, it is written by women who found their own way towards it. What is interesting is that they are in different stages of discovering what feminism means to them. This book converts a stereotypical image of feminists who do not wear pink (as the title suggests), do not wear make-up, and do not like men; instead, it shows that women are complex human beings and each of them likes different things, but it does not exclude them from becoming feminists.