A Tale of Love and Powerful Women, my review of Circe by Madeline Miller
- Mar 7, 2021
- 6 min read
As a child, there were many things that I was passionate about: dance, books and stories, art, … And those passions have followed me throughout the years – even when my love for them wavered at times. However, there is one constant, one passion that never left me, that I never doubted, and that is Greek Mythology. For as long as I can remember, I have been fascinated with those stories of gods and heroes, adventures and inventions, those tales that seem to carry wisdom and warnings. As such, one thing that I have been really enjoying these past few years has been the appearance of Greek myths retellings as a sub-genre. It seems that many authors have found that there are still many things left unsaid from the classic stories that we all know; a majority of which are stories of women and goddesses, cheated and ignored by male writers.
Madeline Miller is possibly the one of the most well-known contemporary authors to have rewritten Greek myths, and after the success of The Song of Achilles, she came back in 2018 with the incredibly wonderful and empowering Circe, witch of Aiaia, and an important but overlooked woman in Greek stories.
Though this novel has been out for quite some time, I do want to warn you, there will be spoilers in this review, and I would recommend you read the novel before reading!
‘It is a common saying that women are delicate creatures, flowers, eggs, anything that may be crushed in a moment’s carelessness. If I had ever believed it, I no longer did.’
The witch Circe is mostly known for her encounter with Odysseus (or Ulysses) as told by Homer in the Odyssey. Out of her hatred for men, she lured them to her island before turning them into pigs and killing them. In the original story, Odysseus, the great hero, tricked her and convinced her to release his men who had been themselves turned into pigs.
Madeline Miller depicts a different and more complete picture of this misunderstood and mistreated woman. Circe is a young girl desperate for love and approval, who comes into her power and grows into an empowered and determined witch, whose passion rules above all.
There are so many interesting themes in this story, some of which I am going to develop later on, but the most prominent one is, I believe, the ability for her story to be applied to modern life. In a way, this is what I enjoy most about myths, the fact that they can relate to any era, any life. They are universal tales because they are human stories, in the sense that they tell us something about ourselves, reflect on our lives, and, as anyone who has studied ancient literature will tell you, a cathartic outlet. Circe is no exception, and her story, her struggles and her ability to make herself the powerful woman in her own life.
A lot of the book’s success also comes from Madeline Miller’s incredible writing, and I believe that her style and narrative voice really compliments the issues dealt with in the story, keeping the fantastical and enthralling characteristic of Greek myths, while also grounding it in a realistic and relatable story.
I will admit that I preferred The Song of Achilles to this novel, but I think that it is mainly because there is a lot to unpack in this story, and as she lives for many centuries, it is sometimes difficult to take it all in. It is definitely a story worth rereading and dive back into if you want to understand all of its nuances.
‘What could make a god afraid? I knew that answer too. A power greater than their own.’
Above all else, Circe is a story of female empowerment, and of resistance against a system that believes women to be weak, lesser than men. Circe grows up in her father’s shadow – quite literally as he is Helios, god of the Sun. However, it is made clear that she longs to have his power and strength, as well as his status. As she lives in his palace, she craves his attention and his love and tries to follow in his footsteps, even though she is believed to be lesser than him. After all, she is not only a woman, but not even a god, as she is reminded by her family and her looks.
But through time, and through many mistakes, Circe carves out her own path, one in which she is defiant, independent, and a powerful witch. Once she is removed from her environment, one in which she is always compared to her siblings who are crueller – and thus considered more powerful – she discovers the true extent of her abilities, and becomes a different kind of witch, a more compassionate one.
By the end of the novel, she finds the balance between power – independence – and her empathy. She is not vain, nor prideful like her siblings, who use their powers for malice and fail to show remorse; instead, she insists again and again on the shame that she feels for what she did to Scylla, and carries her faults that she chooses to admit and own up to.
It is only once she has created her own identity, and her own power, that she can stand up to Athena, and in the end, her father.
It is a wonderful thing to see her grow, make mistakes, grow resentful but ultimately become the passionate and powerful woman she was meant to become.
‘But perhaps no parent can truly see their child. When we look we see only the mirror of our own faults.’
While this novel deals with female empowerment, it also introduces questions of motherhood, which is very interesting to see in a story which places its main character outside of social norms for women. In a sense, we could debate on the fact that motherhood is an expected role for a woman, and Circe could have rejected those ideas even more. However, the fact that she is both a strong and powerful woman but also a caring mother depicts her as even stronger. She is not a mother because of social expectations, but rather because she wants to, and she gets to raise her child in her space, with her rules. Of course, I am not saying that it is perfect, nor that she manages motherhood properly, but rather that she learns and tries her best to reconcile her past and her power with the love and care a mother can have for her child.
‘But I pressed his face into my mind, as seals are pressed in wax, so I could carry it with me.’
Ultimately, Circe is a tale of love, humanity and divinity. As an immortal woman, Circe encounters many men, and falls in love with some of them. From Daedalus to Odysseus, but also Glaucus and Telemachus, she learns of the pain of falling in love with mortals, and the knowledge that she will outlive the men she loves. At first, she tries to defy mortality, and gives Glaucus the plants that ultimately make him immortal, but she soon learns that her powers are not enough to make her happy for eternity.
Instead, she allows herself to fall in love and learn of the death of her lovers through others. She grieves and keeps the memory of them, as part of her story, but not her entire self. She shares those stories with others, as she tells Odysseus of her life with Daedalus, and then tells Telegonus and Telemachus of her life with their father Odysseus.
The men in her life reflect her love for humanity, which is shown early on when she talks to Prometheus about humans, and repeated over and over again every time she falls in love. However, she does not let herself be consumed by her love, and instead chooses to admire humanity from her position.
By the end of the novel, she understands that the solution may not be for her to turn her lovers to immortals, but rather for her to be in touch with her humanity and become mortal.
There are so many more things that could be said about this novel, and I will be exploring it all in the next few months as I am preparing to write my dissertation on Greek myths retellings, so I might update this review once I am done, but I definitely recommend this novel, especially if you enjoy Greek myths or stories of strong and determined women.
If you enjoyed this novel and are looking for similar books, I do recommend that you check out her other novel The Song of Achilles, and Natalie Haynes’ A Thousand Ships, which tells the story of the Trojan war but from the perspective of all of the women involved.
I will be posting a lot more in the next few months, and I would love it if you shared this review with people around you! You can also follow me on Instagram here, where I will be posting updates and shorter reviews.
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