Sylvia's Journal

Troy has just been taken. No, I am not talking about Congress which has also hauled in a Trojan horse, a modern-day drama to appease the demands of today’s gods (egos). I am reading about the original story of ancient Troy and how it succumbed to the Greeks. It is very different from the story I learned in school when we had to read parts of the Iliad and the Odyssey in the original language. The original epic poems are about heroic men: Agamemnon, Menelaus, Odysseus, Achilles, Hector, Patroclus and all the other fighters. It is history written by a man as the story of men, his story. The protagonists (the good and the bad ones) are described in the most flattering ways, waging war for pride and power. I was led to believe that these were indeed great men. 

Now I am reading the other side of the story, her story. I realize, shockingly, that I never thought about the women in the story: the one that get kidnapped by Paris (Helen), the teenage daughters of Clytemnestra and Hecuba whose throats are slit to appease the gods; Cassandra, who refused to surrender to Apollo and gets hit with a curse that destroys her. And then there are all the other women of Troy who were simply divided among the Greek troops as just so much more loot to take home.

This story (her story) is ‘Elektra,’ written by Jennifer Saint, a British classicist and teacher (her other book is about Ariadne, which is next on my list). Some decades ago, I read Maryse Conde’s story about the Salem Witch Trials from one of the accused’s perspectives (Tituba) – that book too was a revelation. Of course, there is nastiness between the women, and they are not saints, but that doesn’t take away from their perspective, which is about love, grief, fear, jealousy, and revenge, to name just a few minor emotions.