Pandora's jar : women in Greek myths / Natalie Haynes.
Material type:
TextPublisher: New York, NY : Harper Perennial, [2022]Copyright date: ©2020Edition: First U.S. editionDescription: 308 pages : illustrations ; 21 cmContent type: - text
- still image
- unmediated
- volume
- 9780063139466
- 0063139464
- 9780063211315
- 0063211319
- Pandora's jar : women in the Greek myths
| Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book
|
Main Library | NonFiction | 292.211 H424 | Available | 33111010808125 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER
"Funny, sharp explications of what these sometimes not-very-nice women were up to, and how they sometimes made idiots of . . . but read on!"--Margaret Atwood, author of The Handmaid's Tale
The national bestselling author of A Thousand Ships returns with a fascinating, eye-opening take on the remarkable women at the heart of classical stories Greek mythology from Helen of Troy to Pandora and the Amazons to Medea.
The tellers of Greek myths--historically men--have routinely sidelined the female characters. When they do take a larger role, women are often portrayed as monstrous, vengeful or just plain evil--like Pandora, the woman of eternal scorn and damnation whose curiosity is tasked with causing all the world's suffering and wickedness when she opened that forbidden box. But, as Natalie Haynes reveals, in ancient Greek myths there was no box. It was a jar . . . which is far more likely to tip over.
In Pandora's Jar, the broadcaster, writer, stand-up comedian, and passionate classicist turns the tables, putting the women of the Greek myths on an equal footing with the men. With wit, humor, and savvy, Haynes revolutionizes our understanding of epic poems, stories, and plays, resurrecting them from a woman's perspective and tracing the origins of their mythic female characters. She looks at women such as Jocasta, Oedipus' mother-turned-lover-and-wife (turned Freudian sticking point), at once the cleverest person in the story and yet often unnoticed. She considers Helen of Troy, whose marriage to Paris "caused" the Trojan war--a somewhat uneven response to her decision to leave her husband for another man. She demonstrates how the vilified Medea was like an ancient Beyonce--getting her revenge on the man who hurt and betrayed her, if by extreme measures. And she turns her eye to Medusa, the original monstered woman, whose stare turned men to stone, but who wasn't always a monster, and had her hair turned to snakes as punishment for being raped.
Pandora's Jar brings nuance and care to the millennia-old myths and legends and asks the question: Why are we so quick to villainize these women in the first place--and so eager to accept the stories we've been told?
"Originally published in Great Britain in 2020 by Picador, an imprint of Pan Macmillan"--Copyright page.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 291-308).
The Greek myths are among the world's most important cultural building blocks and they have been retold many times, but rarely do they focus on the remarkable women at the heart of these ancient stories. Stories of gods and monsters are the mainstay of epic poetry and Greek tragedy, from Homer to Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, from the Trojan War to Jason and the Argonauts. And still, today, a wealth of novels, plays and films draw their inspiration from stories first told almost three thousand years ago. But modern tellers of Greek myth have usually been men, and have routinely shown little interest in telling women's stories. And when they do, those women are often painted as monstrous, vengeful or just plain evil. But Pandora--the first woman, who according to legend unloosed chaos upon the world-- was not a villain, and even Medea and Phaedra have more nuanced stories than generations of retellings might indicate. Now, in Pandora's Jar, Natalie Haynes--broadcaster, writer and passionate classicist-- redresses this imbalance. Taking Pandora and her jar (the box came later) as the starting point, she puts the women of the Greek myths on equal footing with the menfolk. After millennia of stories telling of gods and men, be they Zeus or Agamemnon, Paris or Odysseus, Oedipus or Jason, the voices that sing from these pages are those of Hera, Athena and Artemis, and of Clytemnestra, Jocasta, Eurydice and Penelope.
Pandora -- Jocasta -- Helen -- Medusa -- The Amazons -- Clytemnestra -- Eurydice -- Phaedra -- Medea -- Penelope.