Review of 'Circe' by Madeline Miller

Last year there seemed to be a real trend for feminist retellings of Greek stories. I had to read the Iliad and the Odyssey as part of my English lit degree and really enjoyed delving into these stories that had at least in part made their way into modern pop culture (who hasn't heard of Icarus flying too close to the sun, in some form?). Circe really brought me back to that but from a whole different direction, which I loved.

Circe is the witch who kept Odysseus trapped on her island whilst he was trying to make his way back home from war. However, this story starts way before then, showing us a more human, or at least rational, side to Circe. Although a child of Helios, god of the sun, Circe is a weaker demigod, born of a nymph. After realising she had some powers and using them to punish the people she hated, Circe was banished to live out her existence on an island away from all other gods.

Here she spends her time cultivating her powers, using plants she grows on her island to assist her. As a woman who quite simply won't do what she's told, Circe enrages men, both human and god alike. This book showcases the struggles of a woman who loves several men who don't love her back, who yearns for the affection of a father and who is angry, rightfully so, and punished for the outbursts of anger she expresses.

Although it was a little slow in places, this really was a very thoughtful and interesting read. I loved how Circe's story intertwined with other myths we've read about (the birth of the Minotaur, Scylla, Ariadne and the maze, Odysseus' return home and slaughter of his wife's suitors). It was really great to have these stories re-envisaged through a woman's eyes. And a flawed woman at that. This really was one of the most important parts of the book for me. Circe doesn't fit neatly into one of the characters that you often would have in this kind of fiction: in the Odyssey she plays an evil witch gone mad with power and lust for Odysseus. In this however, she's much more complex. Women are also placed at the forefront of all of the other side stories too, and I think this made for a really interesting way of telling them too.

I've given this 4 out of 5 stars, only because as I mentioned, there were parts that I really think could have been paced a little better, and that I slightly lost interest during.

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