the sorceress
pov you take the phrase 'men are pigs' to a whole new level
Hey Ancient Echoers!
I have a bit of a different one for you this time, as I was asked by the lovely
(author of the ) to write a post to feature on her newsletter, and I said yes! This article is going to be about the sorceress Circe, but I wanted to base it off of the novel Circe by Madeline Miller. So that’s what we’re doing!You can go and check out this article and loads more super interesting pieces of writing by Mariella over on her Substack (linked above!), where she tells the stories of all different historical women of fiction. I’m told that gentlemen are allowed as long as they don’t interrupt, and wear shiny cufflinks.
And while I’m promoting other people on here, I want to give an absolutely enormous shout out to
’s newsletter too. Her newsletter has all the fun and actual academic content too (she actually completed her Classics MA y’all), so if you want to actually learn something rather than having me scream at you about how cool I think Pompeii is, you know where to go. I did a guest post for her on Psyche and Eros not too long ago, so you can go and check that one out too! is also hosting a whole real-life symposium in London very soon on the 2nd of November (you can read all about it over on her blog), so if you’re in London and want to go and have the best night ever, you can get your butt over there for that.But now, Circe.
THE CONTEXT
I’m going to use Madeline Miller for the context today, because I fear I’ve been talking about nerdy old men quite a lot here recently, as unfortunately women writers weren’t really allowed back in like, 600BC. Homer talks a whole bunch about Circe in (spoiler alert) The Odyssey, and that’s the end of that conversation today.
Miller’s Circe is one of my all-time favourite feminist Greek myth retellings. Her debut novel (it blows my mind that it was her debut???) The Song of Achilles (2011) was the first Greek myth retelling I ever read in 2020, and so we have her to blame for everything that has come after, including this newsletter.
It’s been a while since I last read Circe, but I remember knowing I’d found something special the first time I read it, devouring it in something ridiculous like three days. I will now steal the blurb to describe to you the general plot of her myth:
“In the house of Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans, a daughter is born. But Circe is a strange child--neither powerful like her father nor viciously alluring like her mother. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power: the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves.
Threatened, Zeus banishes her to a deserted island, where she hones her occult craft, tames wild beasts, and crosses paths with many of the most famous figures in all of mythology, including the Minotaur, Daedalus and his doomed son Icarus, the murderous Medea, and, of course, wily Odysseus.
But there is danger, too, for a woman who stands alone, and Circe unwittingly draws the wrath of both men and gods, ultimately finding herself pitted against one of the most terrifying and vengeful of the Olympians. To protect what she loves most, Circe must summon all her strength and choose, once and for all, whether she belongs with the gods she is born from or with the mortals she has come to love.”
I mean, the setup is sensational, and Miller does not disappoint. This book does it all for me tbh, plot, characterisation, pacing, you name it, Miller nails it.
As one girl I follow on Goodreads put it: ‘madeline miller, you have done it again. i’m your hoe’.
Before we get into it I’d just like to say that I have so much fun writing these. It’s like the same content as my uni essays but there isn’t any referencing, I get to write how I want and put in ridiculous pictures.
Hell yeah???
THE STORY
This is going to be an absolute whistle stop tour through miss Circe’s life (which, given that she is immortal, is quite a challenge), because unfortunately I don’t (yet!) feel that I have the capacity to write a novel on the matter. That, and it’s kinda already been done.
To start at the very start: Circe is born to the sun god Helios, and his wife Perse. She is generally mocked and scorned by her family, including her sister, Pasiphae. If that name rings in a bell, you might want to go and have a quick peek at my last blog post about Ariadne. Pasiphae was in it, playing a very interesting disturbing part.
One day, Prometheus is brought to the palace where they live and Circe witnesses him being whipped, before having his terrible eagle-related fate decided for him. Against her father’s wishes, Circe secretly brings Prometheus healing nectar, and he tells her that she doesn’t have to be like other gods.
This conversation is pretty crucial, and Circe decides to make it her entire personality from now on. And honestly, with a family like that, fair enough girl. Two baby brothers are born (Aeetes and Perses), and later all of her siblings are married off, leaving Circe alone in the vast, empty palace (Miller treats time so amazingly well in the novel, unlike I am doing here).
Circe meets a mortal sailor, falls in love with him, and goes on an unhinged side quest to find a highly illegal and dangerous substance, pharmaka, to make him immortal. When she does so, he promptly leaves Circe for a nymph called Scylla instead. So far, not so good.
Having never been parented properly, or ever, in fact, Circe decides that the best next course of action would be to pour her pharmaka into the pool where Scylla bathes, hoping to make her as ugly on the outside as she is on the inside. Instead, Scylla becomes a horrifying, six-headed monster who flees to live in a cave near a whirlpool.
When Circe goes home to confess to her dad, it’s revealed that all four siblings are actually a rare kind of witch/sorcerer, and they have abilities that no one has ever heard of before.
Then, to make things worse, Circe is exiled by her father to a far-flung island (Aiaia), where she must stay forever. It’s not actually as bad as you might think for a while. She chills by herself, honing her newfound witch-y skills and even adopting a lioness at one point, just because she can.
Now for a comprehensive list of things that happen to Circe while she’s on Aiaia:
Hermes shows up unannounced, and tells Circe that Scylla has been killing and devouring passing sailors. Circe is deeply troubled by this news, considering it to be her fault seeing as she created the monster in the first place, and then, as there isn’t much else to do, sleeps with Hermes to pass the time.
Daedalus (remember him from Ariadne’s myth? He’s the dude who built the labyrinth for the Minotaur) shows up on a boat with instructions from Pasiphae to bring Circe to her in Crete. Our witchy girls jumps at the opportunity to leave her island to see, and maybe kill, Scylla for herself. She fails to defeat Scylla, but is at least successful in helping her sister through the birth of the Minotaur, and then gives it a potion so that it’s only hungry once a year (nicely setting up Ariadne’s myth).
Aeetes’ daughter Medea (blog post incoming for this absolute menace) and her boy-toy Jason turn up next, with pleas that Circe cleanse them for their sins. When she does this, they reveal that Medea killed her own brother in order to slow down her father’s pursuit after they took his golden fleece. Circe invites Medea (another witchy gal) to live with her on Aiaia so they can practice their magic together. Medea is extremely rude in her refusal, and takes off with Jason soon after.
Loads of nymphs start arriving; apparently word has got around that Aiaia is the place to send your misbehaving daughters who are bringing shame down on the family name.
Lost sailors start arriving on the island. She invites the men on the first ship into her house, and they thank her by raping her. After that, she turns every man who steps foot over her doorstep into a pig, which I think is a completely valid reaction ngl. When Odysseus shows up on his way home from the Trojan War, however, he waits behind before going to Circe’s house, effectively outsmarting her. They quickly become friends, and Circe turns all his mates back into humans, and promptly becomes her lover, which I can’t imagine his friends being overly happy about.
That’s the end of that absolutely unhinged list.
Odysseus chills on the island with Circe for a year (yes, the very same Odysseus from the Odyssey who tried his very best to get home as quickly as he could to his waiting wife and child), before leaving to continue on his ten year long holiday. Unbeknownst to him, he leaves Circe behind with his child in her belly.
Later, Circe births a baby boy, Telegonus. Athena shows up and demands the baby, and Circe says absolutely not??? Leave us alone. And casts an enchantment on the island to hide her and her baby from the goddess. But when Telegonus turns sixteen, he demands to be allowed to go and find his father. Circe is powerless to refuse, and pops off to grab a huge, ancient stingray tail from under the sea to give to her son to keep him safe on his journey.
Telegonus comes back with Penelope and Telemachus, Odysseus’ wife and other son, and tells his mother that he accidentally killed his father; when Telemachus refused to avenge his fathers’ death him and his mother had to flee the angry citizens of Ithaca. They live peacefully on the island for a while, until Athena shows up again and demands to speak to them.
Having loved Odysseus, their father, the goddess offers both of his sons a powerful kingdom in the West. Telemachus refuses, but Telegonus accepts. Circe sends her son off, and decides she too wants to see the world, so summons her dad (that’s Helios, the sun god), demanding that her exile be lifted. He agrees, and she leaves with Telemachus to travel the world while Penelope stays on Aiaia to look after it.
Together, Circe and Telemachus kill Scylla, travel the world (and become lovers along the way), before finding the place where she found the pharmaka right at the start of her journey.
The ending of the book, I think, is very cool. Circe consumes the pharmaka, knowing it will transform her into what she truly is: the essence of her, hoping that it will make her mortal so she can live out the rest of her days with Telemachus on Aiaia. The book ends there, without the reader knowing the outcome of her consuming the pharmaka, which I loved.
To make a long story short, Circe had an absolute time of it.
SOME ART
Hello and welcome back to the JWW fan club. This week we will be staring at this interpretation of Circe until our eyes fall out of our heads. Peep Odysseus in the mirror behind her!! And the lions on her seat?? I’m unwell.
Double JWW alert! I couldn’t help but put this one in too, mainly because he has Circe riding a giant catfish??
This painting captures a younger ‘jealous’ Circe, poisoning Scylla’s bathing water. The intensity in her gaze is absolutely crazy; I adore this painting.
Not to rock the boat or anything, but I can’t decide if I like this one or the second JWW one more. Sorry John. I don’t know much about this piece, apart from that I want it hanging up in my living room.
Her wrap that looks like fairy wings?? The red flower petals which look like blood, paired with the tiger pelt?? The metaphors are flying around every which way, and I love it. 10/10 Wright, good job buddy.
Breaking news, this just in, John did a THIRD painting of Circe?? And this one has a leopard, and the loom in it?? This looks kind of like me trying to do my science homework.
THE END
To finish with, here’s a cool article Madeline Miller wrote on depictions of Circe in art overtime.
I hope you found this at least vaguely entertaining, and/or informative, and as always, thank you so much for reading. Also, before you go, remember to check out
and !!Mariella just posted a great feature on Van Gogh, if you’re an art lover (and I know you are, you’re part of the JWW fan club).
See you next time!
I’d say more, but I can’t find my cufflinks.
I limit my time on Substack to 15 minutes, but I always extend to read your column!
JWW works are awesome. Kamala Harris should have used the lion loving Circe as a campaign poster- cat ladies indeed. But you dated the first photo as 1981, which would be remarkable if true!