![]() ![]() When the god Asclepius learns the art of healing, he is able to save the dying and revive the dead. This dual nature – defending and attacking – is the key to understanding Medusa as something more than a monster. By submitting the manuscript, I was leaving them, or allowing them to leave me, these women who had looked after my mind while I was trying to repair my body. I realised that these gorgons were the family I had made to keep me company when I missed my own. It wasn’t just relief at finishing the book (though I had been ill, so that was part of it). When I finished the first draft, in September last year, I cried for two days. I spent the long winter lockdown of 2021 writing a novel about Medusa. No one punishes the rapist god, of course, but Medusa is given snakes for hair. The assault on her body is compounded by a curse from the goddess whose temple her rapist profanes. ![]() Her mortality is described by the poet Hesiod as a wretched condition: her sisters know that she will die while they live on. The three live together, and are devoted to one another. She isn’t a monster, although we have come to think of her that way she is the mortal sister of two immortal gorgons. Medusa’s dual nature is the key to understanding her as something more than a monsterĪncient Greek and Roman sources tell a very different story about Medusa. He who fights monsters, said Nietzsche, should take care he doesn’t become one himself. He holds up her head as a trophy, crushes her ruined body beneath his feet. It is a potent illustration of violent misogyny: even once he has killed this creature, his hatred is not quenched. But, of course, she’s a monster, so we don’t have to worry about her feelings, or her body. The Cellini statue shows Perseus trampling on the torso of the woman he has beheaded. Hillary Clinton’s decapitated face replaced the gorgon head. And, in recent years, the monstrous Medusa has become a default allegory for a hated woman in the public eye.Ī 2016 cartoon of Benvenuto Cellini’s statue Perseus With the Head of Medusa became a hugely influential meme during the US presidential election. But it cemented the idea of Medusa as predator in my mind for a long time. I love this film: it was my first introduction to Greek myth. Perseus has to approach her by looking at her reflection in his shield, and even once he has killed her, she is toxic. He hunts Medusa to a dark cave, and discovers that she is hunting him too: armed with a bow, she picks off his comrade with an arrow, and then petrifies him with her glowing eyes. ![]() Harry Hamlin, as the handsome young hero Perseus, has been sent on a quest to find the head of a gorgon. For my generation, we knew this at a very early age, from the 1981 movie Clash of the Titans. She can destroy you with a single glance. There is no more potent symbol of male fear of the female gaze than Medusa. “Don’t look at her, Johnny! She may turn you to stone!” read the first line of the piece. It was illustrated with Caravaggio’s painting of Medusa, her hair a writhing mass of snakes, her eyes bulging, her mouth open in a silent scream. “A ncient Archetypes, Amber Heard, and How to Avoid Both” read a headline on a rightwing US website in May. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |