Micro Review 60

 

Argo by Mark Knowles (Head of Zeus)

It is no secret that I love Greece and all of the stories, myths and legends attached to the country. It also no secret how much I enjoy retellings and reinterpretations of these tales for modern readers and so discovering a new version of the Jason and the Argonauts tale got me very excited, and even the whopping 600+ page count didn't deter me.

Sadly this one didn't quite live up to expectation and to mix my legends it felt far more like one of Hercules' labours to finish rather than an edge of the seat tale of epic adventures.

I'm not sure why, the chapters were short and punchy and the over all tale is fascinating. However I wasn't a great fan of the writing style and to get to the end of the novel to find that it didn't cover the whole adventure was the final straw. A definitive translation of the original epic comes in at only 375 pages *including* commentaries and an introduction!

This led me to think about modern versions of the Greek legends and their authors. Many of these new volumes have been by women - Natalie Haynes, Madeline Miller, Pat Barker and Margaret Atwood  to name a few, and I've enjoyed or loved nearly all of these. However Stephen Fry's retellings left me cold, as did Colm Toibin's.

This has made me think about why this could be: 

Not all of them are told by the female characters so it isn't all about giving voice to the unheard characters from the sources. 

They certainly don't shy away from the brutality of the originals so it isn't all about being squeamish either. 

Toibin is an award winning writer while a lot of the female authors are debut novelists so it isn't a straightforward case of experience. 

It isn't even an unconscious bias against male writers in general as I've read and enjoyed translations of the originals and these are by men and the editions I have are translated by men... 

If anyone has any other ideas as to why I'm struggling with the retellings from (modern) male authors - or suggestions of other retellings I could try I'd be grateful to receive them but for now I shall be eagerly awaiting Stone Blind, a new version of the Medusa tale from Natalie Haynes which is due later this year!