Circe and Till We Have Faces - Kate Bennett

 As I was reading Till We Have Faces, I noticed a plethora of similarities to Madeline Miller’s fiction work, Circe. In this story, Miller recounts the Greek myth The Odyssey, but from the point of view of one of the characters Odysseus encounters on his travels - a woman named Circe. Like Orual from Till We Have Faces, Circe was constantly degraded and made to believe she was ugly by those around her, especially that of her father. This distaste for Circe was so strong that he eventually banished her to the island of Aenea, where Odysseus would sail upon her and stay for several years. Moreover, the story of Circe is told in Circe’s point of view, just as Till We Have Faces is told in Orual’s point of view. This kind of transparency is incredibly empowering, considering both of these women were distorted to be perceived as bad people, while their recollection of it all proves completely different. For Circe, The Odyssey myth painted her to be a vengeful witch that seduced Odysseus into staying on the island for an inconveniently long time. Taken from her own account, however, it was Odysseus that was ultimately malicious toward her and her island. Similarly, it was not necessarily Orual that was wronged in Till We Have Faces, but the intense disruption that the separation from Pscyhe induced is also a painful account for women. Deprived of the only companion Orual had, she is determined to tell her own story, and provide her own account of the injustice that was brought upon her family. Ultimately, I absolutely love Circe, and the connections it makes to Till We Have Faces, so processing this story has been incredibly fulfilling. I greatly enjoy these kinds of myth retellings and I’m glad I got to incorporate the fiction work that I loved prior to this class into the content that I am learning now. 

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