Feminizing Old Myths

[Dark Muse]

I have recently started reading "The Mists of Avalon" by Marion Zimmer Bradley, which is a retelling of the legend of King Arthur with a focus upon the female characters, seeing things from their point of view. When I first started reading this book and first heard of it, I did not realize that the author had written it with an actual feminist agenda. I simply viewed it as offering an alternative perspective to an often retold myth. And I thought the concept of giving a more in depth look into the minds and hearts of the women and letting them voice their own version of events was an interesting approach. Though I suppose one could argue that the very idea of creating the story from the female point of view if feminist I did not initially see it that way but in reading remarks and reviews on the book several people did mention how the book was in fact intended to be a feminist take upon the legend which that in itself does not really bother me so much. I am enjoying the reading.

Than I was telling a friend of mine about the book I was reading and he mentioned this book he read that was a recreation of the story of Robin Hood, he could not recall what it was called but it portrayed the idea that Marian was in fact a better archer than Robin Hood but Robin Hood ends up getting all the fame because of a fluke lucky shot. And I have to admit I was kind of put off by that idea because Arthurian lore and the Legend of Robin Hood are two of my favorite things, and that seemed to me too much of a deviation from the traditional myth. I admit I can be a bit of a "purist" at times.

But this got me thinking on the tendency to rewrite these legends and myths that were created during very patriarchal times and cultures and "modernizing" them by transforming them into works of feminists propaganda and feeling that need to take the female characters within these stories and elevate them to be either equal to or superior over their male counterparts while marginalizing the male characters.

Now naturally I am not against either feminism or recreating, and reinterpreting old lore and myths and there is nothing wrong with wanting to explore and give voice to characters that might have originally been kept more in the shadows and the background and see things from different points of view.

But at the same time it does make me wonder is there an actual validity in this feminizing of stories that come out of a predominately male run society, or is it just a way of taking pot shots at these dead patriarchies and lashing out, or a way of granting the women of these stories their revenge.

I myself have mixed feelings about what I think about such tendencies. A part me is of the point of view that as long as the story is good, than I will simply read it and enjoy and don't really with what agenda it may have been written. But being that I do have a long time devolution lore and mythology and as a lover of history a part of me feels that it does show a lack of understanding or regard for the culture in which these stories were originally crafted.

[PeterL]

I think that the ancient Greeks thought about the same thing, and the character of Medea was one result. There were quite a few strong female characters in ancient myths, so there isn't much point in making those feminist.

The Robin Hood stories are mostly stories iin that theme that have no relationship with the original Robin Hood, so it doesn't make much difference . There is a core of historical fact in the Arthurian stories, but there too people have writtn all sorts of things, so much so that it doesn't make any difference whether there was a core of fact.

It is a pity that ignorant women don't realize that women ran the world without most men even noticing it, until they started trying to make their power overt.

[kiki1982]

That Robin Hood thing was going a bit far, I find, but as long as it still respects the stories, it's fine to me. Mind you, my husband actually thinks (I suppose he still does) that these Mists of Avalon are actually history :lol:. I have tried to tell him millions of times, but he doesn't want to believe me :lol:.

Well, what can you do ;).

But as far as 're-telling' from a female perspective goes, actually the whole Arthur thing was devised in the courtly love period in the 14th century (?). Before this, there were some very vague references to someone who had won a great battle on a mountain, not named, and that was it. And then there came a great Flemish person who wrote it all down 'well and truthfully', that was translated in French and the whole thing got out of hand. Guinevere and Merlin were introduced and the courtly love, Lancelot and the rest could take their course and quests and what-not.

The thing is that courtly love put the woman at the centre of everything without actually naming her. Where women literally still got slapped around in earlier days (there are actuall references to a woman being beaten until her nose bled :eek: in Karel ende Elegast, one of the stealing Charles the Great stories), suddenly they were these tender creatures you made poems for, were on your best behaviour for, you did great deeds for, etc. All those men swarmed around their ladies and bettered themselves for them (where have we seen that romantic notion before ;)), so in a sense, who was really running the story and those men's lives? Re-telling from a female perspective is actually repeating the same, really, only more blatant.

[dfloyd]

I somehow doubt this, although the movie about Robin and Marian in their latter years, with Sean Connery and Audrey Hepburn, puts Maid Marian, now a nun, in the driver's seat.

There is no doubt though that women excell over men in many aspects. two things come to mind: the wearing of nylons and high heels.

[JCamilo]

Well, to be honest, Artur is not an accient myth from patriarchal age. In fact, in some versions, Morgana was very important, more than in Mist of Avalon, but anyways, it is not original. Tennyson poems were already from women point of view and Ovid did already a lot of work from old myth from Women point of view. It is not a problem or new if welll done.

[Ecurb]

In fact, the Greek myths were often reinterpretations of older myths, and the older myths often emphasized the Goddesses more than the Gods. Cults worshipping Goddesses who morphed into Hera preceded those worshipping Zeus. Medusa, the snake-haired monster whom Perseus slew with the help of Athena and Hermes, has her origin in older myths, where she is a goddess, not a monster. So it we can accept the "masculinist" interpretation of the Greeks, we should probably accept femminist interpretations.

I haven't read it, but "The Wide Sargasso Sea" is a prequel to Jane Eyre, told from the point of view of the mad wife in the attic.

[themiddleprince]

Medea, Antigone and such are tellings that relate major events from the point of view of the women whose role is often overlooked. What they have in common is in exerting control over the female role without diverting from it. Marian as a better shot than Robin is just tomboyism. The UK kids TV series "Maid Marian and Her Merry Men" did a similar thing with great humour and panache. What the TV series also did was subvert some other social assumptions too.

The whole point of Brecht's epic theatre was to view "great" events from "small" perspectives, an idea that is the staple of most modern literature...albeit it more often than not middle class "small" perspectives.

Whether overlooked for reasons of gender, race, ethnicity, education or economic means, in the end it's all just class war...

[Dark Muse]

Medea, Antigone and such are tellings that relate major events from the point of view of the women whose role is often overlooked. What they have in common is in exerting control over the female role without diverting from it. Marian as a better shot than Robin is just tomboyism. The UK kids TV series "Maid Marian and Her Merry Men" did a similar thing with great humour and panache. What the TV series also did was subvert some other social assumptions too.

The whole point of Brecht's epic theatre was to view "great" events from "small" perspectives, an idea that is the staple of most modern literature...albeit it more often than not middle class "small" perspectives.

Whether overlooked for reasons of gender, race, ethnicity, education or economic means, in the end it's all just class war...

I think that just telling something from a female point of view and acutally conveying a feminist message are two different things. And I do not want to be mistook for saying that they are one in the same.

As with the example of The Mists of Avalon. I originally thought it was simply a way of telling the story from a female point of view, which that in itself I do not necessary consider to be "feminist"

But according to other people the author wrote the book with an actual feminist agenda that goes beyond the simple telling of it from the woman's point of view but acutally insinuating a feminist message within the story.

As for example at the period of time in which the story takes place it was the common norm for men, particuarly kings and ruling lords in which having male heirs was important, to engage in varrious different affairs and sleep with whomever they wanted. But women on the other hand were expected to remain virtuous, and faithful, and could potentially be punished by death if caught in the act of adultery.

But in the book in the marriage of Margouse and Lot, Margouse is notorious for having all of these open affairs that everyone including her husband knows about and Lot takes her council on how to rule his kingdom and they have this very liberated marriage that is much more of an equal partnership.

And one of the other characters has this moral dilemma with herself about whether or not she should terminate her pregnancy.

So while on the actual telling of the story the book does not really deviate from the myth in dealing with the inner thoughts of the characters and the daily lives of the women and such it does seem to approach a lot of women's issues with a modern eye.

And it does make the male characters as sort of second fiddle to the female characters. Merlin is sort of transformed into a side kick of Lady Vivian.

[themiddleprince]

I agree completely that "feminist" and "female perspective" are very different.

Female perspective throws familiar history and events into a fascinating new light. The natural next step is to highlight people who expand the expected "female role".

Feminist writing, like all politically inspired art, too often gets involved in telling the message rather than the story. Marian as a better archer than Robin - I'd want hell of a good back story to explain that, or it's just trite.

[JCamilo]

You wont find feminism of today on the past obviously. Medea for example, is not a feminist perspective or a female perspective. In fact she is every bit a histerycal woman who cann't accept her husband right to trade her for a younger girl. Hecuba and The Trojans are plays that truly voice female concerns (as they are not warirors, but mothers).

In many aspects, Ovid Heroides is feminist, not just giving female voices, as talking about their concern. But Tennyson is clearly putting feminism in the table. It is not his only work where he discuss the subject even.

[Lokasenna]

What an interesting thread!

There's been a fair bit written about the females of Arthurian literature. I recently ordered a copy of Carolyne Larrington's King Arthur's Enchantresses: Morgan and her Sisters in Arthurian Tradition, and look forward to when I'll have a chance to read it. Carolyne also wrote The Feminist Companion to Mythology, which could be interesting for you.

Personally, I'm always drawn to the female characters in myths and folktales - my PhD thesis is on the negotiation of supernatural female power in Old Norse myth.

I don't think the stories need re-writing or updating. Partly that's because I'm a purist, but also because there are plenty of strong, interesting women already in evidence in medieval literature. You ask anyone who, for example, knows a lot about Old Norse literature who the most interesting characters are, and I would bet they'd rattle off names like Gunnhildr konungamóðir, Guðrún Ósvífsdóttir, Guðrún Gjúkadóttir, Hervor Angantyrsdóttir and so on. While these stories might have been produced by patriarchal societies, that doesn't prevent them from being peopled with strong, independent women whom the modern feminists can identify with.

[G L Wilson]

The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood is a feminine take on the myth of Odysseus. If you know something of Homer, it could be worth a look-see.

[themiddleprince]

What an interesting thread!

You ask anyone who, for example, knows a lot about Old Norse literature who the most interesting characters are, and I would bet they'd rattle off names like Gunnhildr konungamóðir, Guðrún Ósvífsdóttir, Guðrún Gjúkadóttir, Hervor Angantyrsdóttir...

I'd have to cover my drink with my hand while they rattled away I think...