#anti Madeline miller

[mythsandheather]

The real question about Greek mythology is who hates it more?

‘Feminist retelling’ authors looking to make a quick buck, Hades/Persephone shippers or DC Comics?

[dootznbootz]

Hi. I'm cyberbullying a long dead poet because of his shitty fanfic. Enjoy. I'd love it if you joined me.

(Before you get mad at me, yes, I know Eugammon of Cyrene is an important figure and all that. I'm sick with some sort of flu. Let me cyberbully an ancient dead fanfic writer in peace.)

[1800naveen]

I hate Greek retellings.

I don't actually hate them like that. I have a few that I love (Percy Jackson, God of war, etc).

Shit like "a Hades and Persephone retelling!" Pisses me off.

Lore Olympus did some damage, fuck Rachel Smythe. Persephone is a self insert of her and Hades is apparently based on Mads Mikkelsen.

AND HOW SHE PORTRAYED APOLLO? He's one of my favorite gods and I don't remember a myth where he "assaulted" someone (correct me if I'm wrong!)

How did she see Apollo and go "I'm going to make him a rapist!" There are a bunch of gods and goddesses who are that, why him?

People had the sheer fucking audacity to attack pagans/witches who work with Apollo. Bitch, it's a real religion/belief that people have been following since the ancient times?

Is this a safe place to say I'm not a fan of Madeline Miller? Circe assaulted Odysseus and Achilles tries to assault Tenes' sister, murdered Tenes, and assaulted Troilus who is Apollo's son in APOLLO'S OWN TEMPLE.

Paris is an icon for putting him down🙏🏾

[alatismeni-theitsa]

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/25/books/greeks-myths-adaptions.html

Westerners never cease to amaze me with their entitlement - this was nearly too infuriating to even read.

Also, honorary mention: “There’s no final word on anything, because language is always changing, so there’s no definitive myth,” said Miller, who is currently working on a new novel about Persephone and Demeter, her mother. “These were fluid texts right from the beginning.”

Said Miller, who twists and bends myths and cultural elements beyond recognition so as to excuse all her inaccuracies and downright murder of the Mythos. Also, it's a known fact that Miller sees Demeter as an oppressive mother and that she bases said belief on British poetry of the 19th century. Therefore, when that monstrosity of a book does come out (where Persephone is twice assaulted by Zeus, no doubt), I honestly wonder how they will find a way to present her portrayal of Demeter as "feministic", especially knowing her previous distaste towards maternal and female familial figures, in general (Thetis, Kirke's mom and sisters etc).

The article is titled "The Women of Greek myths are finally talking back". Which is disgusting because the Women who talk are Western Anglo women and they cover with their voices the voices of modern and ancient Greek women.

They paint our antiquity and our struggle like some type of torture porn and, in the process, ignore how much depth and power female characters were given in our ancient texts.

Those retellings are a cheaply written, stereotyped power fantasy for Western women who use us and our ancestors to feel like they are doing something against the Patriarchy.

[blue-lotus333]

Reminder: Circe is NOT Hermes Ex, that was made up by Madeline miller in her modern book “Circe”. no where in the Odyssey does it say they had a relationship.

[bugwolfsstuff]

Am i wrong?

I have personal beef with Ovid (IF I HAVE TO GET INTO ONE MORE ARGUMENT ABOUT MEDUSA WITH SOMEONE IM SELLING SOMEONE TO ONE DIRECTION), every time I mention him picture me saying it with the exact expression and tone as this:

[memoryyong]

I am so anti Madeline Miller it is insane

(Sorry if it looks blurry, idk how to fix that)

[corvid-ghost]

If I had a nickel for every time Madeline Miller made a rapist into an sa victim in her books to make people like th character more I would have at least 2 nickels. Which isn't a lot but Jesus fuckin Christ stop doing that

[that-guy-in-the-chiton]

When Circe (Homer) Meets Circe (Miller):

[edwinspaynes]

Okay, I gotta do this for my own sanity because it's word vomit time. Song of Achilles rant. 0/5 stars to this one.

Okay. I am not a fan of war stories or of tragedies. This was both of those things. So I will admit that this was perhaps not my genre. THAT BEING SAID, I can usually point to a tragedy or a war story and go "that was objectively good/well-done, but not my thing." This was neither good nor well-done.

The main appeal of this book - its 'heart,' if you will - seems to be the ""love story"" between Patroclus and Achilles. Unfortunately, I'm leaving the book with 0 understanding of what they like about each other. Achilles was lowkey an enormously terrible person. Patroclus KNOWS THIS. He just is an idiot who continuously gives him the benefit of the doubt over and over again. Achilles sends girls off to be raped. He kills an enemy and drags his corpse around for ??? reasons besides he can. Patroclus is sitting there just going "O! His blond cascading waves! Wow!! He is everything to me my SOUL ahhh." Their emotional connection is deeply shallow in how it's written.

ANYWAY fine. Whatever. The narrative also deeply hates women. The only important female characters are a) Achilles's goddess mom who's continuously villified, and b) a slave girl (the only character I actually liked, RIP) who randomly dies at the end for no reason other than shock value. Women are sent off to be raped continuously; the narrative justifies this. I understand that in times of war back in this time period this actually happened, but I am baffled by the author's seemingly constant attempts to portray this POSITIVELY. Achilles himself is just like 'yeah, this girl's a bartering chip!" and Patroclus, while he's not cool with it and does go save the girl, totally rationalizes this and the author clearly thinks it's justified !!????

No.

And let's talk about that shitty ass pacing. Nothing happens!!! For half the book!!! And then they all go to war and the ONLY reason Patroclus is there is because he wants to follow Achilles. Because they share a 'so devoted the lines blur' Bond apparently, like Will/Jem or Charles/Edwin. News flash. They will NEVER HAVE A BOND ABOVE BONDS LIKE WILL/JEM OR CHARLES/EDWIN.

Anyway!!! Whenever Patroclus talks about Achilles, it's just like oH My gOd hE'S bEaUtIfUl. Okay bro!!! We get it!! Y'all have to have sex ALL THE TIME because this is Madeline Miller's shitty yaoi fanfic of Greek Myths!!! Greek myths are deeply gay which is great, but NOT LIKE THIS! It's giving a middle schooler who just finished Junjo Romantica and Percy Jackson and decided to write a crossover fic. And, yes, the prose is that bad. It's so fucking simplistic. I cannot even.

I hated this book. I hated this book painfully. And I cannot believe that I accidentally gave one of my favourite of my own fanfics a title from it. I like, want to go change the title. I just used it because I liked the quote. AUGH.

Would give this negative stars if I could. I do not think I've disliked a book this much since Queen of Air and Darkness, and at least Qoaad had, like, some funny moments and didn't hate women.

[encrucijada]

I love your blog and your hatred for TSOA. Besides the Thetis' dad name and the heroes-constellation thing (and the pressed olives spoof), are there other things she's gotten wrong? I'm new to mythology and want to be critical of what I read, but everywhere I visit it's just praises of her work

patroclus

just. his entire thing

patroclus is a soldier just like achilles. being older than achilles he had experience achilles did not and often counselled him in battle. he handled achilles divine horses and he participated in the war with troy. there is a reason achilles agrees to let him put on his armour and lead the myrmidons in his place: patroclus was good at war. he was a mortal man who managed to kill sarpedon son of zeus. he wasn't weak. he wasn't pathetic. he wasn't a healer. frankly i have no idea where madeline even got that from to include in her book. i tried looking up if there was any mythological info on patroclus as a healer and all i got was that, again, patroclus was a soldier. maybe it's because he was friendly with the camp physician??

also achilles. he loved both deidameia and briseis, or he at least he was attracted to them. madeline bending over backwards to make him gay gave us a blatant disrespect of deidameia which is the only part of the book that made me cry (out of frustration and anger). and turned them sleeping together into a rape scene???? orchestrated by thetis who is Also disrespected because all the women are in this fucking book.

madeline turned thetis into a homophobic mum who doesn't approve of her son's boyfriend, which... i don't think i have to say isn't what happens in the mythology. achilles liked women. he had sex with them. he liked having sex with them. this does not negate he had a romantic and possibly sexual relationship with patroclus.

thetis liked patroclus in the iliad. she offered to look after his corpse and keep it from decaying while achilles returned to battle. also: achilles was the one who asked her to make the achaeans lose because he was disrespected, not the other way around. i also feel the need to say the remaining conflict of shade!patroclus is so funny to me because there is an entire book in the iliad dedicated to his funeral games. the army liked him and gave him a proper burial lol

in regards to neoptolemus (achilles' son) from what i can see him being a heartless brutal killer seems to be a roman invention but this is only from a quick wikipedia read, i could be wrong. though i do remember him being portrayed as the compassionate one when i read philoctetes.

[dootznbootz]

"Girlbosses" 🙃

Understand that I like all these "girlbosses". these are silly

Template down below for friends who wish to add to the collection ｡.ﾟ+ ⟵(｡･ω･)

[random-krab]

I know you're not the biggest fan of Emily Wilson (Me neither) but I'm curious about what you think

Both the Odyssey and the Iliad would've been performed orally by court poets while playing an instrument. Most likely with a lot of pauses and dramatic flare as it's a performance.

Not only does Emily Wilson have extreme bias, she also translates it like it's meant to be READ.

The thing is, neither of these epics were originally meant to be read, always spoken. I think THAT'S part of the reason why it feels so "strange" when I read it alongside the fact that yeah, she's got clear bias. Taking away a lot of the "dramatic flare" to make it simpler to read takes a lot AWAY from these poems!

You Anon are correct, She writes it almost as if it is a novel or a story meant to be read to oneself. I think that's something many modern writers need to correct while translating Epic Poems in general. If it wasn’t for her cherry-picking, biased perspective I do believe that maybe I wouldn’t be so harsh but with the novel-like writing and her choosing to gloss over or paint certain characters (Like Agamenmon or Calypso) in a certain light feels wrong. I’ve mentioned before how much I don’t like her glossing over/minimizing Odysseus’s assault several times but It should be mentioned what she does to Agamemnon while also common is so very incorrect and upsetting. Do not get me wrong Agamemnon is a frustrating character but it’s not fair to write him as some sort of villain. There is truly no villain in the iliad other than the circumstances of war itself. If you look through the Iliad you can find at least one line that makes almost every single character and hero a frustrating and or horrible person. Agamemnon is a confusing, interesting, complex hero, is he the antagonist of Achilles at various points? Yes. But so are Diomedes, Odysseus, Ajax, and practically the entire Greek army. At the highest point of Agamemnon and Achilles' rivalry, Achilles turns his back on everyone by not helping during the war. But yet Emily’s translation makes it seem like Agamemnon is some antagonistic villain who hurts his people, From as far as I know there is no point in which it is mentioned that Agamenom is a bad king to his people in other translations. She wants to build emotion and drama but creating drama but villainizing a character is no way to do so.

I hope that answers your question(?) and I’m sorry for that whole tirade lmao 

[hozieroftroy]

more people (goodreads-wise) have read circe than have read the odyssey...

[blue-lotus333]

There needs to be more circe (by madeline miller) slander

[linddzz]

Think you should write a full on rant about Madeline Miller 😆. You clearly have lots of strong opinions and shouldn’t be scared of upsetting people who love what you hate.

I think it's less scared and more that I've accidentally made friends who like things feel bad when I rant about them, and I don't like making people feel bad!Also snarking on MM is a salt topic I circle back to on my own every so often, so a lot of it is rehashing for me at this point. I can fully understand the desire to see people roasting the thing you dislike though, so I have these links to get you started!

A rant from my Dionysian side blog. This one is mostly aimed at Saints' Ariadne novel, but the rant covers what I hate about the "feminist" retelling trend that I blame Miller for

Here are actual Greek people venting about MM and her style of retellings.

A Review of TSoA that makes my heart happy