Powerful Mythic Retelling by Judith Starkston

When I set out to write Achilles’s Wife, my recently released novel of Greek myth retelling, I knew I was working in a well-established subgenre of historical fiction. In recent years, there have been several best-selling novels that reinterpret myths to develop feminist themes. Madeline Miller’s Circe, Natalie Haynes’s Stone Blind, and Costanza Casati’s Clytemnestra are three strong examples.

A Lesser-Known Myth

A lesser-known myth drew my interest, that of Achilles and Deidamia before the Trojan War. In this myth, Thetis, Achilles’s goddess mother, hides Achilles among the women of King Lycomedes’s court on the island of Skyros. She does this to prevent him from going to Troy and fighting in a war she knows will cause his death. Achilles and the princess, Deidamia, have a relationship.

I dug into the tradition to see what character the young woman in the myth would take in my imagination. My style as a writer is grounded in accurate historical context—place and time and culture—so I also needed to find those elements as I explored the mythological tradition.

While we know Euripides wrote a play based on this myth, unfortunately, that ancient source didn’t survive. The other scattered references to the tale of Achilles and Deidamia are just that—brief, fragmentary mentions. The only longish extant version of this myth is found in the Latin writer Statius, who wrote near the end of the classical period, c. 45 – c. 96.

A Not-So-Inspiring Primary Source

Although Homer’s epic poem The Iliad is the source that most likely comes to people’s minds for stories of Achilles and the Trojan War, it turned out Statius was the go-to for this myth. My first novel of Greek myth retelling, Hand of Fire, arose directly in conversation with the brilliance of Homer’s Iliad. Statius, in contrast, offers less emotional depth and resonance. He covers the episode of Achilles and Deidamia in the first book of his unfinished epic the Achilleid in about 30 or so not very skillful pages. I was going to have to pull nuanced characters and richly layered humanity from my own inner resources while using the skeletal mythic structure laid out by Statius and the other references.

Developing a Full Character from a Skeleton

Two examples of how I rejected Statius’s character development while borrowing his plot elements will give you a sense of my process. At the start of his telling, Statius has Achilles’s mother, the goddess Thetis, running around to different gods asking for help saving her son from the eventual death she’s been told will happen if he fights at Troy. Being turned down by everyone, this weak and minor divinity hides Achilles while he’s unconscious in what she thinks of as “shameful feminine attire” because she can’t come up with a better plan. When he awakens, he only agrees to stay in these clothes because he’s seen Deidamia, and in a truly teen moment, wants nothing more than to jump into bed with her and figures he can get close in his silly disguise. The whole tale feels tawdry or comic.

I knew of a different Thetis from the mythic tradition. Not Statius’s dithering minor sea-divinity, but a goddess of great power, whose actions were often vicious and vengeful—and full of meaning and menace in equal measure. I did not want to reduce to meaninglessness her one redemptive emotion, the love for her son and desire to save him at any cost. So, in my version, I returned to her the primordial, pre-Olympian powers hinted across the sources. She is, for example, described as saving Zeus when the other gods try to overthrow him. She is the only one who can call upon the hundred-handed giant Briareos, and with the giant, she releases Zeus from his chains. Any son of hers will be more powerful than his father—even Zeus himself—which explains why the gods force her to marry a mortal so her son can’t take over as king of the gods. A cosmically important mother leads to, in story anyway, an equally significant son, which was far better for my novel.

Banishing a Randy Teenager from My Story

Another example of Statius’s treatment that I found distasteful and not hinted at anywhere else in the bits that come down to us, was Achilles’s behavior toward Deidamia. In Statius, Achilles sneaks into a Bacchic revel, and when he can get Deidamia alone in the woods, he rapes her. In the aftermath, Deidamia is timid and passive. She wants to hide her shame, even after she gives birth to a son. Other than her maidenly modesty and quivering fearfulness at any disturbance, Statius gives us little sense of Deidamia. She’s a prop, and Achilles, while impressive looking with weapons in his hands, is reduced to a randy teenager easily manipulated by his lust for sex and violence.

We wouldn’t have any complete ancient version of this myth without Statius’s Achilleid, so his telling is important, and I used it, but I didn’t have my characters yet, and I didn’t know how I would transform this myth into the tale of Deidamia that I felt trying to emerge.

From Silly to Heartfelt

As I’ve said, Statius and the fragmentary versions of this myth pretend that the biggest, greatest warrior of the age could be effectively hidden by dressing him in woman’s clothes (a disguise that is supposed to fool even those living daily around him). It strains credulity, and indeed, in the modern period this myth has often been done up as a humorous tale of a young man in drag getting the beautiful princess pregnant and fooling no one for long.

That funny version, while good for comic opera, for example, wasn’t the story I wanted to tell. I wanted Deidamia at the center. I took seriously Achilles and Deidamia’s experiences together and had to find a way to tell a heartfelt story with respect, rather than the slapstick that can arise in the traditional versions.

Without a plan, I began an exploratory draft, and a novel solution (pun intended) to the inherent silliness of the extant versions arose under my fingertips. You’ll find that reinterpretation of the myth in the novel’s prologue. It set the tone and themes for the rest of the novel.

Divine Cruelty

My approach involves an act of extreme maternal cruelty (however unintentional the cruelty) by a goddess who doesn’t understand or care what being human feels like. With a “magical” divine transformation from male into female for a disguise, Thetis pushes Achilles into crisis, a conflict that added depth to his character. This reinterpretation of the myth meant Achilles desperately needed support from a friend. The resulting bond between Achilles and Deidamia (or Mia as she goes by in the novel) became integral to the overall story of Mia’s growth and positive transformation as a human being. Mia trusts the friend she knows as the girl Pyrrha. She sees the world through Pyrrha’s eyes, as good friends do. But what she doesn’t know, until she’s already deeply influenced, is that those eyes are actually male, with a male vision of power, leadership, and proper roles for a ruler.

In contemporary life we celebrate the importance of role models. We recognize that a woman in a profession dominated by men will help girls envision themselves taking on that job. But where would an ancient princess find a similar role model? I had found a way to create that within the mythic structure and without anachronism.

I hope you’ll enjoy and find inspiration from this portrait of a Mycenaean princess overcoming challenges that will feel familiar to modern women. The difficulties of motherhood and good governance transcend time.

In an ancient kingdom, a princess takes inspiration from a visiting young woman to challenge her father’s views and reach for leadership—and then discovers her muse is a man.

The goddess mother of Greek mythology’s most famous warrior, Achilles, will do anything to prevent her son’s fated early death. In a desperate move, she hides Achilles, against his will, on an island—disguised in a girl’s body.

Tormented by inner discord, the miscast “girl” befriends Mia, the eldest daughter of the island’s king, launching a transformation of Mia’s own. Armed with a new vision she believes comes from a girl, Mia contends with family secrets, a controlling father, her destiny to rule, and the wrath of a goddess.

When fate reveals Achilles’s identity, a divine mother’s fury drives Mia and Achilles into marriage. Mia must navigate her love for a man with a divided heart and a dangerous measure of immortality. Balancing governance and motherhood, Mia will face an unbearable choice.

Thanks so much Judith. I loved Achilles’s Wife for bringing Princess Deidamia out from the legendary shadows as a forceful presence among Homeric heroes. The pathos of her love affair with Achilles is matched by her heartbreak in dealing with the raging Neoptolemus, her half-divine son, who seeks to match the valour of his famous father. A compelling tale of doomed love, maternal devotion, and inexorable fate. 

I’m looking forward to finding out what lies in store next in the Trojan Threads series. Readers can read my review of the novel at Goodreads.

Images of paintings are in the public domain.