Reviewed: Katherine Beutner, Alcestis
Alcestis by Katherine Beutner (Soho Press, 2010)
Originally written around 438 B.C. the classical Euripidean tragedy portrays Alcestis as a modest and devoted wife who sacrifices herself in place of her condemned husband Admetus; selflessly propelling herself into the underworld. For this she is worshipped in traditional mythology as a source of purity, benevolence and as the very essence of the ideal wife.
In her modern retelling of the classic legend, Katherine Beutner weaves together a rich tapestry of fantasy and ancient mythology to portray Alcestis as a complex heroine in her own right and not merely as the wife in the story of Admetus. Our Pennsylvanian author gives the Greek princess a unique voice through which she speaks of her deepest thoughts, desires and experiences from her inception to her death and beyond when she falls into the underworld.
Beutner’s treatment of our protagonist’s motivations bears a starker sense of verisimilitude than the traditional mythology in terms of the historic period in which it is set. Her bleak debut novel demythologises the story of Alcestis and presents her to the reader as a woman in her own right. From her first breath we follow her every move as she is raised by her servants and sisters rarely seeing her patriarchal father Pelias (son of the sea god Poseidon) and king of Iolcus. In childhood she is struck a harsh blow when her beloved sister Hippothoe tragically dies and after this Alcestis harbours strong sentiment towards her and the ultimate hope of one day being re-united in the underworld.
Alcestis’ downfall into the underworld was hastened along when she reached marital age and men from far and wide competed for her hand. It was Admetus who finally triumphed though he was a condemned man doomed to die young but for the divine intervention of an Olympian debtor, the powerful god Apollo. As a young man Apollo was damned to spend a mortal year on earth and it was Admetus who gave him shelter so when Admetus’ time has come, Apollo makes the promise that he may find someone to die in his stead. Admetus is forced to plead with elder friends and family to accompany Hermes down to the underworld in his place and none comes forth, that is until Alcestis offers herself forward.
It is this moment, on the edge of mortality, that Alcestis considers her options. The ethos of her time requires a woman to have a man and so the death of her husband would simultaneously cause her own downfall; she would lose all social standing, respectability and honour. Against her husband’s will, then, Alcestis takes the liberty of departing thereby avoiding a living death. The underworld is both daunting and tantalizing and clouded with forlorn souls including the seductress Persephone. Under the influence of Persephone, Alcestis changes her character decisively, it seems that in death she blossoms into an intriguing, aggressive and wilful woman. The one failing of the novel is after her eventual rescue from the underworld where there is an all-too-rushed conclusion which fails to show how Alcestis takes these qualities back into the mortal world.
However, this is a soulful adaptation of the Greek tragedy which lends our central character the personality and backbone necessary to endure the trials and tribulations she faces. Beutner is keeping pace with a growing interest in the female perspective of traditional texts.
Review by Ruby Kearney
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Also reviewed by Harriet Brown
Alcestis is known from Greek mythology as the archetypal good wife; she loved her husband Admetus so much that she offered herself as a sacrifice to die in his place. Katherine Beutner’s bittersweet retelling puts a feminist spin on the tale, finally giving a voice to one of mythology’s more overlooked characters.
Alcestis tells the story of her life in a society where women’s liberties are strictly curtailed and their destinies decided by the men to whom they are little more than property. The princess Alcestis is just as much a prisoner as the slave girls who tend to her; confined to her rooms and embroidery, her sexuality and virginity are closely guarded. When she comes of age and is put up for marriage to the highest bidder, Alcestis is won by Admetus, King of Pherae, but his love for Apollo casts a shadow over their marriage; disillusioned, she offers herself as a sacrifice out of duty rather than love. But with this death comes a reawakening, as she loses her heart to Persephone, Queen of the Underworld.
Beutner’s ancient Greece is deftly depicted as a place where the divine is normal, where immortals shaped like animals lie in wait to seize unwary maidens, and a refusal to placate the gods can lead to snakes in one’s marriage bed. Lautner’s language is sensual and poetic, and although her unhurried pace starts to drag towards the second half of the book the ending, whilst somewhat melancholy, still offers some hope in the evidence of Alcestis’s increased autonomy. Beutner has written a subtle and subversive book which gives us some insight into a woman whose voice has been silent too long.