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Book Review
May. 3rd, 2012 08:47 pmAlcestis
by Katharine Beutner
This beautiful book retells the Greek myth of Alcestis, who voluntarily dies and goes to the underworld in her husband Admetus' place, and is rescued from Hades' realm three days later by Hercules. Beutner fleshes out Alcestis, giving her a backstory marked by death - that of her mother in birthing her and the later death of her beloved sister Hippothoe, from asthma. She also gives Alcestis and Admetus a more complicated relationship than the bare outlines of the myth suggest: while their marriage is founded on affection and regard, with some flickerings of love, it is complicated by Admetus' affair with Apollo.
The heart of the book, however, deals with a part of the story that the myth never touches on: Alcestis' time in the underworld. There she engages in an ultimately tragic search for Hippothoe, and becomes entangled in her own divine love affair, with Perspehone. That relationship proves to be more complex and fraught than even what we glean of Admetus' with Apollo. Alcestis loves and longs for Persephone even though she resists the goddess' capriciousness and volatility.
Alcestis is a gorgeous read. Beutner's evocation of the ancient world is lovely and as sharply vibrant as the edge of a midday sunbeam on a marble floor. It truly is a world of myth and legend, where seeing and meeting the gods is rare and unusual, but certainly well within the realm of the possible. Her portrayal of Alcestis is intimate and vivid such that her and her voice really got into my head. Yet Beutner does this with prose that has a delicious haziness to it, an almost nostalgic feel. The prose becomes a little sharper, a little more tightly focused when Alcestis is in the underworld, adding to intensity of Alcestis' experiences there.
by Katharine Beutner
This beautiful book retells the Greek myth of Alcestis, who voluntarily dies and goes to the underworld in her husband Admetus' place, and is rescued from Hades' realm three days later by Hercules. Beutner fleshes out Alcestis, giving her a backstory marked by death - that of her mother in birthing her and the later death of her beloved sister Hippothoe, from asthma. She also gives Alcestis and Admetus a more complicated relationship than the bare outlines of the myth suggest: while their marriage is founded on affection and regard, with some flickerings of love, it is complicated by Admetus' affair with Apollo.
The heart of the book, however, deals with a part of the story that the myth never touches on: Alcestis' time in the underworld. There she engages in an ultimately tragic search for Hippothoe, and becomes entangled in her own divine love affair, with Perspehone. That relationship proves to be more complex and fraught than even what we glean of Admetus' with Apollo. Alcestis loves and longs for Persephone even though she resists the goddess' capriciousness and volatility.
Alcestis is a gorgeous read. Beutner's evocation of the ancient world is lovely and as sharply vibrant as the edge of a midday sunbeam on a marble floor. It truly is a world of myth and legend, where seeing and meeting the gods is rare and unusual, but certainly well within the realm of the possible. Her portrayal of Alcestis is intimate and vivid such that her and her voice really got into my head. Yet Beutner does this with prose that has a delicious haziness to it, an almost nostalgic feel. The prose becomes a little sharper, a little more tightly focused when Alcestis is in the underworld, adding to intensity of Alcestis' experiences there.
