I got ‘Memoirs of a Bitch‘ by Francesca Petrizzo many years back when it first came out. It is the story of the events leading up to the Trojan War and what happened during the war. The special thing about the book is that it is told from Helen’s perspective. Once upon a time, there were not many books which retold the old Greek tales from a woman’s perspective. I knew of only three – Cassandra by Christa Wolf, Medea also by Christa Wolf, and The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood. I don’t exactly know why there weren’t more. I always wondered why there wasn’t a book from Helen’s perspective. So when I saw this book at the bookshop, I couldn’t resist getting it. But unfortunately, a period as long as the Trojan War has elapsed before I picked it up to read. It sounds like a cool thing and perfect timing, but I feel ashamed that I waited for so long to read the book.
It was very fascinating to read the story from Helen’s perspective. Helen comes through as a fascinating character, a normal woman who is swept by events beyond her control, and when she tries to do something that she likes and live her own life, it results in the Trojan War. I learnt many things through the book. For example, Helen was from Sparta and her parents were the king and queen of Sparta, and her husband Menelaus was not from Sparta but became the king because he married her. The book also says that Helen and Achilles were lovers and once Theseus kidnapped her and tried to rape her, but her brothers somehow managed to save her. I don’t know whether these two stories are true or they are part of the author’s imagination. I was also surprised to discover that Clytemnestra, Agamemnon’s wife (who plays a major role in Aeschylus‘ play, ‘The Oresteia‘) was Helen’s sister. It was also interesting to discover that Helen’s daughter was called Hermione. I’m wondering now whether Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter series is named after her. When I was a kid, I thought that Paris kidnapped Helen and that is why the Greeks went to war against the Trojans. I was later surprised when I discovered that Helen and Paris actually fell in love and they eloped. Totally different story from what I thought. Later in the story as told in this book, Helen and Paris breakup and Helen and Hector, Paris’ elder brother, fall in love. I don’t know whether that actually happened or whether it is Francesca Petrizzo’s imagination. But I loved the Helen–Hector love story. It was my favourite love story in the book. This book also gives a different version of Achilles’ death, a new story that I’ve not heard of before.
I loved Helen as she was portrayed in the book. My other favourite characters were Hector (loved him, he is such a beautiful soul), Callira Helen’s best friend, Cassandra, and an unknown soldier who comes at the beginning who is Helen’s first love. I’ve always hated Achilles (because he killed my favourite Amazon Penthesilea), but in this book he is very likeable.
The friendship between Helen and Callira is very beautifully depicted in the story and it was one of my favourite parts in the book. In one place, Helen says this about Callira –
“Callira smiled and allowed one single ornament for my arm, a silver bracelet shaped like a serpent. Callira, Callira; a princess among her own people, and if I had been able to bear losing her I would have sent her back to them. But I was selfish, and she was always smiling; not faithful in the normal manner of slaves, but close to me with a closeness I could not explain except by saying I responded to it. We had come together by strange oblique routes, but we belonged with one another.”
Towards the end of the story, when Troy is burning and everything is gone, this scene happens –
“I firmly detached Callira’s clinging hands. ‘If I am still your lady, you must do what I say. Just go.’
She was hesitating, I could see it in her face, but I too had the blood of kings in my veins and the throne had spoken through me. So Callira, slave and friend, my life companion, indeed the companion of all my many lives, let go of my arm, and with a desperation I knew only too well in myself, kissed my hand. ‘Please don’t die,’ she said.
‘We all die sooner or later. But you run off now.'”
I cried when I read that. I knew that they’d never meet again.
‘Memoirs of a Bitch’ is the story of a woman who was pushed along by people around her, and when she decided to do one thing that she liked, and live the life she wanted, two countries went to war and many people died. It was okay if a queen had affairs and a series of lovers. But if she wanted to leave her husband and start a new life with someone, all hell with break loose, and there’ll be war and people will die. That seems to be Helen’s story. If Helen had been an ordinary woman, it would have been easy for her to leave her husband and start a new life with her lover. But as she was a queen, it was hard. Still, she tried. Unfortunately, it ended in tragedy.
I loved ‘Memoirs of a Bitch’. It is one of my favourite reads of the year. When I finished the book, I cried.
Francesca Petrizzo’s writing is beautiful and flows smoothly like a river. Francesca Petrizzo was an undergraduate student when she wrote this book. Since then she has done her doctorate and has become a professor who teaches medieval history. ‘Memoirs of a Bitch’ appears to be her only novel, as she seems to have become a full-fledged academic now. I hope one day she writes another novel. It will be a shame if this is the only novel that she ever wrote.
Sharing some of my favourite parts from the book.
“And so I would go riding, bribing the grooms with gold and jewellery, and calling at poverty-stricken hovels in the foothills of the Peloponnese, where I mingled with shepherds and peasants and women worn down by constant childbearing and hard work. They would offer me water and ask for nothing back. The gods they prayed to had no relation to the gods venerated in the temples. If I had been born like them, I would have died after an anonymous life of exhausting labour and been buried close to the door of my home. They had never expected anything else. It was the only destiny open to them. They had read it in their mothers’ wrinkles and sucked it in with their milk, accepting their destiny just as they accepted their own blood. But for me it had been otherwise. I had had the chance to live a different life, but it had been snatched out of my hands. Of course I was only flesh, bones and skin just like them, but I was also full of regret for what had so nearly happened for me.”
“Patroclus was very young, and like all young men was excited by war. Convinced that somewhere among the dust, spilt blood and entrails, could be found that scrap of straw, that useless bauble, that object of foolish desire : glory – an empty and sinister word to my ears.”
Have you read ‘Memoirs of a Bitch’? What do you think about it?
For some reason mythology has never resonated with me. That aside, I really enjoyed your review! Thank you, Vishy!
Glad you liked the review, Heidi 😊 Sorry to know that mythology has never resonated with you. I love mythology but rarely read retellings. But I’m glad I read this one.
[…] reading Francesca Petrizzo’s book about the story of the Trojan war from Helen’s perspective, I thought I’ll read the original book, Homer’s ‘The Iliad‘. I wondered […]