Abstract
Madeline Miller’s Circe, Miller considers varying perspectives on a well-known character—one who has been vilified as a monster, recast as a feminist icon, and rewritten into a variety of spaces in between. As part of this continuous narrative, Miller draws on the inherently hybrid space of Circe’s character to construct her as a product of her multi-faceted lineage. A character with so many identities makes for a complicated subject, but Miller utilizes this plurality to her advantage, deliberately casting Circe as a product of multiple backgrounds—occupying both the space of oppressor and oppressed—to both compound her status as a liminal being and to further demonstrate her trauma response to oppression. This paper will adopt a multidisciplinary perspective to a literary text, implementing the role of women’s silence in mythology, liminal spaces, and the process of overcoming generational trauma to consider the implications of Miller’s character.
Recommended Citation
Stucky, Emily
(2024)
"Cultural and Personal Inheritance: Generational Trauma in Madeline Miller's Circe,"
The Cardinal Edge: Vol. 2:
Iss.
1, Article 5.
Available at:
https://ir.library.louisville.edu/tce/vol2/iss1/5
Included in
Classical Literature and Philology Commons, Modern Literature Commons, Psychology Commons, Women's Studies Commons
