dolorosa_12 | Following those pomegranate seeds (Reply)

Day Twenty-Six: Favourite classical female character (from pre-20th century literature or mythology or the like)

Persephone (Greek mythology)

Look, I'm unapologetic about this. I love any and every iteration of this character (well, maybe not Twilight). There's something so powerful about a mother-daughter relationship that's used to explain the changing of the seasons. There's something powerful about the story of a woman who passes into an underworld, and is transformed and changed. I find it hard to articulate why I love this story so much, and I fear being misinterpreted when I say I identify with Persephone, but it's true. I've always been obsessed with crossing-places, turning points, identifiable moments of profound change, and with visible markers of transformation. As long as I can remember I've looked backwards to identify those tiny moments in my life which had reverberations for years afterwards, which unintentionally shaped and changed me. That's what Persephone means to me.

This post by

catvalente says it so much better than I ever could.

I can't leave this question without also mentioning biblical figures such as Esther, Leah and Ruth, and Briseis from the Iliad, whose stories have very personal resonances for me for various reasons.

Day Twenty-Seven: A female character you have extensive personal canon for
Day Twenty-Eight: Favourite female writer (television, books, movies, etc.)
Day Twenty-Nine: A female-centric fic rec
Day Thirty: Whatever you’d like!

Some other cool links today: a friend of mine, Ellie Barraclough (who was a PhD student with me at Cambridge and now has a permanent post at Durham), did a radio programme on 'The Supernatural North", featuring Philip Pullman and A. S. Byatt. In more Pullman news, he's releasing a new short story set in the His Dark Materials world. And I'm going to be raiding this list at