Recently I’ve found myself looking hard at the role of women in folklore. It’s not as if there aren’t any: our fairytales are filled with captive princesses, lovelorn mermaids, persecuted beauties. Then there’s the next generation: the jealous Queen. The wicked stepmother. The evil witch. The old crone. But these are never the heroines; they’re always the villains, the scapegoats, the ones with the poisoned apples. It seems that folklore and fairytale is not unlike the modern world: young women are valued by men for their looks; the older ones are mostly just jealous.
In a world of magic, as in the world around us, the one superpower older women share is that of invisibility. The young go on quests and journeys; the older ones plot against them, fatten them up to be eaten, lock them in towers, or sometimes just die on the first page, leaving the young hero or heroine conveniently orphaned, and free to begin their journey.
But where is the mother’s journey? Where are the stories of women with agency and experience? Don’t bother looking; they’re not there. The same goes for diverse love stories; unless you’re young, straight and cis, forget it. And what about all the different kinds of love outside of youthful, romantic love? What about platonic love, or love in old age, or the love of a parent for a child? Don’t go looking for those either. Romantic love is most commonly at the heart of the fairy tale, and thus is generally portrayed as the only love that matters. And once that love has been secured, the happily ever after ending is only a formality, dismissing those later decades in a single, well-worn phrase.
And yet there are so many different kinds of love - the Greeks had at least eight varieties. There’s new love; love in old age; passionate love; playful love. There’s the love one has for a friend; the love of a parent for a child. But Eros, the god of romantic love, is the one who gets by far the most press. He even managed to claim for himself the statue on the south-Western side of Piccadilly Circus, although the statue actually represents his brother, Anteros.
But it has always been thus. Eros is pushy and selfish; Anteros, self-effacing and gentle. So why does the brash and offensive twin always land the best stories? And how would a story with Anteros, not Eros, at its heart unfold?
These were the questions I had in mind when I started writing Orfeia. The original Orpheus legend is very much a story of love; but although there’s no denying the devotion of Orpheus, who travels to the Kingdom of Death to bring back his Eurydice, he is also very much an Eros guy; impulsive, passionate, brave, but also selfish and immature. I wanted my version to look at another side of love. That’s why my version of Orpheus is not a young hero, but an older heroine; and her journey is not a simple rescue mission, but an exploration of memory, motherhood, grief, fantasy, temptation - and ultimately, self-sacrifice.
How different is this story from the traditional source? In some ways, not so different. It’s still a story of love and loss; but it’s more of a song of experience than a song of innocence. And instead of giving the love story to the passionate Eros, it goes to his gentler twin Anteros, so often – like those older women – overlooked and underestimated.
Because mothers, too, have stories to tell. They too have their journey. They too are capable of courage and defiance, passionate love or dreams of romance. Age does nothing to change that. Feelings are universal, and do not lose their potency with time. The heroine of Orfeia is the mother of a young woman in her twenties. It is no accident that I am also the mother of a young woman in her twenties. The experience of motherhood is at the heart of this tale – the love, and also the fear of loss. In Orfeia, Fay loses her child to mental illness and suicide. Thus begins her story; not with the death of the parents, as so many fairy stories begin, but with the death of a daughter; and it takes her on a journey through the real world, Faërie, Dream, and finally to the land of Death, where she must fight for the one she loves, and make an almost unthinkable choice. It’s a story that tells of a battle between Eros and Anteros; between youth and experience. By reshaping it as I have, I wanted to make the original myth a more universal story. I wanted a woman at its heart, not as a trophy to be won, but as an adventurer in her own right. Most of all, I wanted to rebel against that happily-ever-after ending that writes off the stories of later life as unworthy of being told.
Tales of magic and transformation are not just for children. At the heart of the fairytale lies the belief that we can all change our lives, our situations and our world; that we can all fight monsters; find love; experience transformations. Magic in its purest form is just a metaphor for change; and in these times of trouble, we need to believe in our power to change our world; just as we need Anteros, the god of compassionate, selfless love, far more than we need Eros, his selfish twin, who flits from one love object to the next with no thought of the consequences.
Most of all, in a world run by men, we need to tell women’s stories – and not just the stories of those women whose value lies solely in their erotic appeal, or their need to be rescued. I want to tell the stories of those women who rescue themselves; who see further than a Hollywood wedding or a happily-ever-after; who want more from life than just to stay young or to feed poisoned apples to the next generation. Those are the women that interest me most. Those are the unsung heroines. Because a woman who refuses to settle for the traditional role is a woman who can fight monsters; have adventures; go on quests. She is the wielder of magic; of change; and Eros is no match for her.