The Trojan Women

by Anne Carson, Rosanna Bruno (Illustrator), Euripides

Here is a new comic-book version of Euripides’s classic The Trojan Women, which follows the fates of Hekabe, Andromache, and Kassandra after Troy has been sacked and all its men killed. This collaboration between the visual artist Rosanna Bruno and the poet and classicist Anne Carson attempts to give a genuine representation of how human beings are affected by warfare. Therefore, all the characters take the form of animals (except Kassandra, whose mind is in another world).

Genres: Graphic Novels, Comics, Classics, Fiction, Plays, Mythology, Poetry

96 pages, Hardcover

Published May 25, 2021

About the author

Anne Carson is a Canadian poet, essayist, translator and professor of Classics. Carson lived in Montreal for several years and taught at McGill University, the University of Michigan, and at Princeton University from 1980 to 1987. She was a 1998 Guggenheim Fellow, and in 2000 she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. She has also won a Lannan Literary Award.

Carson (with background in classical languages, comparative literature, anthropology, history, and commercial art) blends ideas and themes from many fields in her writing. She frequently references, modernizes, and translates Ancient Greek literature. She has published eighteen books as of 2013, all of which blend the forms of poetry, essay, prose, criticism, translation, dramatic dialogue, fiction, and non-fiction. She is an internationally acclaimed writer. Her books include Antigonick, Nox, Decreation, The Beauty of the Husband: A Fictional Essay in 29 Tangos, winner of the T.S. Eliot Prize for Poetry; Economy of the Unlost; Autobiography of Red, shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Award and the T.S. Eliot Prize, Plainwater: Essays and Poetry, and Glass, Irony and God, shortlisted for the Forward Prize. Carson is also a classics scholar, the translator of If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho, and the author of Eros the Bittersweet. Her awards and honors include the Lannan Award, the Pushcart Prize, the Griffin Trust Award for Excellence in Poetry, a Guggenheim fellowship, and a MacArthur Fellowship. Her latest book, Red Doc>, was shortlisted for the 2013 T.S. Elliot Prize.

Reviews

[s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all] · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wish I were as cool as Anne Carson. I’m not. Nobody can be, Anne Carson is the coolest and Anne Carson does what Anne Carson wants. And I get to read it. If whatever she wants is a graphic novel “retranslation” of Euripides’s The Trojan Women, she’s gonna do it and you bet your ass I’m gonna read it. And love it, because this is so bonkers and brilliant I can’t help but gush about how cool Anne Carson and this book are. Through a loose, crude yet engaging and expressive art style from Rosanna Bruno, Carson brings Euripede’s tale from the stage to a visual landscape populated by…well dogs, cows, cats, crows and such all engaged in a Greek tragedy of suffering, slavery and societal collapse following the Trojan’s defeat in the Trojan War. You read that correctly.

To the victors go the spoils they say, and Carson’s uniquely astute adaptation examines how horrifying a reality this is from the perspective of the women being carted off to serve the Greeks while still mourning loved one and the overall catastrophic loss of life and livelihoods in the city of Troy. It’s a harsh tale told in a harsh yet oddly hilarious and beguiling fashion that only Anne Carson could pull off.

Bit of a bummer in ole Troy these days

Troy has been sacked, the men have been slaughtered, and the Greek’s are divvying up the women as their prize at the start of Carson’s The Trojan Women. The way the citizens of Troy are portrayed as gangly cows or Hekabe, the central figure of the tale, as an old, beaten down sled dog really drives home the message of the novel that the losing side are little more than cattle to the victors. Though the visual entertainment does not stop at cows and crows because we have Poseidon represented as a giant wave, Andromache and Astyanax as trees, for some reason Athene is a *checks notes* giant pair of overalls with an owl mask, Helen is a sultry dog but also a hand mirror, and Menelaos is ‘some sort of gearbox clutch or coupling mechanism.’ Why? Because Anne Carson can and Anne Carson fucking will. She’s a scholar, guys, okay? And undoubtedly the smartest person in any room she walks into, she can do what she wants.

It’s kind of great and its just wild enough to work. Oh, so Kassandra isn’t an animal and is the only human character appearing…because her ‘mind is in another world’ and is being all batshit with fire and fantasizing her captive romance. Why not I guess. Because everything else is wildly bleak. And so much cruelty for the sake of cruelty. I mean, even the gods—ESPECIALLY the gods—are just going to ruin your day or kill your dad for laughs. Such as the plan between Athene and Poseidon that awaits the Greeks (no spoilers, friends who have read The Odyssey).

‘They need a lesson! Why?
Because they broke something of ours.
Because they squeak when they die.
Because we CAN.’

And yea…that’s pretty much everyone’s mentality here. NOT AWESOME. But the book? Awesome. It shouldn’t work. Like, you look at this and think “what the actual hell?” but then you remember that “what the actual hell is this?” tends to be the first reaction to anything Anne Carson. And then you remember how amazing it always is. The same applies here.

It’s a great little story where pretty much everything is horrible. Andromache is sent off to be the sexual “prize” for Pyrrhus, Achille’s douchey son, Odysseus insists that Andromache and Hektor’s little boy be killed for…morale I guess?...and Hekabe has lost literally everything including her will to live and is sustained solely on spite and hatred for Helen. Which is fair.

The Trojan Women from Anne Carson and Rosanna Bruno is a strange yet satisfying graphic novel adaptation of Euripedes that pushing into the weird as a way to allow the themes and hardships to resonate with greater range. It’s a book you’ll pick up and say “what the hell?” but then “ooooh” and “ooooo” and “aaaaaah” and, finally, “Thank you, Anne Carson, you are brilliant.” Thank you Anne Carson, you are brilliant.

4/5

[prashant · Rating 4 out of 5]

leave me with the stones. i’m made of stones. i weep stones. and when i’ve wept all the stones there are, i’ll be done.

such a unique way to present a tragedy i loved this anne carson is a genius

[Ksenia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unsurprisingly excellent, I was waiting for this one. Anne Carson is a splendid Euripides translator, she understands and speaks his dramatic language, bar none; occasionally - makes it better (like in this case, due to the fact that "Trojan Women" is not exactly a masterpiece of tragedy). Loved the illustrations and overall artistic direction as well. Reimagining classics is what keeps them fresh and exciting and there is no such thing as too much great drama.

[bird · Rating 4 out of 5]

kind of messy..... just like WAR

[Rosamund Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is Carson's interpretation of Euripides' The Trojan Women, as illustrated by Rosanna Bruno. Plays and comics have a lot in common, both being forms that marry the visuals and dialogue, and both can work with broad or small palettes. Rosanna Bruno's illustrations are loose, spontaneous and gestural: they give the play a sense of immediacy, as though the action is taking place right now, almost too quickly to be captured. Though many of the interpretations of characters are quirky or unexpected, such as Andromache appearing as a poplar sapling, or Athene as a pair of overalls, Bruno captures the poignancy of these images, as well as their irony. Carson's interpretation of this story is also admirable: her poetry is vivid and clear, and captures the atmosphere of a city devastated by war. It feels brutally relevant: these characters wait in a camp for their future to be decided by forces beyond their control, unable to protect their children. Carson presents the facts starkly and without authorial comment, making the story feel both immediate and eternal. Though there are imperfections both in the text and in the images, overall I thought this was an impressive achievement, much more so than many of the other modern interpretations of the women of Troy.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was just meh, unfortunately.

It was amusing to see Helen turned into a fox and a hand mirror, Hekabe, “Top Bitch” a sled dog, Athene, literally an owl head in a pair of overalls.

I’m sure it’s all impossibly witty but I didn’t get it. Missed the point. Don’t care enough to dig for the point.

Also I wished the drawings had color.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

The art style is either deliberately obtuse or just plain bad. Not sure it matters. Either way, it oozes laziness, and is so grating on the eye it manages to distract from and deaden the remarkably energetic and dynamic text it accompanies, which is the death of any comics collaboration.

[James · Rating 2 out of 5]

I read a good review somewhere of this graphic version of The Trojan Women, doubtless by way of one of my classics-nerd Facebook follows. I'm a fan of both Euripides and the graphic format and I generally like an irreverent take, so I was anticipating this read with some pleasure. I read the Richmond Lattimore translation beforehand, somewhat to prepare but mostly because I'm a completist who is working his way through the tragedies, and I watched the superb Michael Cacoyannis film , and I'm glad to have experienced both of those, but the graphic version itself didn't really seem to have been worth anyone's time: Anne Carson's, Rosanna Bruno's, or mine.

I guess that's unduly harsh, but I found the text tin-eared and awkwardly contemporary (Ganymede is described at one point as the "buttboy" of Zeus, which is accurate enough, I suppose, but the casual homophobia is jarring and I didn't understand the point) and the drawings graceless, weird and kinda contemptuous of the text. The Trojan women are all dogs* and cows (uhh, pick one), Helen is mostly a fox (natch), but sometimes a mirror, Menelaus is a gear box and Athene is a set of coveralls and an owl mask. Aphrodite and Hera, though, look like badly drawn Disney princesses. WTF?!? Was Bruno swinging for the Maus fence? She couldn't've whiffed more completely.

So, the only good thing about this self-consciously "edgy" snooze is that it pointed me toward better versions of a terrific play that could not be more relevant right now as Afghan women experience the terrible consequences of opportunistic, West vs. East adventuring.

*I will admit that this choice sorta worked for Hecuba, who spends a good chunk of the play lying in the dirt.

[Gareth Reeves · Rating 2 out of 5]

This isn't, and doesn't pretend to be, an introduction to Euripides' play. It's almost the opposite: an obscurely witty retelling that James Joyce might have liked. For me, most of it fell a bit flat, and the overall effect was muted. I bought it based on (a) the opening page and (b) the fact that it was translated by Anne Carson. It's not Euripides' best play (Medea, Bacchae, Hippolytus - take your pick), but it didn't seem to have any power at all, awkwardly comic and obscure. Rosanna Bruno's decision to use animals/objects to represent people/gods is a divisive one, and her drawings are sketchy. The review in the TLS said the translation closely matched the playwright's style in Ancient Greek; if so, it is pretty garish in modern English. I'll read the play in a different modern translation and perhaps revisit this later.

[Kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collaboration of an economical poetic text by the eminent classics scholar and translator Anne Carson and raw, powerful illustrations by Rosanna Bruno, was an absolute pleasure to read and absorb. The retelling of Euripides play captured the suffering and the absolute surreal existence of those who survive on the losing side of a war. I'm not sure how effective it would be for people unfamiliar with the original play, but if you have a familiarity with the original text and enjoy imagining re-interpretations of old stories, I highly, highly recommend this version: the images and the language will haunt me for a long time. It's simply a beautiful work.

[kate · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 stars for οιμοι love u anne carson

[Johan Thilander]

Carson är som allra bäst när hon låter sig filtreras genom de grekiska texterna. Snarare än en översättning är detta att läsa både henne och Euripedes - samtidigt och parallellt.

Dramatik i serieformat fungerar förvånansvärt bra, men som någon redan påpekat är det ju två manusbaserade medier.

Fantastisk såklart.

(Läst jämte Emil Zilliacus översättning av Trojanskorna, Euripedes kanske mänskligaste tragedi).

[Online Stig · Rating 4 out of 5]

Otroligt fult tecknad men mot slutet var jag så förförd att jag börja gilla det med!

[Ross Williamson]

dry, like a dull, unused knife

[deniz eilmore · Rating 4 out of 5]

anne carson please leave your husband and marry me please please please

[Chris Via]

Video review, along with Nox and H of H Playbook : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xo4Mf...

[Justine Cucchi-Dietlin · Rating 1 out of 5]

Not a fan of this manifestation of the play. Although many of the insults hit their mark, such as Zeus' cupbearer Ganymede being called a "butt-boy," it still felt odd and out of place. The art style was also not for me.

[Nicole · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another perfect Carson translation paired with what feels like a production with some strong directorial choices. The closest thing to a play on a page.

[casually_20th_century · Rating 4 out of 5]

The text by Anne Carson was amazing — she is basically God to me but I just did not love the art style.

[Tessa · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anne Carson branches into graphic novels?? Effervescent. Also sad. The play is, as they say, a tragedy.

Loved Andromache as a tree split down the middle => Astyanax is a sapling cut down too soon. Athena as a pair of "Warhartt" overalls with an owl mask (this is so funny I will never not love this). Wonderful illustrations. I think this is a really good medium for plays!!! More ppl should do dramatic poetry as graphic novels pls

[Lucía C. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Impresionante versión, dolorosa e irónica, que demuestra el profundo conocimiento por parte de Carson de la obra de Eurípides, de cuya traducción parte para construir una nueva visión desde el s.XXI.

[Annina Luck Wildermuth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I enjoyed the translation--it felt fresh and it flowed and it makes me want to read another version of Euripides' "Trojan Women". I found the graphic component odd and didn't think it enhanced the text. I did not agree with many of the choices for characters.

[Nelson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Trojan Women is probably no one's pick for best play by Euripides. On the other hand, there is nothing by Anne Carson that is without interest. Maligned unfairly by those who ache for the stilted pieties of the old Lattimore / Grene editions (U of C Press) of the Greek plays, Carson is a vibrant translator who reaches for striking images and metaphors to connect to modern readers, yet always anchors her moves in nuanced and empathetic readings of the original text. So it makes perfect sense to pair her powerful renderings of Euripides with an illustrator who isn't going to do a straightforward depiction of gods, mourning women and Greek soldiers. Rosanna Bruno's images occupy an analogously oblique space to the original text that Carson's metaphors do. In short, they are a really fine pairing who manage to render palpable the agony and distress of soon-t0-be-enslaved prisoners of war in ways that earlier translations, with their choral odes and inert but accurate diction failed to do. All translations are by definition interpretations; why not an interpretation via graphic novel that keeps what is weird and strange about Euripides through new verbal and visible means, while fulling conveying the horror of the original text? This stands as a terrific rendition of Euripides and a compelling graphic text. Like everything Carson touches, this is highly recommended.

[Jason Furman · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed and was fascinated by this sophisticated and surreal adaptation of Euripides' play "The Trojan Women" by noted poet and classical translator Anne Carson and illustrator Rosanna Bruno. I did not, however, understand much of it, probably missing many references, and being puzzled by a number of the choices, but maybe one is not supposed fully understand something this surreal.

It starts out with Poseidon depicted as a wave, Troy as an old decaying hotel, and then it starts getting weirder when Athena is an empty pair of overalls. Hekabe is an old mangy dog, Helen alternates between being a fox and a mirror, Andromache and Astyanax are both trees, and then it gets really weird when Menelaos is depicted as a floating "some sort of gearbox, clutch or coupling mechanism, once sleek, not this year’s model."

The underlying play has a lot of weaknesses compared to the best of Greek drama but this was an intriguing and thought provoking way to experience it again. Unlike many simplistic graphic depictions it didn't clarify and simplify but instead moved in the opposite direction, creating some unforgettable images in the process.

[Cassandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an adult I’ve never read a comic before but what Anne Carson creates, I am intrigued by, so this was my first comic as an adult and wow. I was not let down, this is amazing! It is so so innovative, it really speaks to all of Carson’s strengths, her intimate understanding of classic greek texts, her ability to use colloquial language in a way that never diminishes the beauty or complexity of the text, in fact I think it allows the text to exist in a natural and organic way, her humor, her absolute genius. The choices in the illustrations are so insane and perfect, to have Athene as a fox that turns into a mirror, to have Kassandra as the only human, to have Menelaus as a gearbox, etc.
this comic beautifully and heartbreakingly explores the grief and pain of the Trojan women after Troy is conquered by the Greeks, with touching modernized images like a grave with a “#1 dad” sign.
The illustrations themselves are also so good!
Highly recommend this to anyone interested in Greek mythology.

[Rex Libris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This the graphic novel version of the Classical Greek play by the same name. It is an anti-war statement that follows the fates of the Trojan women who survived the Greek sacking of the city. The main characters are Hecabe (the widow of King Priam), her daughter Cassandra (the prophetess of Apollo who is fated to never be believed), daughter-in-law Andromeche (widow of Hector), Helen (the cause of it all).

The author does an excellent job encapsulating the story into the abridged version presented her. Well worth the read to see her translation.

Like many graphic novels, the project goes off the rails with the artwork. Too many artists ruin the imagery with odd symbolism and drawing style. The author represented Athena as a pair of overalls, Menelaus was a set of gears, and Helen was a fox in high heels.

[Joanna Clausen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I hadn't read The Trojan Women by Euripides for many, many years, so I reread it before reading this graphic version. I'm glad I did.

There are things about this book I love: (Troy ". . . crouched on the plain like James Baldwin . . .") and Athene embodied as a pair of "Warhartt" overalls carrying an owl mask, not to mention Hecuba as an "ancient emaciated sled dog of filth and wrath," and my favorite, the chorus of dogs and cows. Things that are bizarre enough to be thought provoking. I had hoped to add this to my beloved collection of art books.

But, my inner English teacher rose to the surface (of Poseidon?) when I read "not" instead of "naught" and "by" instead of "my." My red pen grew enraged. I may need to consign this work of art to the Little Free Library. Alas, proofreading is dead . . .

[Jack Markman · Rating 4 out of 5]

The most haunting comic I've ever read (admittedly, not stiff competition). Anne Carson flexes once again her masterful use of language to draw out the grief and tragedy for the women at the fall of Troy. Her terse, modern style is perfectly paired with Rosanna Bruno's rough, archaic/crude illustrations, painting a troubling picture of human cattle at the end of the slaughter. I imagine dark pleasure was had by both Carson and Bruno that in visualizing the inspiring work (tragedy) as a comic (comedy), the primal Greek genres are flipped on their heads. Much like Troy, I would suppose.

While I don't think it is a work I would return to, it is a good read and an excellent catalyst for anyone who thinks that the ancient classics lack any remaining power to move us. War makes beasts of us all.

[Emery Pallas · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you like Anne Carson's translations, then you'll like the translation here. If you're a stickler for a more literal translation of the Greek, then you'll probably hate that she uses more modern words and concepts (the art does too). That said, Carson captures the feeling and flow of the Trojan Women extremely well. The art style also won't be for everyone. It's messy, confusing at times, the way people are depicted is symbolic instead of literal. I think that goes extremely well with what the Trojan Women is about though. It's a messy, confusing, horrific event where the women are being treated as commodoties instead of people. I think this translation and art are exceptional at depicting the Trojan Women in a way that can resonate with people.

[Anetq · Rating 4 out of 5]

Recreation of Euripides' The Trojan Women - which I wasn't familiar with. Telling the story of the women of Troy after the war has ended - all represented by animals - dogs and cows mostly. All their husbands and sons have been killed and they are now waiting to be shipped as the greeks' slaves as the spoils of war - to be killed or raped or whatever else might happen.
Unless the gods get them first - as Athene has talked Poseidon into making waves for the greeks as soon as they set sails.
I'm guessing the eternal message through the times is that war might be bad, but it's always doubly bad for the women who suffers no matter who wins or loses...