Conversations: Charybdis, a Gaping, Hungry Hole; Fear of the Monstrous Woman w/ Cosi Carnegie

Published Mar 29, 2024, 7:00 AM

Liv is joined by Cosi Carnegie to talk all things horny (boob cups! the threat of a sexual woman! all the erotic pottery you can imagine!) Follow Cosi on Instagram; read more from her; and learn more about Propylaea Productions! Help keep LTAMB going by subscribing to Liv's Patreon for bonus content!

CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. Given it's fiction, and typically involves gods and/or monsters, I'm not as deferential as I would be were I referencing the real thing.

Attributions and licensing information for music used in the podcast can be found here: mythsbaby.com/sources-attributions.

Hello, this is Let's talk about Mitz Baby, and I am your host live here with arguably not arguably definitely, I'm absolutely the racist episode I've ever recorded, and oh what a joy it was today. I am joined by my friend and I would like to clarify that that we are friends. I did not inflict this upon a strange Cossie Carnegie. Cossi is a masters student at Cambridge and generally just an incredibly fun person. Being Australian helps, but it is also just Cossi who joined me to talk. Oh my gosh everything. Boob cups were the beginning, and originally we're supposed to make it into the episode title until we got to the concept of Caribdis just being a gaping and hungry hole. Spoilers for some of the best parts of the episode. Oh my god. We had so much fun talking about the ways in which ancient male fear manifested in how they spoke about and visualized and generally understood women, from things like the fear of paternity, like what it meant that women could who the father of the child was, of the horrors all the way to Scilla and Chriybtis as I mean I've always, you know, been interested in them as women, but it had escaped me just how sexualized they are. Apparently I need to be looking at everything with a slightly hornier eye. I have learned my lesson, which is all to say, you know, this episode has a lot of sexual content. For once, we don't talk about assault. I don't think so that's something. Basically, the ancient Greeks were super horny and simultaneously super afraid of the power that women held, just just biologically, you know, the power of the uterus. I should say, they were really afraid of that thing. This was such a joy of an episode. If you can't already tell, I just re listened to it again and we had such a great time. That said, I wish i'd let Cossi talk a little bit more, but I was going through some stuff and this is how I handled it, apparently as Adhd went wild. I also just want to add a couple of clarifications for things that come up in this episode. First, I did mention the Medusa book that I am working on, and I said that it the call for short stories is still open. I don't believe that's true, but if you're interested in this Medusa book that is in the works by me and the reason I've been having my brain explode even more than usual lately, and also is featuring a ton of short stories. You can check that out. It's on flame Tree Press. It's still a ways out, but I think you can look into it if you are at all curious. I also want, speaking of Medusa, to add a clarification. There is a point where I talk about my least favorite Greek myth retelling books, like one of those anthology compendium like all quote unquote gree myths, and the author says some really dumb stuff about Medusa that remains dumb in super patriarchal and super misogynist. But one thing that both Cossy and I thought was like completely made up technically is not there is a reference in pseudo Apollodorus. It's like this fucking final sentence. Literally, it's like the entire story of Medusa, and it's like all of what we think and know, the normal stuff, and then the very end he's like, you know, some people say that actually she said she was prettier than Athena and that's why she was cursed, and like that's that's literally the whole of it. So it is still absurd to write that additional sentence into the actual plot structure of the Medusa myth. That is still absurd and contextually wrong and egregious, but it isn't technically coming out of nowhere. And on that note, let's just dive right in to the horniest episode of this podcast, just in time to finish off Women's History Month. We are looking at the threat of a horny woman Conversations Caribdis a gaping hungry hole, fearing the monstrous woman with Coty Carnegie.

Do you needed to do like an intro or are you just gonna like intro me in the recording and be like, this is cozy, she's Australian and swears a lot. Welcome to the fucking show.

I might cut that out and put it somewhere. We talked ton Athen's. We met it for the first time. That was so fun, even though we've known each other for like probably five or six years.

I found I.

Found one of the mugs, or you sent me one mug. I guess I forgot I even had it. I like was going through my cupboard the other day and I pulled it down. I was like, oh, this is so cute, and it just it's like some goddess on the front and then it just says Couzie's odysty on the back. But it was very cute. I was like, that was fucking years ago. You would have sent me that one.

That was No, that was the Hessey mug. That was three years ago. Yes, that was three years ago. That's insane.

Yeah. And then I still have like the little branded condoms that like sometimes just like pop up somewhere in my apartment because I'm just like, you sent me enough that I'm just kind of like people.

Just send me unsolicited photos of the condombs in their hands just in my DMS. I'm like, happy for your safe out there.

Who I mean, I think that's the perfect introduction to generally having you on the show. Though of course, today's episode isn't about Code of Bos. We'll leave that as just a little a little easter egg for future recordings, please, yes, please, But like I feel like we were just sitting at dinner and I was like, you should come on my show. What could we talk about? And then you told me a whole thing that frankly I've forgotten most of, but I just remember thinking I would like to talk to you about this on the show and I could fit it into Women's History Month. And that is the extent of my memory on the topic. But like, have you written something recently? I know it was sexy. Do you remember? This is a very careful conversation. I'm keeping all of this in Okay, thank.

God, I do remember. We were talking about what I wanted to write my thesis on and hopefully my PA and so what I was blathering on to you about was the connection between the female body and drinking vessels, and particularly like the way that they facilitate not only containment but also consumption, and how there's a sort of connection between the female body's ability to disrupt boundaries and kind of mess with everything, and that there's a sort of kind of appetite associated with the female body that can be kind of seen in the visual imagery and the vessels themselves. I think that is what got you excited.

Heck, yes, and so it was. I mean, this was off, Mike, I think, But I'm just going to point out that it was particularly relevant that I just showed you my little cantheros that sits behind me while I record and which shows Circe having transformed a man into a pig and he's like holding a cup, just waiting for more. And now it feels even more relevant.

It's absolutely relevant. And I think what I wanted to talk to you about was have you heard of Masstoy cups? No?

But I based on the word I've got an inkling, and I would love to hear more. I love etymology. I feel like I can pick stuff out. I'm ready to be right.

You know, you know what's going on. So it is exactly what you think it is. It is this breast shaped cup that they used to drink from, and it like it had a nipple on the bottom, like just a boob cup. They were like, I think, I don't know if the term boob cup has made it into scholarly journals, but if it hasn't, it should.

Well it's going to be in the episode's title, so we'll get it started.

Okay, boob cups. So they were these sort of incredible things that they would they would hold them in their hands and I would drink from them. And I mean, whether you want to think of it as like a very kind of erotic, suggestive, sensual thing or if it's just like calling doctor Freud. I don't know which way you want to slice it. I'm not presuming to you know, I'm not judging anyone. I don't want that horrible phrase. I'm not yucking anyone's young.

Again.

I feel like I can't not address that just like a tiny.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I okay. I'm trying to picture it. So is it kind of like a right on in that you think you look at it and you think, like, how would you set this down and have it not spilt? Because now I'm thinking of like a nipple on the bottom of a cup just feels incredibly impractical for like, I don't think this is gravity, but I don't do science, but you know what I mean, Sitting something down on a surface when it has a nipple on the bottom just feels like it's gonna be a little unsteady, which reminds me of like you know, when they drink out of like a goat's head in a or something, and you're like, how do you set that down? Do you have to chug it all at once? What do you do?

I think so just visually, it's similar to a skiphos and I don't know if you can add some images yeap to this episode. But it's sort of this sort of size and it does, you know, exactly as you were saying, have that sort of weird nippled bottom, which does make it really impractical. But also some Pylexes had nippled bottoms. This was there's a whole thing with an ancient drinking vessels where they would give them kind of body parts, so vases would have you know, feet and lips and faces, and it's you know, they were very into the whole The vase has a body, but with the Mastoi cups and other cups where you couldn't really put them down. That sort of played into the drinking party or the symposium. So it was all part of the theater of it all and the kind of challenge of masculinity. And exactly as you said, would you have to chug the whole thing? I mean probably.

Yeah, realistically just practically speaking, yeah, yeah, Like where are you.

Do you nestle it in some dirt in the andron? Maybe keeping dirt.

In their androns? Like I cut you off from saying, do you nexcel it in another person?

I mean, I don't presume we know, we know they all got up to all kinds of shenanigans at the symposium, so god knows what they were capable of when it came to their drinking vessels. We have some harrowing visual images of Sata's doing unspeakable things to cups and jars. So it's not out of the realm. Yeah, Satus, what are you gonna do? But it's not outside the realm of possibility. Yes, everyone listening at home, please google Nasto cups.

Yes, oh my god. Well, when we have a promo for this'll Mikila will certainly find pictures. I know that by this point she will have already searched and found them. Ah. But like I just I mean, that's a joy, that's it. I love the drinking tradition, but I also am so fascinated by like these connections with women in such like powerful ways. But then simultaneously and like I don't know, you know, location wise, but I imagine so much of what we come from, what we have comes from Athens. That like, so they're just like doing all these things kind of in seeming reverence to women, but then they're also like, you don't get to be people though.

I see, I mean I completely agree in that there are so many different ways to look at it, right, and you can look at it as a beautiful way of like enshrining the female body and worshiping the female body, but also if you flip that, isn't it just the most absurd form of objectification.

Yeah, yeah, I mean I wish, trust me, I want to believe that it was all this.

Oh, she's on a pedestal, she's on a pot, But it's like, no, you are not only an objecting this way, will drink wine from you. Welcome to ancient grace.

It's like doing a shot where like out of a belly button, but like ancient Greek stuff us.

Yeah, yes, and more extreme.

Yeah, because also like if we're talking symposia, then there would be minimal to know women involved who weren't you know, sex workers in some way, so like and you know, I mean hittera, I I think, get a bad rap, but like, are very fucking fancy, well off ladies who you know just were companions for gifts, and like, I think nothing wrong with that. In a world like Athens. I feel like it's probably the only way I would want to live, quite frankly.

Truly, at those parties rather than stuck at home.

Yeah, exactly, Like I feel like if I had to pick a life, particularly specifically in ancient Athens, like one hundred, I want to be a freiny. I don't want to be just like a lady in the house, you know.

A frenie would be oh right, that would be a moment. Yeah, I'm not saying it's without complexes, but.

No, no, of course, yeah, yeah, I mean ancient grees. If anything is complexes, all shit, And sometimes we have to just find little joy in pretending that things can be simple and not quite so awful.

Yes, yes, if we could just rose colored glasses, the whole.

Situation exactly, so okay, like other than the boob cups, Like what have you looked at in terms of like women's bodies and drinking or like any I mean, I just I love this idea so much. I'm also not going to pretend I'm not getting ideas for my novel.

Oh no, that makes me so happy. I mean, I think what sort of got me thinking about this was looking at all of the myths and the imagery that depict female monstrosity and then right and then coupling those with all of the very very explicit images we have of Heteri in wild, unfathomable, seemingly physically impossible orgies and sexual situations from the symposium. And then I was sort of looking at those two sets of images, and it got me thinking that there might actually be something similar happening here. And then I wondered what that was, because the female monstrosity stuff has been looked at a lot. You know, we're talking about Madusa, We're talking about Skiller and Charybdis, We're talking about the Sphinx. You know, that's all sort of quite familiar stuff. But then when it comes to scholarship, oddly enough, the fantasy professors haven't been rushing to look at the pawn. I know, I know, not me down with a feather. And so in looking at those two sets of images, I was trying to figure out, you know, what they might be telling us about the ancient sort of imaginary when it came to the woman and the female body. And so then I was I started thinking about appetites and sexual appetites and thirst and then actual physical hunger. So if you compare the sort of hyper sexualized depictions of the hatter I with Charybdis, the gaping forever hungry whirl for I.

Never thought of Charybdis this way.

Really, she's my favorite. I think about her way too much.

I me too, Like I actually wrote about her for a thing that I don't think is like beneficially announced. I won't say it, but like I got to write about her a little bit. Like I was given a list and just like asked to pick, and I was like, fucking Chrybdis, even though I was like, I don't know how I'm gonna you know, like there's not a lot to say. And now I realize I miss saying that, which was good. This is for kids, I think, but.

Yeah, leave that one out.

Yeah, But I love her, like I think that she really is so interesting in that way of like she is like nothing but also fascinating and also like a she despite the fact that she is a gaping hungry hole, which now I'm thinking a lot more about.

Like she's feminized. And then it's so there are so many connections here where like the feeling of arousal and kind of erotic emotion is so closely associated with liquidity, and Charrindis is in the ocean right and then you have Skiller, who has dogs coming out of her waist. Women were called bitches a lot in Age of Greece, and that was associated with their like hypersexuality and their sexual appetite. So it's like you have these two female monsters that men have to travel through, and they both have these kind of erotic, hungry, monstrous aspects. It's just, oh, lows my mind.

I yeah, I love that. I just so much. You've forever changed my two of my favorite monsters because I don't really care a monster absolutely in a good way, Like I just think Skill and Chrybtis are so interesting generally with that even without that that, now I'm like, oh, I'm obsessed with you guys. Yeah, because they're I mean me too, Like they've always been my favorite because they're just like this fun little duo where you like always have to it's always Skilla and Charybdis and Criybdis has always just been fascinating to me because it's just a fucking gaping whirlpool. But now, oh, now I have so many more thoughts.

I think you honestly, in a day, I literally call them like a toxic pair of female friends. Like teammate makes the dream work.

That's literally them, no, one hundred percent. They work together to kill everyone, and I love it for them.

And they're horny and they're scary, yeah, and I love it.

I never saw a lot of them is horny, and now I'll never forget it, and I just think, yeah, they are. They're so much more interesting.

I think it's just when you read I think it's Eschylus who is talking about Clydemnestra, or it's maybe Homer talking about Helen, but calling them dog faced or bitches has like a clear reference. I think it's in Emily Wilson's introduction to the Odyssey, where it's a clear, clear pulling on their sexuality as part of you know, saying horrible things about them. And so then if you look at Skiller, it's like, oh, what's all this?

Then yeah, okay, now I need I just want to know about all the horny women that I've never seen as horny because I've just been reading the wrong shit. Like, yeah, I I like time to process. You're like, truly, truly this happens a lot, but it's rarely about something quite so joy fully weird. So I have I'm working on writing. I forget when it's coming out, but there is a call out for short stories about or featuring Medusa, like of any kind, just fiction. Generally. It's by Flame Tree Press. You can go look for it if you want to submit anything. But I am writing the like I don't, I forget what we're calling it, but like it's kind of an introduction, but it's like a very it's like almost thirty thousand words, so like it's going to be a good long introduction about Medusa as a character and her cultural history and like wow, you know, yeah, And I was thrilled to be asked to write it, and at least because it means that my name is associated with Medusa in any kind of way. But like I've been just at this point just doing some like really surface level looks into like I obviously know the ancient sources pretty front and back when it comes to Medusa, but I don't have as grade a grasp like her, oh you know, over the last thousand years, say, and so I was like looking for more kind of contemporary understanding of her. Uh. And I found this video on YouTube by the History Channel, and it is terrifyingly hot garbage, like just incredibly wild, like you know, it's it's most egregious thing is just the conflation of Avid with Greek myth. And this like the thing that people love to do of like telling a story that only Avid is evidenced for writing about and pretending like that's the Greek myth. And so there's all this stock of Greek myth, Greek myth, Greek myth, and then it's literally all the stuff that is exclusive to Avid, and like there's nothing wrong with Avid as a source, but it is, you know, cut and dry, not Greek myth. We don't have any evidence that like parts of that story you know, actually appeared in Greek myth. Blah blah blah. But like you know, they also had all these like male talking heads and one woman, oh well a couple of women. So that yeah, there's these all male talking heads who are just like going off about Medusa and saying these things that just sound like Freud, Like like they they sound like Freud's interpretation of Medusa, this idea that she was this you know, this feared monster where you know, men fear like a powerful woman. I'm trying to remember all what it was. I just I just remember being like shocked that it was like such psychologizing for a character like Medusa, who like objectively And this is why I'm bringing it up because I'm so curious her thoughts. But like, to me, the ancient Greek sources as we have them, and I would say, like the visual representations as well, do not give us any indication that Medusa was like a creature that was actively feared by men, Like you know, in in He See It, she's literally said to be like just you know, the only mortal gorgan. She suffered a woeful fate is the translation that I have completely memorized. And then and you know, Perseus killed her, But there's literally nothing about her being dangerous, causing any damage, even being monstrous or or like literally really any details about her. And if you go through the surviving Greek sources, like there's really nothing in terms of of her being a danger to anyone. Like the entirety of the story is that Perseus needed to bring back her head because you know, Polydectes wanted him dead and so it was like, go get me Medusa's head as a gift, and he just figured it would kill Percius. Like that's the whole of it. It's not like you know, like a lot of times people will talk about Medusa and they'll be like, well, she, you know, was terrorizing the lands and so like she needed to die. And I'm like, there's literally not a single line in a surviving Greek source that says she did any damage whatsoever, like while her head was on her body, Like sure he used it as a weapon, Like that's not on her. And I don't know what people are, you know, it's just fascinating to me. But these these men talking about it, who were scholars, were like they were definitely putting their own anxieties about women like into this History Channel piece about Medusa, because I was like, as somebody who knows the ancient source is like, absolutely not not to mention that a gorgan was then used as a protective like it's topic.

Yeah, well that was exactly. I think two points to what you're saying. And the first thing I think that complicates exactly what you're saying about the written sources is it was you know, the simbil, the gorgon aeon. You know, it was a potrapeg and it was protective. And it's so difficult to trace back like how exactly that visual would have functioned because it was frightening. It was supposed to be frightening. It's on a Theenis shield, it was supposed to be scary. Yeah, you know, like that much. We though that much is you know, a part of it. So it's and then if we go into kind of the psychobabble world, which I personally love. So it's the Greeks taking something frightening and something scary and something that is feminine and feminized and putting it on their houses, on some of their drinking wear and kind of inviting a part of it in as a way of protecting themselves. So it's it's a very complicated thing. I think anything that just says she was just a monster and that's that, it's it's so one dimensional.

Yeah. Well, and I'm really fascinated by the idea that like for all we have, like everything you're saying about the gorgonion, I never know how quite to pronounce it, but like you know, on the shield on the you just like definitely meant to be scary, like all those gorgon faces with the tusks and the tongue out and the big eyes and all of this, like you know, absolutely meant to be scary and all of you know, in addition to what you're saying about eptropic. But like, for the most part, when it comes to those types of representations, like where it is explicitly a gorgan, it's often not like it. Like obviously the shield has this kind of mythological backstory of being Medusa's head, you know, once off her body, but outside of the shield like it is, and even like in Homer versus he Siad, the shield is just a gorgan. It's just a gorgan. Like the actual connection to that scary gorgon face being Medusa is not as explicit as people want it to be. And we also have like lots of pieces of pottery where she is depicted as incredibly human with like little bits of of like divinity, like the snakes for hair or wings, but she like is otherwise completely anthropomorphic. And I think the same for like the Furies are like that too, where they're like terrifying, but like if you actually see representation of them, they're just nice ladies with snakes in their hair and on their arms, like you know, And maybe it's just a nature of like Greek art and stuff. But it is always fascinating to me that very very often if a character on a piece of pottery is labeled as Medusa versus a gorgon, she actually looks incredibly sympathetic from what I've seen, and like often considerably less scary than this concept of a gorgon, which is so explicitly tied to both just like a gorgon and also her after her head was removed her from her body, And I think that just opens up so many interesting questions. A but like what they could have seen her when she was alive, because we have almost nothing about that. I don't know. I'm obsessed with Medusa.

I mean, she's incredible, but I think I have to I have to confess some of my cynicism here when it comes to the sort of more anthropomorphic depictions of her. And there's that tiny little voice in my brain that's just like sexualizing monsters and like sahting women, you know, where it's like taking shifting the form from a kind of monstrous head or a monstrous body into something you can fuck, into something that you want to fuck. And you know the complexities of wanting to fuck a monster and there's all these horrible jokes about oh yeah, Meduica will get you rock hard, all of that blah blah blah. But but you know, the gaze of Medusa was supposed to be arresting and so presenting that kind of visual test where it's like, can you still pursue her? Can you still be attracted to her even when you're faced with the power of her gaze to you know, stop you right where you're standing. So, I mean, I would love to have the generosity and the like open mind to be like, ah, yes, maybe it wasn't all horrible, but just like her having like a tight little body, I'm like, oh, poor Meducer. I like, it's just a big cynical No.

No, I think that's like that's incredibly relevant. I think for me, like I get I definitely and I'm trying to remember this when I'm writing this piece, Like I definitely do get too caught up in the textual sources, because I'm also interested in the fact that the textual source is for the most part in terms of like the most ancient of like Greek ones don't actually describe her as anything. They don't often even like use a word that like suggests monstrosity, Like she's quite sympathetic, particularly Inhesid, which is like funny because he seid it's like a pretty objectively shitty guy. Not a guy, but in terms of the poetry that we attribute to Hesiod, but like he literally is just like she was the only mortal Gorgon. She suffered a woeful fate after Poseidon like quote unquot lay with her, but like it's a word that is rarely used for consensual sex. And then Percy has killed her, and you know, and then she birthed children and that's like basically it in terms of Hesiod. Like the only thing he says is that the Gorgons were daughters of Forcus and Keto and that she was a mortal one. But like, yeah, it's just interesting to me that they that there is also not like in the tech sources that I'm you know, most familiar with, there's not like a suggestion that she should ever have been feared or or like really even like a a an acknowledgment that her gaze was stony when her head was on her body, which I'm also just fascinated by, Like, and I think that it's just like a nature of like interpretation of like a broader thing, which is also what you're doing, versus like, yeah, staying maybe two in the weeds in in the text sources that do survive, but there's something in between, you know, Like I don't know. I think that she's just so she's just so interesting because she has like all these questions get opened up, and she is so kind of complex and weird. And yeah, like I won't make this all about Medusa, even though.

I mean we because I want to. I want to broaden it out even more and then we can move on to something. But I think, I mean, and this is where I you know, I wish I knew more, and I would, you know, really like to know more. But I mean, have you thought much about whether she's a sort of amalgam or reinterpretation of a Near Eastern character or Gottness or something like that. I mean that because that might help explain some of the not like conflicting. But you know, we have the visual representations of her, we have her in the text. We have all these sort of different themes and different understandings of her that we're trying to understand at the same time. So like, where are the kind of roots of her and her characterization, because I mean, the Greeks, I'm not sure how much they invented completely off the bat themselves. I don't think it will be the biggest rate that they were like, no, not that, but let's like add a little bit of pepper and salt on top and then call it us.

I mean, that's absolutely what they did for most things, let's be honest. And I think, like, I'm definitely going to look into that because I could see that being like maybe the visuals and I say.

That that's exactly what I was thinking.

Yeah, Like I could see it being the visual aspects because she also one of the only things that we do know about her is that she lived in the West, which they do tend to give associations like like often if you know, if something is aware a text of source is aware of Eastern origins like or has some kind of particular connection, like, they'll often place them in that area, like I think of you know, like I just yesterday recorded, uh, just a straight reading of book two of this is Roman but Quintus of Smyrna's Fall of Troy, and you know it's all about Memnon, who's the king of the Ethiopians, and he's a child of Dawn and so like he literally comes from like where Dawn kind of they figured down kind of like hung out, and it's you know, like Medea is the daughter of the Sun, and so she is in the east where the sun comes up. And so it's interesting to me that like that Medusa is in the west because she like is kind of explicitly near the hesperities, so she is, Yeah, she's much more explicitly in the west, which I think memnon yet like they've got him kind of in like West Africa as well for that same reason. So yeah, I almost wonder maybe there's like a West African connection then too, and then maybe we have that kind of association with that location. I'm gonna do some digging. That's fascinating.

It was just something that came up in my mind. I was like, there's something here, Yeah, but I think it would make it all make more sense.

Well, I'm using this conversation to help me try to write this piece because I'm hitting a wall. So thanks all around. But I want to hear more about monstrous women and also fuckable women and the convergence of the two.

It's a big topic, and I would recommend have you read I think it's Anne Carson's Woman Desire.

No, I have it, but I'm going to find that chapter. Thank you. Now, I'm obsessed with it and that's what's going to stay in as a response to have you read it? Yeah, No, I mean, I've just never. It's weird, I've never. I think it's just like access, right, Like I think, because I am not in the realm of academia, all of my access to these ideas that are beyond like just the words on the page tend to come from just like what I encounter, like talking to you or talking to anyone else. And I don't I think I am a little I mean, I know that I am generally like a little too in the weeds with the ancient sources sometimes because I do, I'm so interested in them as these things that survive and like what they say, you know, literally what they say that I often have trouble kind of breaking down what might be beyond it, not because I'm not interested, but just because like I don't, you know, like I don't have that that the sort of the things that come with studying that in that way that just like I don't know, like ideas beyond what is exactly surviving in the sources. And I all to say, I'm fascinated and realed to be having this conversation because like I just I mean, I'd never thought of Kribis as horny and now it's so obvious.

But there are things that you just can't unsee. Well, yes, you're like, oh.

My god, well when it comes sexuality and stuff, when like in terms of the ancient world, like you know, the people that have been providing us with this information, the translations and the like, you know, just all of it for the last couple hundred years are just like boring old white men and so like obviously that's changing now, thankfully, but it is still like a thing where you know what you're going to immediately find is going to be this like sanitized or or worse like anti woman nonsense, and so it is often kind of hard to find to see something that like is so intentionally kind of like I guess unmentioned because I can't believe that I've not heard of or thought of Scilla and Chribtis in that way before, because yeah, it's so obvious now and I fucking love it.

So what's that phrase? What's that quote? You'll know this quote and where it's like the two worst kind of plights of men, like the say and waymen like like it's right there, it's right there. I can't remember, I'm sure, I'm sure we can find the quote, but it's right there.

Yeah.

Yeah, like the connection between.

Them big dangers man, oh my god.

Yeah, like honestly the main dangers to men. And then also when thinking about Charybdis, I just kept thinking about vagina dentata and all of those you know it like honestly, and that's such a massive motif and symbol that you know isn't necessarily one hundred percent present in Greek mythology, but but it's not. They're kind of looking like cousins to me, like a little bit, yeah, like they're not twins, but like you.

Know, yeah, I mean it's not a coincidence that most of the monsters in Greek myth are women. Like it's right there. And and I mean, yeah, Medusa having been sexualized over the years is fascinating. I do like in terms of what I like, I said, what I've seen, it's been it's been more recent like very much. Freud level pathologizing. So I'm, you know, more curious about the ancient world. But like I mean, Scilla and charybdis Circe being a temptress, Medea being a temptress, and those aren't even like the monsters. The fact that the furies are women, the fact that even the fates are women feels like monstrous in a different way like that like, oh, like the fate of men is determined by women. Like that's another horror kind of in itself. And I've been thinking about the slot good.

I hope it haunts you, And I say that with all the love in my heart. I hope it haunts you in the way that it haunts me.

It will, it will excellent.

I think, with a lot of sort of female monstossy. And this is just another book recommendation for you. But The Monstrous Feminine by Barbara Creed is another really good one. But I think when we look at all of that and all of just sort of the examples you just listen, and even if we add sort of Helen of Troy, who looks out at the sort of field of battle and compares it to a sort of farm, and then we you know, we're thinking about the earth and the consumption of the earth, and the earth eating all these dead bodies. I think with female monstrosity, it's such an interesting kind of mirror or reflection of the female body's biological productive power. And so you have women being the source of life, and then how do you reconcile that with patriarchal power when women are the ones that are giving you children, women are the ones that are sort of knowing and being able to determine paternity. And then there's this really interesting kind of externalization of that reality into female monstrosity, and you're sort of just watching the ancient Greeks kind of battle with it intellectually because it's so irreconcilable with their power job show.

Yeah, well, I mean, there's a reason why they acknowledged that the world started with a woman and then she was immediately subjugated by a man, immediately exact a man she created.

Like.

But then also makes me think of and I always forget what source this actually comes from, but there's that that notion that the Trojan War took place because Guya was like too there was too much pressure on her and so they needed like a cat war.

I know, talking about. But I can't remember where it comes from. Either it was like or whatever.

Yeah, exactly, like there were too she it was too heavy on top of her, the number of humans that existed, and so they needed that kind of like that such a deadly war to like make it better.

That is just such a missed up premise.

Yeah, exactly, Like it's another it's like demonizing the woman, right, like, like, well, the truth they they haven't blamed the Trojan war on another woman enough, so like let's add one, Like it's not enough that it's fully Helen's fault, despite the fact that she had absolutely no agency in the whole thing, but let's also make it about Guya.

Gold.

I don't even know what to say to that. That's just maybe so sad.

I mean, it's why I have a career. So at least there's that talking about that. How demonized women are for absolutely no reason in the ancient world, well in ancient Greece, very specifically, I mean, and it hasn't gone away. It makes me think there's a I'm sure I've mentioned this on the show before, but like I one of the first books of myth that I picked up when I started the show, Like you know, I was like years out of my degree and I really hadn't done any research for a long time. Also, I did my degree, Like this is wild how fast things change, but like we really didn't get to use Google a lot because it was not early Internet obviously, but it was still a long time ago. And like so I just feel like I didn't have a great grasp on like how to research and stuff when I picked up the podcast. And so I just like picked up a book that I found because it was just called The Greek Myths and it at the time, I didn't even really notice it, which is funny because I was using it to start my feminist podcast about Greek myth But like, there are parts in this book that was published in like two thousand and five that are like some of the most horrifically misogynist stuff I've ever read, like complete departures from the ancient sources in order to demonize both Medusa and Pandora. Those are the ones I always remember, like it's wild, like as if it's like at one point, this guy, Robin Waterfield, who is credited on the cover and then the inside cover, it's acknowledged that his wife helped him write it, but she's not on the cover. And in his section on Medusa retelling the story like one, not only does he in this book called the Greek Myths does he use Avid's story without acknowledging that it is not a Greek myth, but he also, in addition to using Ovid's, which has its own problems, he introduces the idea that that that Athena was angry that Medusa was prettier than her, or that Medusa bragged about being prettier than her, oh, which as yeah, exactly like your shocked face is it?

Like?

Where is exactly? It has absolutely no basis in the ancient sources, none, And it's just like this invention to make women even worse, like this idea that like, oh, well, in order for Athena to want to curse her, she would have had to say that she was prettier, because lady care whether another girl is prettier than them.

But also this just drives me triple insane because it's like, if you reduce the value of women to what they look like, and then you get upset when they have feelings about what they look like like, right, what is expected? What is expected?

Here, I really wonder why women ever worry about whether they're pretty compared to other women, Like it's not coming naturally, like you know, as somebody who was a teen, like fourteen in two thousand and two, I think is like an incredibly important date milestone, like just the early two thousands and the pressure placed on young women at that time, when Kate Moss is out there saying nothing tastes as good as pretty feels like, you know, this this stuff that we get blamed for, like it's just anyway, I think a lot about how broken I still am from just like being a teenager in the early two thousand.

We had the whole thy gap thing runs through Oh Gogle when I was sixteen.

That was fun, right, Yeah, that's our little yeah, that's our age gap, the thigh gap. And I do not envy you because I was old enough at that time. I was still definitely still influenced, but like, yeah, I mean we we just like it was wild and like the fat shaming on every single TV show that we had to watch, like there was just no way to get out of it, to get out of hating your body, Like you're literally raised from the time that you're like eight years old to hate multiple things about your body.

Mm hmm mm hm. Yeah.

Anyway, I respect all the women who have been able to get over it, but I am still trying and not going.

Probably most women are in the trenches with it.

Yeah. Oh fucking fascinating anyway, Oh my gosh. I've just like, I mean, I think a lot about the fact that that the ancient Greeks did turn women into monsters, but I haven't thought about the sexuality involved.

Well, I think just to just to speak about an earlier point you mentioned, which is, you know, when it comes to translation and when it comes to so many of the translations being you know, as horrific and horrible as they are, it's like that, on the one hand, is so unequivocally true and needs to be addressed. But I think as well, what I find and I'm sure you you know, really find this too. When you're dealing with the ancient sources, and when we're in the very privileged position of being able to engage with the literature and the visuals, you know that you do have to have an awareness I think of not projecting. I think we joked about rosy colored glasses before, whereas you know, I want to think it was this gorgeous utopia, but you also have to hold space for the reality it was a patriarchal society. You know, we know enough, we know enough to know that women buy in large, we're not having a great time, And so it's like, how do you kind of tread that line between reclamation and kind of looking at this stuff with a new, more empowering lens, whilst also not dismissing what we know of what was happening to these women. And I mean, and that's so difficult, right.

Oh yeah, I mean, it's just so many things at once because like ill, yeah, and I mean it is what I love about looking at the ancient world, and what I particularly love about like the point that my show is at now in speaking about this stuff, like the ability I have now to talk about the context that I didn't have before when I was just like a random woman picking up a book at a bookstore without any idea. Like you know what, I guess really goes into men writing these myths, and by that I mean like rewriting the myths, because the book that I find to be so egregious is one of those ones where you know, like it's just called the Greek myths because a man went and like took down notes on the sources and then rewrote them. I mean, granted he's doing what I'm doing, but I'm really open about how fucking biased I'm being and the men are not, you know, and and and until you kind of realize what goes into the the retelling of these kinds of stories, like you really don't know that what you're getting is is nonsense compared to the ancient sources. But then at the same time it lacks this context of like it's wild because it's like I feel like the the modern pieces you pick up written by men tend to be in obviously, like you know, stuff in the last like five years and certain men. Obviously it's not the case, but like by and large, like you think that it's going to be worse, and then it is. But then at the same time, like the context then turns around and it's like, well, the context though, is the women also had a shit time, but the myths still weren't quite as bad as this modern man is making them out to be. But we have to keep in mind that, like you know, the I mean, especially when we're talking about Athens women had little to know freedom or agency at all, And I don't know, I mean, it's just like kind of constant sort of reminders of all of the different bits and pieces going into this stuff. But I also like to think about like the stories that the women might have been telling amongst themselves, or you know, I like to joke a lot about all the sex they probably were having with each other because the men didn't consider it sex and so weren't worried that, you know, yeah, exactly, like you know, they were just like keeping their wives locked up all together in a house all day and not letting them do you know, anything outside of it, Like you think they're not going to find ways of having fun like these women.

I mean, you've seen all those parts of women with bread. Dildos are the ones that came.

I mean also, yeah, like the the a lizbos, right, that's like the ancient word for dildo antient Greek word o lizbos. It's like, oh l s bos if you just google it, I know, google just as dildo a real big But I also did learn it from Assassin's Creed artisty. I will clarify that makes at one point you do go get a dildo that our chamiality is left in somebody's house.

At least it was not in someone right.

True, No, exactly, you don't know they you never.

Know what's that that medieval myth or whatever it is about the sword. Okay, wait, I digress, digress, I digress.

I always digress. That's the point.

Yeah, no, oh no. I was just thinking about your point on translation, and I think, and this being completely frank with you, I don't think I one hundred percent have a grip on this. And I've been studying this stuff for seven years, but I think something that's so hard to grasp is that the myths themselves are being received and massaged and adapted over hundreds and hundreds of years. And that is something that does not get kind of fore grounded in the way that I think it needs to, because we're talking about, Okay, the ancient stuff is over here, and then the modern dudes are over here, and it's like, well, actually, the ancient stuff there was a whole bunch going on. Then when it comes to refracting and massaging these myths for different kind of cultural moments and different purposes, and that is such an important thing to understand, like how these myths were functioning over You know, you can't just kind of point to ancient Greece and be like that was all one thing, it happened over three years whatever. It's like, that's so far from the case. And still it like honestly kind of breaks my brain a little bit whenever I try and like contemplate it too much. But I feel like it's important to note when it comes to translation and different versions of mythology.

Yeah. No, I'm so glad you brought that up, because I've been in the last couple of years. I know that I've become annoying in the way that I bring that up. I bring that up in like almost every episode though, because I also like, I can't guarantee that people have been listening to all of them. They just might jump in and I'm like, well, then I have to remind you that we are talking, like menim mom, eight hundred years in between all of these stories, and and when you just come at this from this casual viewpoint, yeah, you were. You see ancient Greece as a concept, You see Greek myth as a concept, as if there is this like canon of stories and everything is was becid it. I thought it was the word cannon.

I thought I was like, there's one version of every myth. There was one version of every myth, and everyone agreed and it was super chill and easy and straightforward. Are you glad that it wasn't you this time rilled.

And that you sounded just as like excited and annoyed? It is so both, and I think that, yeah, like unless you are deep in this stuff, like you're not getting that context and it's so important.

And also again being like very candid with you, just because you're deep in it doesn't mean it's the easiest thing to understand hold in your mind. It is so difficult.

All I ever do is talk about how confusing and fascinating it is, Like yeah, because it's it's both all the time, and I love it.

All of the times, truly.

I mean, okay, but I really I really want to know more about the like the idea you mentioned that they feared women's sexual appetites. I want know more about this.

So bad, so bad, so bad so fear. I mean it's such a big topic, right, like fear no sexuality. I'm like, oh, can we can we have three hours? Are you wanting to kind of talk about I mean, I assume mythology and like maybe visual I'm just trying to I'm trying to pick some points here because.

I absolutely fair. I mean, I don't I don't care necessarily to stick to mythology. I'm just fascinated by the the idea. But like, you know, if you have, like I mean, I guess I wass just like understood that it would have been a thing, but I've just never thought about like evidence for it other than you know, just the general distaste they seem to have for women. I mean, but yeah, like.

Yeah, there's a strong distaste, right, But I think there's also a huge amount of distrust women. And I think that and this is a very sort of one dimensional view of it. But what I have read over the years is that you know, patrilineal inheritance, when you can't be one hundred percent short of you know, the paternity of your kid, that won't be a problem like that is inter issue, like right, interm literally unfortunately in most cases, so harrowing. And so there's this there's this fear of how the female body can obscure paternity, right, like they could have your like a woman could have your brother's kid or you know, a random neighbor's kid or whatever, and probably there would be no way of you knowing. And so if your entire society is built on you know, you will have sons and it will all be lovely and they will inherit your house and no, no, no, no no, but your life could be messing around on you and you almost certainly have no way of knowing. So how do you within society find a way to sort of curtail that or address that? And it's like just you know, beat the shit out of them culturally when it comes to their sexual expression and just like put them in their tiny little boxes and hide them away. All of that, Like there was this huge societal pressure for the restriction of female sexuality. And I mean, for another bit of evidence, you have the separation between the wife and the hattirai, right, Like the htirai are the fun that drunk ones who will you know, take part in orgies with you and your boyfriends at the symposium, but your wife is at home looking after the grain and the kids and the whatever. And there's so much sort of separation in the literature as far as how you think of, you know, ancient sex workers versus ancient wives. They were constituted and characterized completely differently, so there's little room left for the kind of eroticism of the wife. And then if we take it back to like Helen of Troy or something, it's like we see what happens when a wifely person or you know, the figure of a wife expresses their sexuality, you know, or even just is an object of sexual desire. Like it seemed to be a really dangerous, dangerous thing. It's I feel like I just threw such random broad examples.

That you No, I love it so much. I'm literally taking notes. I've just written down obscuring paternity. It's actually it's a great bank form that apparently I'm turning into a notepad.

No, I just.

Yeah, it's I also made me think of I'm trying to remember like the exact details. But I know that in Sparta they kind of, for a time at least like handled this fear of paternity by being like women can have kids with more than one man. Because they also were so obsessed with keeping it spartan and like keeping their bloodlines pure.

Sounds very and I'm rewatching game of thrones at the moment.

I mean, Targarians are spartans, let's be honest. Actually, like I feel like that, I feel like that works in ways, but like no, and I I've definitely, I want to say, I've thought about this idea of of enter Zeus, of of like the stories of the God's broadly fothering children by mortal women, Like that is just a it's like exemplifying there's a better word. That's not it it is, but not for what I want. But basically it's just like it's evidence for this fear. Right, It's like, well, you know, like if you have to whether the child is yours, then at least you can think that maybe if it's not, then it it's Zeus's, you know, Like so it gives you like a divine out exactly exactly, like you know, if this is like a big fear of theirs, then of course they're going to introduce these stories that explain that happening. But in a way that takes the fault away from the man, you know, like not that it's you know, a man's fault broadly, but like it's clearly their fear. When I imagine it's not a thing that's like happening all that often like, but of course they're going to be afraid of it because they don't control that. And if you control everything, then the one thing you can't control becomes this like enormous boogeyman.

To your point about that boogeyman, I would say that I think there might actually be another boogeyman in this instance. So it's not only about of paternity and issues of paternity. I think it might also be about the way female sexuality and feminine sexuality can prompt transgressive action on the part of the man. So they're worried about what they'll do and their kind of loss of agency and not being in full control of themselves and starting a war or you know, sleeping with someone they shouldn't, or any of the other things that are so richly demonstrated in all of the mythology. And so if you have that kind of fear of there's this certain part of life and this certain aspect of the woman and the female body and feminine erotic power, how do we deal with it? Because it poses this threat to civilization and stable order and family structure and political order and everything, everything and everything. What do we do oh, maybe we channel some of it into these wild feminized, hungry monsters that are just eating everyone. It sounded on hinge when I said it, but I'm standing by it.

No, But I mean, like, yes, like it, but I mean they're all they're almost all women. Like Typhon is an interesting example, but I think he pretty openly embodies like natural disasters. So the idea that like that all the monsters are either like natural disasters or women is like kind of amazing, because even the gigantomic key like accounts for volcanoes, and so it's like literally any of the big bad, you know, divine kind of of fears they are if they're men. Trying to think of a male's the one, right, okay, but but he doesn't actually count because he embodies the fear of paternity.

Just gets deeper. And so in the myths, what do you do with monsters? You defeat them, you overpower them. It is something that gets set up in the myths as something that can be thwarted or defeated, So you can defeat the temptation of the female body, you can defeat the monster's feminine in all of this mythology, so all these lovely men could just sleep at night knowing that it's all going to be okay.

Yeah, I mean okay. Talking about the paternity stuff, like it leads me to just think of all the weirdest ways that Zeus impregnated, right, Like, you know, at first.

I thought every time when I got upset every single time, well, yeah, the Swan's the first thought.

But then then I went to Zeus and Dana Perseus's mom right shower of gold, and like, obviously, you know, golden chower a different context now, that's but what's really happening here, because like you know, the context for that story is that she's like locked in a tower because her father is worried. You know, there's an oracle that says her baby will defeat him, so she's locked away so that she cannot have a child. And Zeus's form that he takes is this like gold falling from the ceiling and just going straight up or vadge, you know, Like I like to think of it, It's like it feels like it has to be like a like a real like a like a mood, like like it has to be embodied in some kind of way. I don't know. I think I think a lot about the shower of Gold, but how that like, you know, this this thing that is like it sounds more like a like a a fatherly fear in this patriarchal world of their daughter getting impregnated by some strange man. You know, it's like so regularly happened, but it's possible, you know that that like it embodies that. But then it's like, oh, but you know, even if that happened, well, I guess that's not a great thing for a Christius. But like, you know, it's Perseus in the end, this baby and he and he still tries to I mean, now I'm trying to think of basically, I'm just like thinking aloud with you right now because now I'm like, okay, well, you know it's he's Percius, so really ultimately he's a good thing, but like he does defeat a Christius. And so I'm just you know, I feel like there's so many there's layers to this fear because sometimes it's obvious what they're fearing.

Well, and then in that instance, right, isn't it the fear of violating the like virginal female, because what that means for the social and financial standing of the family.

Yeah, like that. But then it's interesting because it's like it works out so that that's where my question mark brain is going, you know, like obviously the story of Perseus is good for Perseus and Dani in the end. So it's just interesting to me because it's like, well, is it providing a moral that then is like contradictory to this this idea of being afraid for your daughter's virginity. You know, it's just I don't know, it's interesting.

It's ultimately affirming it or kind of giving some comfort, like just like a bit of a nice myth. Right, Yeah, sometimes it works out.

It could be you probably won't.

It probably won't, but maybe.

I mean, I just there's just so many layers. Like I do. People often ask me like to kind of, I guess you put myself into the character and like answer questions like what would they feel or what would they think? And I fail at that always just miserably because I am I'm far too interested in the story itself and the purpose behind it, and I think this is great evidence for that, Like this is what I want to talk about, is like, but what's the story and what does it mean? Not the characters like, I love the characters, but I don't feel the need to like be in their brains.

But I also show an awareness of how difficult it is to ever get to anywhere remotely close to being in their brains like that know anything, No, And that's such a difficult thing.

You know.

There are so many sort of feminist retellings of Greek myths now that are doing exactly that right. They're you know, giving voices that are providing insight and all of that. But if you're trying to do that entirely based on the ancient sources like you need, you're fucked. You need a hell of a lot of imagination and creative license to begin to do that. It's you know, it's a very appealing thing. But is it necessarily possible if you actually tie yourself to the ancient source material. I don't know. Again, I'm wondering that's true. But I'm like, especially when every almost every source bar like two, are coming from.

Men, well yeah, yeah, no, And I yeah, it's interesting because I it is. It's interesting for me talking to authors and stuff sometimes because like I understand that they have a version in their head of this character because you have to you create a version, but that inherently untethers it from the ancient sources. And that's fine.

That's the perfect verb choice, like untether's it. That's that's exactly what it is, right, what is you? That's the perfect one for it.

Yeah, you have to separate it. You have to make it a different thing. And I think you know, like that if if you are writing this stuff and trying to pretend or if you believe that you are keeping true to the characters, like I think you're doing a disservice to yourself and the book. Like I do think you have to separate that. Yeah, oh sad, And maybe it's a little bit more than what we need time wise. But I realized when we first talked about like how I barely remember it other than I just knew I wanted to talk to you about it on the show, but you were you were just like just mentioned Madea and we'll go. And I realized we've not even gone through.

But we have spoken about Madea, and we haven't spoken about Euripides back as far as fear of the female and female sexuality and female monstrosity, and if we're talking about the like kind of turning women into monsters because of their biological power. I mean, ding ding ding Medea, who not only murders a whole bunch of people, she murders her children. So you have the complete arresting of feminine biological power. And that is why she is the most hated and the biggest monster. And it is just And then I love that she just gets to write off in a chariot. And I don't care what anyone says. I know a canon isn't real, but her riding off on a chariot is canon to me.

Well, I mean it's it is just as it has the exact same level of legitimacy as her killing her children because both were invented by Euripides.

So true.

I know that's so true, which I was gonna I was gonna bring that up anyway, because I'm fascinated by the idea that and I mean, it could it could be a source that we're just that we've lost, Like it could be that Euripides did not invent that detail. That's very possible. Same with the dragon chariot though, but like, yeah, the idea that like before Euripides, we didn't necessarily have this, this idea that she killed her children. I think that's really interesting and also, like is another good connection to the back eye, because I mean I could talk about Euipies for hours, so I will try not to. But like I like to think of of, like kind of why he would put that stuff in because of all the playwrights I know, like, and I say this with confidence despite the fact that I'll never talk to him, but I know that he was interested in women as people and as like complex and sympathetic and very real people though like flawed people. But yeah, I kind of I love that he kind of introduced that idea because I think it.

I think it definitely adds something more. And like I do do you think that him you know, him being Euripides shout out? Do you think I know, I love him so much? But do you think him adding that detail? I mean, considering that women were so often wildly reduced to their ability to create children, and you know, motherhood was the whole thing that was their entire sort of source of value and all of that, and so by Euripides adding that detail, it kind of is this horrific, monstrous assertion of individual agency of a woman. But that's what it is. It's like her own feelings of rage and sexual jealousy and violation and betrayal a big enough and strong enough that they actually super scene her role as mother, and that is something we almost never see. The only other myth that's jumping to mind, is it a Philo, Philomela or no Procney.

Oh yeah, that's the two of them. Yeah, okay, so you've got those names.

Okay, good. Yeah, I was like, am I about.

To say, like.

Yeah, correct?

No, And I mean, yeah, that's yeah, they're another good connection. But they're interesting too because they also really only survive and OVID, which is sort of like its own level of like interest, like in terms of those details. But I absolutely do think and now you've made me think it even more. I won't pretend that this was all my idea before you said all of that, but I've always seen like I've I've definitely spent a number of episodes on the show having to explain that I'm not saying that it's okay that she killed her children.

Just no one is saying that. No, let's be really clear, we're not endorsing in fans, no, no, but.

No, But like I do think that it is incredibly interesting because you can see that there is like an intention behind it, because he makes her sympathetic while she's doing it, Like you you understand her. You don't agree with her, but you understand why she feels like this is the thing she has to do. And that's what I find to be so fucking interesting about that play, but also just about euripities broadly, because I think that argument, like it completely it aligns with my thoughts on him and what I said earlier, which is just that like he makes women into people, flawed people, complex people, people who have thought processes that like we won't not everyone would agree with, and maybe it's bad to kill your kids. Like but at the same time, he's not introducing a villain in Medea. He's not introducing a boogeyman. He is introducing an interesting, complex woman who makes a horrific decision. But like, yeah, he doesn't make her this like caricature of an angry woman. I think that she has become that in pop culture in a lot of ways since then, Like before I really knew the play, all I'd ever known is like, there's a woman in Medea who killed her kids, and you think, but like I even feel like Oh, I wish I could tell you what this is from. But there's definitely like a quote that lives in my head from a movie or something from the early two thousands where it's like she pulled a Medeia and it was like basically the idea of her going crazy, Like I think she became aligned with this idea of going crazy and killing her kids, when in fact, the play makes very clear that she is in her right and rational mind and she's making this decision, and that's so much more interesting than this like caricature a woman who goes mad and kills her children because it's the only way that women could do that.

You know, well, I think there's you know, there might even be more kind of tension in that because exactly like in Euripides, particularly her every single.

You know, line that she delivers is so considered and it's so thoughtful and so and you know, she's wailing off stage and all this she is she is very emotional.

She's in a lot of you know, emotional pain from everything that's happening and everything that's being done to her. But you're exactly right in pointing out, but this doesn't, this isn't what she does is a very considered act or you know, a considered set of actions. And I think you know she is acting, you know, from a place of emotional pain, but not from a place of temporary insanity, because planning goes into every step of it. And I read this this article a few years ago which I found really fascinating, which was all about how Madea is kind of working within and drawing from this kind of outdated mode of Homeric honor. That so and it not only like doesn't have a place necessarily in you know, the time that Euripides was writing. So that's one kind of bit of separation, but it absolutely is not for women. You know, that's not something for her to grab a hold of and then use. But in so much of the language she's talking about, she is Achilles. Her honor has been violated, and she is going to rain down fury. And so that when you're looking at the characterization of Medea, and in kind of one hand you hold the sexual jealousy and the betrayal of the marriage bed and that, you know, which is in there, and then in the other hand you have this kind of she's this wounded, proud hero that you know, wants justice and wants balance, and that is especially when you look at the language. And again, I will send you this article because it's such an awesome take on her that, you know, there's so much more richness in that interpretation. Rather than oh she went thata shit, it's like, no, no, no, no, she didn't. She is Achilles in the tent. She is Achilles dragging Hector's body around the wall.

Troy like just gonna say that one like that is madea like.

That's so much more true to Euripides and true to you know, all of the versions of her story. It seems like and again we have a woman being reduced and hugely oversimplified, where when you look a bit deeper, there's something so much more interesting going on. Mm hmmm.

I can talk about my Daa for hours, like and he's just so interesting.

We do we have time? Please?

No, please please? I want to talk about the back guy, like.

I mean, we have sex, we have sexuality, We have pentheus in all kinds of situations when it comes to his desire. We have the kind of bestial, hyposexual, animalistic monstrous women, you know, ripping animals apart and ripping people apart on the hills, like all of that. It's just right there. It's just sensational. Yeah, it's like, yes, you should all be women because when they get drunk, they're gonna rip your arm off.

All of that. And I also think it's interesting that Dionysus is quite feminized, like you know, like he's I mean, I know, he's like very a he, but he's dressed like a main ad is an ear or like yeah, like.

And then Pentheus is like.

Yes kind of and then also he has Pentheus dress as a main ad to be torn up right, So like like I had a conversation years ago now on the show about like a non binary reading of Dionysus in back eye, but it also included this was with Emma Polly, and they had really interesting things to say from like a more dramatizing na like aspect of it, like they're a dramaturtch end I think a translator as well, so like just sort of everything going on there.

But like.

The argument was basically that both Dionysus and Pentheus have these moments where they can be pretty easily read as non binary. And I think and it's really interesting because like Dionysus appears like that pretty openly I think in the play. But there are these moments where you can kind of if you're looking for, like see Pentheus, like recognizing that in Dionysus and being really interested in it, and then that kind of transitions directly into Pentheus, you know, dressing as a woman to be torn apart. But I mean, yeah, there's there's so many layers in the back eye, like the fact that there's like the.

Heel of transgression and there's the heel of all of that, and then we're back to female monsters where it's like that which is simultaneously seductive and terrifying. That's that's the whole thing in my mind.

Well, and in that case too, they're your family members, which is like adding a whole other level, Like, yes, ladies are monsters, but like even when they're your mom and your aunt, but also.

If we want to get real psychoanalytical and weird with it, maybe especially when they're your mom. I yeah, I don't know. I mean, like the unpayable biological debt to the mother is something that patriarchy finds difficult to deal with.

I mean, it's also.

Like not.

I mean it's I don't want to say coincidence, because I don't think it's either a coincidence or not one, but like it is relevant that this is happening, Yes, that this is happening in the city that will go on to house Edipus and Jocasta, like just another few generations down the line, like and of course, like when it comes to the plays, like there is something to be said for the fact that these are Athenians intentionally demonizing Thebes. But at the core, Thebes is the location of these myths, regardless of whether they appeared in a play. So I just think it's interesting, like Thebes is. I don't know, I have a soft spot for Thebes because I am deeply obsessed with Cadmus and Harmonia and the fact that they are both incredibly important and like really lacking in a lot of detail and like there's a lot of really really interesting things about them that I'll never stop thinking about. But like the fact the fact that this is like partly their family line is always really intrigued me too. But this idea of like the unpayable debt to the Mother, like I've never I don't think a lot about procreation because I hate children and the idea of pregnancy. I think it's utterly revolting. But thinking about it this way, it is very interesting.

I just I think for me, it's it's something that comes up in a lot of psychoanalysis, especially like later psychoanalysis, and like, I'm not a huge fan of Freud, but I'm a fan of some people that came like thirty years later, and some women that came thirty years later and looked at some of this stuff. And so there's this very spicy take on don't I don't know if you'll find this as fascinating as I do. But someone wrote an article on the abject maternal in Eschlus's Agamemnon, and it was all about Clydemnestra and the kind of reversal of the sex act when she penetrates Agamemnon to murder him, and then the red blood spurts up on her and like fertilizes her. And I think that's where I was telling about the word ganos those all those weeks ago. But then they they focused on the image of the red rugs drawing Agamemnon back into his home, and they said it was like some sort of perverted umbilical cord like dragging him back to a tomb, and so it's the whole womb to term thing. It's really cuckoo. I know it's really cuckoo. I hold my hands up, But I mean it's interesting. It's interesting. I'm not sure that like a hundred holds up, but those kind of ideas of the female body and the connections drawn between the female body and the oikos or the household, and how the household was kind of a sight of a lot of these dangers, and these dangers are embodied in the women that lurk within the house. It intrigues me.

I mean, yeah, no, same, I definitely have that super interesting. But I also just immediately makes me think, like that really gives a whole new meaning to the fact that we get the idea of rolling out the red carpet from that play.

Is that where we get it from?

Yeah? Oh yeah, Like it's already a fucked up phrase by the fact that the idea of rolling out the red carpet, that phrase fully comes originally from Agamemnon being welcomed home to his death.

Oh my god.

But yeah, I know I've told that to other people, and it's a really lovely revelation. Yeah, because it is like so much less lovely by what I know, But like, I think that's way better the idea that we can also then read rolling out the Red Carpet into being like, yeah, like this, because I also as you started talking about it, I was like, I don't know, are you gonna go to like a period blood kind of situation? Like I think that's not that far from it either like just a full or like just yeah, like just a full birthing kind of analogy.

Like it's so unhanged. It is so unhanged. But when you think about the fact that Pantheus is ripped apart by his mother, Yeah, lots about you know, issues of the maternal whether it's madea or you know, is it a gave. Is that Pentheus's mom? Yeah, yeah, or a gave or yeah it's let alone. Jocasta, dear old Jocasta.

Oh Jocasta. How you mean? Well, it's so good.

I know.

I'm just gonna think about the fear of female sexuality and everything now, which is funny because I kind of already have, but like less specifically, I'm like constantly Yeah, I love being scary. I just love finding like, I mean, anything that you know, you know, we talked about like the complexity of anything being empowering for women in the ancient world. But I think regardless of the poor women back then, it is empowering now to learn this stuff to just like look back and be like fuck, you know, they were so afraid of women, like and in and it remains today men are so afraid of women and like power and agency and female emotion and rage and a kind.

Of literal objectification and fragmentation of the female body into vessels like.

Full circle.

From and to like store wine, and like the jaws have nipples. Like it's just the archaeological evidence, let alone, like all of the votives of the female body and all of those figuring out and all of that. There's just this huge kind of breaking down of the woman and even like the weird sort of compartmentalization between you know, the wife and the hirai. And yes, they devoted a lot of time and energy to it.

Yeah, well there's just so much, like I just I want I want to know it all, but it's just I mean, yeah, we didn't even get to like all like the full level of the detail of porn, pops, porn pottery.

Well, this is what I wanted to ask you, is like how I guess I have so many visuals. I have so many, but it's like, how do.

We I don't know, I know, Yeah, I mean, there's only so many thing I can do with social media and people rarely see it. But like, maybe we need to figure out something for a future. Maybe we I mean I hate the idea of video, but we could try to do a video special, or maybe we tambleed with Erica and the three of us do.

Something, do like a YouTube dream.

Yeah, because I'm not because eric is not afraid of video like I am. I just oh my, it's just like it's just so fucking interesting that this. I mean, I always knew they were afraid, but like, I love this extra level that you have bestowed upon me through these drinking vessels.

Like you are. And once you see the connection between hyposexual women and monstrous women, it is so hard.

To unsae scilla and chrimptis.

Like my girls, girls, my ladies, just.

A gaping, swirling hole. Just get lost in it, get lost in.

It, get eaten by it. What a way to go, oh my god.

Okay, So I'm perpetually like kind of walking a line for how much I share about the novel that I've been working on, like on the podcast because it's not done, and also like this is me trying to get used to the fact that I've written what I've written, but I am I think I'm just gonna like start wrapping this up by telling the listeners that when you and I met in person, I was like, I think you're the right person to help me with the fact that I really need an ancient Greek word because I've been reading a lot of romance novels and I needed I needed a more relevant one, and that's where this ganos word that you mentioned earlier comes in. This word used for like the spurting of agamem Non's blood when Clydemnestra stabbed him, and it's just so good. But I also love.

Because I looked up on.

Liquid gladness, I forgot about that. I feel like, you know what, Perseus does not use that definition, and I'm glad that you reminded me of it. When I clicked on it in Perseus, it was like only Agamemnon and it was just I forget what it was, but I'm gonna go find it again. Either way, liquid gladness is getting written down right.

Yes, that fertilizes the planes. It's just so much, so much.

This episode is fucking perfect. I just oh, okay, I know, tell you something. But after I wrapped up on the microphone, this was the greatest thing ever. Do you want to tell my listeners where they can hear and learn more from you?

Please? Thank you so much for having me. I am Cozy's Odyssey on Instagram and Twitter and TikTok, and I have got this YouTube series that you can find yes over on our proper air productions. I've actually got a few more projects coming up this year, so keep your eyes peeled. I might wrote live into one. Yes, that's a threat.

Please, I'm down.

Oh yeah, so I'm on literally every platform. And thank you again for having me. This has been sort of as unhinged and joyful as I thought it would be, and somehow even more so.

So.

Thank you so much.

Thank you agree entirely. I both saw this coming and did not an exceeded expectations. But I will link to everything in the episode's descriptions that they can follow you and I'll just say that, yeah, like as causey's odysty. You followed me and messaged me like probably six years ago and we were both little babies, and it's just such a joy. It's so fun. And I mean we didn't even like talk that much in the in between, but just to let the listeners know, we met in person in Athens a couple months ago and it was just truly like we were just immediately old friends, which was very closely so comforting.

I was like, yes, internet friend, real friends.

For real, but it made this episode of far more joyful than it could have been. So so oh well, nerds, that was a joy, just truly, Oh my god, we had so much fun. So you can find more from Cossi on in the episode's description. I have linked to everything and check out Propoa Productions. They are doing some really cool stuff when it comes to video. And also the Erica that we mentioned is of course Erica Stevenson from moan Ink, who is putting out some really awesome content on YouTube, hence the joke about her not being afraid of video, and she's also involved with Propyle Productions. So check out everything that Cossi has done because it's wonderful and also like, I think you probably want to follow somebody who talks about boob cups like academically. You know, thank you all so much for listening. Let's not go. MIT's Baby is written and produced by me Live Albert Michayla Smith is the hermes to my Olympians is that what I say my brain has stopped working. Mickael's assistant producer, Laura Smith is the audio engineer and production assistant. The podcast is part of the iHeart Podcast Network. Listen on Spotify or Apple or wherever you get your podcasts, and just you know, a big thank you. On Tuesday, we should be starting the Bronze Age Collapse series, provided I can write enough of this Medusa book in time. If not, it'll just be the week later. I guess you'll just have to wait and see. I am live and I love this shit, even if it means that I've I don't know how I write so much. It's a thing. It's fun, but it is exhausting.