Beyond Selidor

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

Persephone (Greek mythology)

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

This post by catvalente says it so much better than I ever could.

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

( The other days )

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

I haven't had internet at home for a while, so I'm just now catching up on all my feeds, There's been a lot of interesting stuff posted recently, so I thought I'd make a linkpost.

Sarah Rees Brennan posted this thought-provoking piece about what it means to be an author and have an internet presence.

And then, for a total change in tone, she wrote a hilarious liveblog of Teen Wolf, making it sound so funny that I might be tempted to check it out.

Catherynne M. Valente posted about how she was fed up with arguing about ebooks.

She also wrote about the misconceptions social conservatives hold about 'women's work', and the supposed golden age of pre-industrial times.

sophiamcdougall made a Romanitas playlist. I geeked out.

Here's an article from Rolling Stone about the effects of global warming in Australia. I found myself nodding away to pretty much everything being said.

It's been said before, but it needs to be said again: unpaid internships are exploitative and perpetuate inequality.

Our forum interviewed Philip Pullman.

Finally, I blogged about the start of the semester in Germany.