Women in Greek mythology who live in my mind rent free

I first stumbled upon Greek mythology when I borrowed a book from the local library as part of my summer reading list for school. It was the first book I was genuinely enticed by, and I couldn’t stop reading it. Now that I look back at it, I could see that this book was mostly just easier to process than all those Bulgarian hardcore literature pieces they made 12 year olds read. The Greek mythology content consisted mostly of examples like God one goes on wacky adventures, God two turned into an animal, humans are peasants and once a week someone gets some kind of punishment. Yet, my inner gossip girl was intrigued, and I devoured that book with the speed of a granny running for Lidl bargains. With time I grew more fascinated with the Greek gods, one of the reasons being it was interesting to see how women were depicted. Apart from being the love interest of both humans and Gods there are some real gemstones hiding in the nooks of Greek mythology lore. 

One of the women who has a truly fascinating story is Pandora. Pandora, the name coming from “all gifted”, is a woman created solely for the purpose of punishing humans. When Prometheus, God of fire, gifted humans fire it angered Zeus who in turn decided that the most powerful revenge is a woman. After all, if revenge was just striking lightning all the time, we would all live boring lives. Pandora, with the help of Athena, Aphrodite, and Hermes, came to possess a deceitful femininity, with all the newly formed skills and gifts, one of which was a suspiciously looking jar, Pandora went to humanity. While being busy bewitching everyone with her beauty, curiosity got a hold of her, and Pandora opened the jar. Who could blame her, if the jar had a big red sign that said “Do Not Open” everyone would be tempted. Unfortunately for humankind, Pandora unleashed all the evils into the world that were previously safely tucked away in that jar. War, disease, death, madness, bad live action movies - humans now face irreversible consequences drifting them further away from the paradise. Yet one thing that remained in the jar was hope and without hope being stuck at the edge of the jar we would not last a single day in this godforsaken torture hamster wheel we call real world.  

Another iconic character I love to spend my free time thinking about is Psyche. Psyche was a mortal woman whose beauty was the subject of constant praise and admiration. So much that it brought jealousy to Aphrodite, the goddess of love who, in typical spoiled child manner, did not like to share the position of ‘most beautiful’ with anyone. So, Aphrodite sends Cupid to throw one of his arrows at Psyche and make her fall in love with some detestable being that would make her life miserable. However, that day Cupid was off his game and instead pierced himself with one of his arrows and fell in love with Psyche instead. Unfortunately, women’s rights were not a thing back then, so Psyche was taken to live with Cupid in a beautiful home. She did not know who he was, nor had she even seen him, but Cupid was there with her, talking to her, whispering to her ear in the darkness of the night. Psyche grew to love and appreciate him, she understood his kindness and put up with his weird catfishing schemes. One day by the seed of distrust sprouting that was planted by a visit from her sisters, she resolved to disobey his demands and look at her husband’s face while he was sleeping. Horrified that he was betrayed in such a manner, Cupid ran away. So much for healthy communication. Psyche, as a true ambitious woman, went up to the Gods and asked to speak to Cupid. Aphrodite, still behaving very sour and vengeful towards Psyche, assigned her multiple tough challenges that she needed to complete if she wanted to meet Cupid. Psyche showed resilience in the face of these tasks, she persevered even when she had to go to the underworld. Fighting for love is never easy and somehow you never know if you are doing it the right way or if your efforts are going to be fruitless. This wasn’t the case here, once Cupid heard of what Psyche had been doing for him, his pride was revived, and his ego boosted - he reunited with Psyche, and they were happy once again. 

I know that the topic of understanding what is considered a Greek myth is a foggy one – are they Roman myths, Greco-Roman myths or just the creations of some Roman poet. Regardless, stories from back then prove to be just as impactful as stories now. ​​​​​​​