54 pages • 1 hour read
Jennifer SaintAriadne
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2021A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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BetaBackground
Cultural Context: Greek Mythology
Ariadne is based on several classical myths—most notably, that of Theseus and the Minotaur. Saint’s version is mostly a faithful retelling, with the major difference being her decision to place Ariadne rather than the traditionally heroic Theseus at the story’s center. There are many variations of the original myth, but a common thread throughout is Theseus’s portrayal as a brave and triumphant hero who sacrifices himself for his people. His defeat of the Minotaur threatens the tyrannical King Minos’s rule, symbolizing a triumph of good over evil.
However, viewing the story through Ariadne’s lens greatly complicates the reader’s perception of Theseus. Ariadne initially views Theseus as a kind and selfless hero, but this view is abruptly shattered when he abandons her on the island of Naxos. Theseus’s decision plays out in various ways in the original myth: According to some sources, Ariadne was indeed killed by Artemis as Theseus claims in the novel. In others, Dionysus forces Theseus to leave her, as the god wants to marry Ariadne himself. Ariadne heavily implies that Theseus planned to abandon her all along, but Saint leaves this intentionally ambiguous. In doing so, Saint draws attention to the traditionally heroic Theseus’s less-than-noble actions, and by extension uses the myth to explore The Danger of Fame, Heroism, and Immortality.
Authorial Context: Jennifer Saint
Jennifer Saint is a British novelist known for her fascination with Greek mythology. After 13 years as a high school English teacher, Saint wrote and published Ariadne, her debut novel. She went on to publish Elektra in 2022 and Atalanta in 2023, both of which also reimagine the stories and struggles of female figures from Greek mythology.
Saint’s focus in retelling these classical myths is to highlight the narratives of women. Greek mythology often focuses on the great and courageous deeds of male heroes, downplaying the important roles that women played in their exploits. Female characters tend to play secondary roles, and their contributions, such as Ariadne’s help in Theseus’s navigation of the Labyrinth, are largely forgotten or taken for granted. Ariadne subverts this by downplaying Theseus’s defeat of the Minotaur to place the focus on Ariadne’s sacrifice. As in her other works, Jennifer Saint also gives voice to the women and girls of Greek myth, not only spotlighting their heroic actions but exploring their thoughts, hopes, and struggles as women in ancient Greek society. This is part of a larger trend in 21st-century popular literature, in which writers retell or reimagine traditional narratives through a feminist lens in order to explore themes surrounding gender roles, marginalization, and power dynamics.
Socio-Historical Context: Ancient Greece
Both Ariadne and the mythology it draws on reflect the cultural values and beliefs of real-life ancient Greek society. The tension between Athens, a city-state on the Grecian mainland, and the island of Crete illuminates actual historical differences in culture and customs. In Ariadne, both their father’s cruel actions and their cultural differences as Cretans cause Ariadne and Phaedra to worry about how they will be received in Athens. These concerns have basis in history, as the ancient civilizations on mainland Greece often struggled to understand the customs of their island neighbors. Some sources have suggested that these cultural misunderstandings helped give rise to the fantastical tale of the Labyrinth and the Minotaur.
A central focus of Ariadne is the Status and Agency of Women in Ancient Greece. The ancient Greeks valued traits such as heroism, self-sacrifice, courage, and physical prowess, but in most cases women were excluded from partaking in such heroic feats, whether in real life or in myth. While their status varied across eras and from city-state to city-state, women were generally expected to be dutiful and loyal daughters, wives, and mothers, even at their own expense. The men in their lives traded and maneuvered them with little thought to their well-being, but legal and financial constraints meant that women had little choice but to rely on men to provide them with relative safety and stability. Athens was particularly limiting in this respect, as women did not enjoy full citizenship and had only restricted property rights. Ariadne explores the roles of women during this time through its central characters, Ariadne and Phaedra, as they struggle for agency in a world that seeks to deny it to them.
