Heroines in Greek Myth
and Star Wars
Images of the Female
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in folktale themes
in divine machinery
in the hero pattern
in the hero quest
Women in Folktale Themes
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The Wicked Step-mother/Step-envy
Suitor Contest
The Hero's Betrayal of the Princess
Rescue of the Princess
Rescue by the Heroine (Women to the Rescue
A Woman's Web
A Woman's Wit
The Revenge of the Woman Scorned
The Danger of the Feminine
Where have we seen these themes in the myths so far?
Goddesses (Divine Machinery)
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Hera
Athena
Thetis
Aphrodite
Goddess
Wife: Hera
Mother: Thetis
Virgin: Athena
Sexuality: Aphrodite
Mortal Women in Myth
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Helen of Troy
Europa
Penelope
Alcmene
Hero Pattern applied to Women
•The Hero Pattern applied to Women in
Myth, History and Literature
Magical Earth Maiden Pattern
The pattern, which for reasons which will become obvious, we called the Magical Earth
Maiden.
1. A young orphaned girl, on the brink of womanhood.
2 lives in a remote place of power.
3. The maiden does not usually travel; she may be carried off by an evil female.
4. The Maiden is possessed of a power but may not realise it.
5. The power may be symbolised by a token, ring, necklace, or jewel.
6. The Maiden’s power is transformative, healing, or creative connected to the earth.
7. She may be threatened by a powerful rival female who turns out to be a witch.(See
#3)
8. She may have a wise mentor who teaches the arts of the earth and to use her
attractive power prudently. The mentor is often her deceased mother.
9. The Maiden attracts a young male, often a prince or a person of power and
prestige.
10. The Prince may already be on a quest, which may be the rescue of the Maiden;
or he is set a quest by the Maiden.
11. The Prince needs help from the Maiden and she gives it.
12. The quest is completed successfully and the pair are united in a bond of
friendship, familial love or marriage.
Earth Maiden Pattern
applied to Medea
Penelope and the Hero Pattern
Pintoricchio, Penelope with the Suitors,
1509, National Gallery, London
Daughter of Icarius, king of
Thestios in Aetolia (2).
According to one myth, her
mother was Polycaste, the
daughter of Lygaeos (1).
According to another myth, her
mother was the Naiad (seagoddess) Periboea. (5).
Nothing is known of her childhood
(9).
On reaching adulthood her father
proposes a foot race as a suitor
contest to select his daughter’s
husband. Odysseus wins the race
and Penelope chooses to return
with him to Ithaca rather than live
in her father’s house (10).
Penelope the Mythic Heroine
After a long struggle with the suitors (11),
she is reunited with her long-absent husband Odysseus (12),
remains mistress of his house (13) where, for a time, she prescribes
laws (15) until, according to some myths, she loses favor with
Odysseus because of her adultery with the suitors (16)
and is sent into exile or killed (17) by her husband.
Her tomb is sometimes said to be in Mantinea (22).
In another myth Odysseus is accidently killed by Telegonos (his son
by Circe) who takes his father’s body and Penelope to Circe’s
island, where he marries Penelope and Circe transports them both
to the Land of the Blessed (18).
13 points
Penelope as the Faithful Wife
Death of Agamemnon, Aegisthos with sword.
Detail from Athenian red-figure clay vase about 500-450 BC.
Boston. Museum of Fine Arts 63.1246 W.F.Warden Fund
© Boston. Museum of Fine Arts
Penelope Weeping over the Bow of Ulysses
Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807)
Penelope to Ulysses
Ovid’s Heroides I
Heroides = Heroines
Fictitious letters from mythological
heroines to their absent lovers
• Briseis to Achilles
• Phaedra to Hippolytus
• Ariadne to Theseus
• Medea to Jason
• Penelope to Ulysses (-Odysseus)
Ovid (43 B.C.-17 A.D.)
Heroines as Helpers
• Medea (and Jason)
• Ariadne (and Theseus)
The Heroine Abandoned
The Deified
Heroine
Ariadne, Venus and Bacchus
TINTORETTO
(b. 1518, Venezia, d. 1594, Venezia) 1576 Oil on canvas, 146 x 157 cm
Sala di Anticollegio, Palazzo Ducale, Venice
Marie de Medici
as a Mythic Heroine
Marie de' Medici. (1573-1642).
Daughter of Francis of Tuscany.
Married Henri IV in 1600 and mother
of Louis XIII, during whose minority
she was regent. She lost a power
struggle with Richelieu and left France
in 1631.
Rubens’ Hero Cycle on Marie de Medici:
http://department.monm.edu/classics/Co
urses/Clas230/MythDocuments/Mariede
Medici.htm
Padme
Heroines in Star Wars
• Padme
• Leia
Padme
Leia
Heroines in Star Wars
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Folktale Themes
Divine Machinery?
Hero Pattern
Hero Quest
Heroine as Faithful Wife
Heroine as Helper
Abandoned Heroine
Deified Heroine