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Summary
Chapter 3
Circe continues thinking about Prometheus. She hears that he is chained to a mountain peak for eternity, and that every day an eagle comes to eat his liver. She asks her father if Zeus will ever release him, and Helios says Zeus might let Prometheus go if he believes the act of the mercy might somehow benefit him. Circe pays attention to the petty and vindictive cruelties around her and discovers that just as the gods have no loyalty to one another, they are also willing to treat mortals as pawns in their rivalries with one another.
Circe’s status as an outsider continues. She’s mocked by her siblings Pasiphaë and Perses, who tease her and say that their father has tried to marry her off, but no one will take her. When Perse has another son, Aeëtes, she is disinterested in him as well. Circe takes the baby when her mother expresses an intent to abandon him, and as she cares for her little brother, she feels love for the first time. Aeëtes grows quickly and gets permission from Helios to spend time on a remote beach, and Circe enjoys that freedom. Even though Aeëtes is considered strange by the other gods, he becomes a favorite and sits in on councils and absorbs information.
Aeëtes tells Circe about the herbs, or pharmaka, that Zeus poured down Kronos’s throat to poison him. He says that there are rare and powerful plants that grew from the blood spilled during the great war. He also encourages her to explore the nature of her divinity and asks her to think about what it feels like. Circe eventually tells him about her encounter with Prometheus, and he warns her to never speak of it again. If others knew of her actions, she would make her father look weak. Aeëtes also advises her never to defy the gods unless she has a good, self-serving reason.
Helios marries Pasiphaë off to Minos, the king of Crete. Perse is horrified at first that her favorite daughter is being given to a mortal, even if he is a son of Zeus. But Helios considers it a good match as Minos will one day rule over other mortal souls in the afterlife. At the wedding, Circe’s uncles congratulate Helios on such a smart match.
Circe sees mortals for the first time and is not impressed. She questions Prometheus’s sacrifice for the dull, repulsive humans. She also sees Olympians for the first time, including Apollo, Artemis, Hephaestus, Poseidon, and Demeter. Circe looks for Athena, the goddess she is most interested in, but she concludes she might be in disguise and undetectable. Circe also sees the mortal Daedalus. Aeëtes points him out and tells her that the man is famous for his inventions and craftmanship. Circe likes the look of Daedalus immediately.
The wedding is the last time Circe’s immediate family is together. Aeëtes reveals that he’s getting his own kingdom and leaving. Circe asks if she can go live with him, but he tells her she can’t share what’s his. Perses leaves days later for Persia. Left alone, Circe feels more isolated than ever. She returns to the beach where she and Aeëtes spent time together, and she’s filled with misery at the thought of spending eternity in her father’s palace. In her desperation, she regrets not speaking to one of the mortal men at the wedding in the hopes that she might get a marriage proposal and escape. In her lowest point of despair, she sees a boat off the coast.
Analysis
The gods demonstrate an absolute preoccupation with maintaining their power over the mortal and immortal worlds alike. Zeus uses Prometheus’s punishment to express his desire to maintain control over humans. Furthermore, he also uses Prometheus as a living monument to demonstrate the threat of what will happen if a Titan ever dares to defy him again. Helios, in turn, seeks to maintain the power that Zeus allows him to keep by capitulating to the Olympian world order. Even the marriage of his daughter Pasiphaë to Minos illustrates how Helios looks for ways to strengthen his alliance with the Olympians. Since Minos is one of Zeus’s many demigod children, Helios knows that brokering a marriage between Minos and Pasiphaë will link their families by law. Such a link is a political act with no regard for Pasiphaë’s desires or happiness and is designed only to bolster Helios’s power. That kind of scheming and jockeying for power is seen throughout the story.
Aeëtes’s birth marks a pivotal change in Circe’s life and further demonstrates patriarchal control over women. In taking responsibility for raising her new brother when their mother declares a lack of interest, Circe enjoys more freedom only because of the fact that Aeëtes is a son. Circe’s ability to leave the palace is only a byproduct of the privilege her brother has as a male. Here freedom here cannot exist without the freedom her brother is entitled to. Additionally, any secrets or knowledge Circe might impart on her younger brother results in Aeëtes thinking it is a joke. It is unthinkable to him, a man, that his sister could know anything he doesn’t. Relatedly, when she tells him about her experience with Prometheus, his advice to her stems not from concern for her safety from their father’s rage but rather as a means to control her choices about when and how to defy the gods. His concentration on garnering power and being smart about how to navigate the world of the gods further exemplifies the patriarchal structure seeded into immortal society.
Circe’s first encounters with mortals foreshadow future events for her. Although Circe concludes upon her first glimpse of mortals that they are small and weak, she will one day realize in the most brutal way how men, even mortal ones, can be a danger to an immortal woman like herself. This fact strengthens patriarchal themes of the novel and how no woman is truly safe in a world of men. Meanwhile, Circe’s first impression of Daedalus is also significant.
While he is introduced as a utilitarian craftsman, Circe’s interest in him foreshadows her first experience with a healthy romantic relationship. The fact that the mortal Daedalus reveals himself as a sensitive and kind man with wit and intelligence in turn informs Circe’s eventual relationship with Telemachus. The mortals in these first encounters set up a dichotomy for the rest of the novel between the dangerous nature of men and their capacity for empathic love.
The chapter ends with Circe once again experiencing a sense of complete isolation from her family and foreshadows her total isolation on Aiaia. Her brothers’ departure from their father’s palace after the wedding increases a familial distance with which Circe is already painfully familiar. The fact that Aeëtes can leave Circe without any hesitation or regret reveals how he puts his own desires over any feeling of love he might have for the sister who raised him. Furthermore, by telling Circe that she cannot have even a small part of what is his, Aeëtes reveals just how selfish and power-hungry he really is. Circe’s despair over her isolation is ironic since she will soon be completely separated from her family. She will quickly need to learn how to enjoy the freedom that comes from not having her family around her anymore.
