This year’s Santa Fe Reads was a real page-turner

HOMER. SOPHOCLES. AESCHYLUS. And now, Madeline Miller.

The first three, of course, are among the ancient Greek poets and playwrights whose written works secured the oral traditions of the Cradle of Civilization for eternity. The latter is a contemporary novelist following in their footsteps with books like Circe, the literary fantasy that was this year’s choice for Santa Fe Reads, a citywide book club funded through a National Endowment for the Arts grant.

Santa Fe Reads kicked off April 20 (see “Join the club,” April 12) and ends Thursday, May 16, when Miller will participate virtually in a staged discussion with St. John’s College professor Marsaura Shukla and answer questions at the Santa Fe Convention Center. The event is free, but reservations are required.

The Santa Fe Literary Festival, which begins the following day, is co-presenting the closing event for Santa Fe Reads, and Teatro Paraguas will stage a brief play about barrio witches. The City of Santa Fe’s Community Services department is funding a reception catered by Youth Works. Those partnerships and the many others involved in the city’s four-week open book club thrill Sorakamol Annette Prapasiri, executive director of Creative Santa Fe, who coordinated the closing event and serves as host.

“Over 30 organizations are coming together, pitching in and offering something in celebration of how stories unite us and bring us together to ask questions but also to learn something new,” she says. “Together, we are strengthening the social fabric and growing.” Between the kickoff and the ending, the Santa Fe Public Library will have hosted almost a dozen related events (some taking place this week) — that include discussions, lectures, arts and crafts projects, and more — to allow readers to fully engage with the ancient Greek period and its traditions.

At one such event last month, St. John’s College professor Krishnan Venkatesh praised Miller’s work as a modern contribution to two of the greatest works of ancient Greece — the epic poem The Odyssey by Homer and the tragic play Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus.

The ancient Greek authors reworked the original fables, each putting a unique spin on their culture’s shared stories of gods, mortals, and monsters, just as Miller has done in Circe, Venkatesh says.

“Over 30 organizations are coming together, pitching in and offering something in celebration of how stories unite us and bring us together to ask questions but also to learn something new. Together, we are strengthening the social fabric and growing.”

— Sorakamol Annette Prapasiri

“It’s not just a conversation with The Odyssey; it’s a completion of The Odyssey,” Venkatesh says, noting how Miller deals with Circe’s pregnancy, motherhood, and (spoiler alert!) her marriage to Telemachus and decision to become mortal.

Family ties extended through ancient Greek culture, and Miller’s book helps readers understand the relational connections between the many gods, Venkatesh says. Circe is the daughter of the sun god Helios and granddaughter of Oceanos, the god of seas. Prometheus was her uncle. Because of these and other interconnections, “all Greek mythology is a family drama,” Venkatesh says.

During one point in the novel, Circe tells Telemachus, “You are not your blood” — in other words, renouncing family ties in favor of individualistic freedom, Venkatesh says.

“No Greek would have said that — this is a modern twist,” he told about 75 people who attended his April 27 lecture at the Southside Library Branch.

Miller also tapped into a modern understanding of post-traumatic stress syndrome to explain Odysseus’ raging behavior upon his return to Ithaca after the Trojan War, Venkatesh says.

In previous interviews, Miller said she is happy to bring a modern and a feminist perspective to these fables by elevating Circe to a main character and imagining events through her eyes.

“I’ve loved Greek mythology since I was a child, and I’ve always been really excited about the character of Circe,” she said in a June 2022 interview with Arts Midwest published on Youtube. “I saw the story of a woman who was struggling to find her voice, struggling to find her power in a world that is profoundly hostile to her.

“It was also a really feminist story from the beginning for me,” she continued. “I loved the fact that I was looking at voices that had been silenced in the original material … these characters who had been forced to very constricted roles. It was really fun to write this story and give them a chance to breathe.”

Prapasiri of Creative Santa Fe, who was involved in choosing Circe for this year’s Santa Fe Reads, says it wasn’t the Greek mythology that led her to recommend the book.

“I felt this story transcends specificity as all good stories do. It’s an exploration of themes that are universal,” she says, adding that stories “allow you to really expand and grow and look at yourself. You get to go on an adventure without having to break a sweat.”

Prapasiri says she loved watching Circe gain her full power over the course of the book’s many adventures as she lets go of one piece of divine armor at a time, finally relinquishing her immortality.

“In that surrender,” Prapasiri says, “she gained something truly powerful — love.”

This year marks Santa Fe’s third time participating in the National Endowment for the Arts Big Read program. Attendee Carman Melendrez of Santa Fe hopes it won’t be the last.

“I think it’s phenomenal,” Melendrez says. “It’s an amazing opportunity to read a classic and engage in a dialogue with other people about its meaning.”