Our Favourite Myth Retelling Recommendations
We love a myth retelling at Dash Arts, and our current production of Dido’s Bar is just that. It reimagines the ancient myth of The Aeneid - set in two rival music clubs run by the mischievous Goddesses Juno and Venus. We’re retelling the classic tale of Aenead through the eyes of refugees today (largely inspired by our friend and composer Marouf Majidi), wrapped up in immersive theatre and original world music.
We’ve pulled together some of our favourite works that retell classical tales, from books to theatre to poetry.
Turnus (Tuukka Leppänen) and Matina (Gemma Barnett) in Dido’s Bar. Photography by Ali Wright.
FROM OUR FRIENDS
CLARE MURPHY
Ragnarok: The End of the Gods by AS Byatt, 2011
A girl in the midst of the Second World War discovers an old Norse legend
Over Nine Waves by Marie Heaney
Ancient Irish legends retold by journalist Marie Heaney.
Listen to Clare Murphy in our podcast episode here.
LEN GWYNN
Gender Swapped Greek Myths, Jonathan Plackett and Karrie Franzman
Illustrations of male sirens and underworld queens… what more can we say?
INSIDES at Camden People’s Theatre & Wales Millenium Centre with Porscha Present and Sinan Güçlü
Ancient myth, story yelling, music and modern gender, basically.
Listen to Len Gwyn in our podcast episode here.
The creative team at a residency in Falmouth, May 2022. From front left: Georgina White (Juno, Dido’s Bar); Riku Kantola (Music Arrangement, Dido’s Bar); Jane Showell (Head of Marketing & Communications); Marouf Majidi (Composer of Dido’s Bar); Tuukka Leppänen (Turnus, Dido’s Bar); Hattie Naylor (Writer, Dido’s Bar) and Manuel Di Francesco (designer, Dido’s Travelling Bar).
From our followers
Song of Achilles by Madeleine Miller
Largely centres around Achilles, from Homer’s Illiad, from the perspective of Patroclus. A queer love story that portrays an often unseen type of relationship from antiquity.
Hadestown
A musical by Anaïs Mitchell, first performed in 2006, that retells the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. The concept album (of the same name) was released 2010. Listen on spotify
The Penelopiad, Margaret Atwood.
An adaptation of The Odyssey, from the perspective of Odysseus’ wife, Penelope. The novella features choral verses, a popular storytelling technique from ancient Greek tragic plays.
Our recommendations
Lavinia by Ursula Le Guin
A charming retelling by the queen of sci-fi herself. It is the second half of the Aeneid told through the perspective of Lavinia, who is entirely without a voice in the original epic. Hattie (Writer of Dido’s Bar) and Josephine (Director of Dido’s Bar) wanted to give voice to this silenced female character, and so created Matina (see image above) - an amalgamation of Lavinia and her mother Amata.
Hold your Own, Kae Tempest.
A poetry collection based on the myth of the blind prophet Tiresias - who transforms from child to man to woman to prophet. A beautiful collection that weaves classical myth into vivid commentary on gender, sex, community and alienation. Watch Kae reciting the title poem here. Listen to the title poem as a song here.
Medusa: The Girl Behind the Myth, Jessie Burton. Illustrated by Olivia Lomenech Gill
An illustrated retelling of the misunderstood Medusa, exploring themes of gender stereotypes, sexual trauma, and female autonomy. Written by the author of The Miniaturist and aimed at YA readers, expect stunning storytelling and gorgeous visuals.
Weight, Jeanette Winterson
A reimagining of the myth of Atlas with Winterson’s bewitching and witty prose. In this short novella, we follow Atlas as he navigates his own morals and duties with the devious hero Heracles, while carrying the world on his back.
Silence of the Girls, Pat Barker.
This tells the story of Briseis as she lives beside Greek hero Achilles as his sex slave. Barker wonderfully illustrates the Trojan War from the female point of view, that inherently shines a light on the traumas of war for women across the ages. Note: this is an interesting book to read before or after Songs of Achilles, as they both essentially tell the story of Achilles, but from very different perspectives, to curiously similar outcomes.
Find out more about Dido’s Bar here.
More On Myth
In the third episode on the journey towards our production, The Reckoning, Dash’s Artistic Director, Josephine Burton is in conversation with Rory Finnin, Professor of Ukrainian Studies at the University of Cambridge. Interspersed by some short performances from the developing script, the two discuss the creative process behind the making of the production, rooted in testimonies taken from survivors from the Russian war in Ukraine.