Book Review: “Stone Blind” by Natalie Haynes

Stone Blind by Natalie Haynes

Sensei Haynes is the premier classics-themed stand up in the UK, and possibly the world.  This puts her in the first ranks of nerd-dom, as well as popular education, and general Sensei-dom.

She also brings an educated woman’s eye to a field that is the absolute paradigm of reactionary male culture.  For all her humor and plain pleasure with the classics; at times, Haynes is not amused—and she is willing to tell us about it. 

In her recent books, Haynes has taken to retelling the old stories–closely following the original sources–from a distinctly feminine viewpoint.  A Thousand Ships tells the Trojan War from the point of view of the women who were there.  Pandora’s Jar is a collection of essays that works through stories about women that have evolved as they were carried down from ancient times.

Stone Blind is labeled “a novel”, but it, too, is based on the ancient stories; stories about Gorgons, and Medusa.  She (Medusa) has appeared in many stories, not least Clash of the Titans (1981), which has shaped our contemporary imagination of Medusa (and introduced us all to the Kraken).  But the original story of Medusa was vastly different, weirder, and darker than the Hollywood version.

Haynes finds contemporary resonance with the British media slang, showing us that she was “Monstered” by story tellers.  If Medusa is a Monster, she was made a monster by brutal abuse and ignorance, and by the needs of narratives she had nothing to do with. 

I was going to say, Medusa was Monstered by the brutality of powerful men, but, of course, she and other women are abused by powerful women as well.  (And here, as elsewhere, Haynes has made clear her own well justified fury, at the abusive women as well as the men.)

Let’s be clear.  These characters and actions are all based on the actual ancient sources.  Obviously, Haynes offers us a very contemporary feminist interpretation of these tales.  But this is how they were originally told.

These ancient stories show us an alien world.

It is a world infused with magic that made little sense. The Olympians were petty, childish, stupid brats—with incredibly dangerous super powers. Powerful men (and women) took whatever they want.

And, in this story, heroes were gormless fools who could not lose because the gods rigged the game. Not exactly what we think of has “heroic”.

All in all, this world is not quite the brilliant foundation for Western Civilization we’ve been taught about.

Medusa’s tale itself is a sad story, sickening in many places, with an unhappy ending that you already know.  Perseus, the famous hero, is a psychopathic killer without a plan.  And he wins the princess, fer goodness sake.  Hundreds die. Injustice is not punished.

The only people (using the term generously) who come off truly human and sympathetic in this novel are the Gorgons—known to us and the whole world throughout history as terrifying monsters. The rest; gods, goddesses, kings, queens, heroes, magical olive groves; all the great and good; are mostly ignorant, greedy, bullying bastards. 

The only way I could make it through this horrible tale is because Haynes is a marvelous writer with a comic flare. 

Medusa and her sisters are nice people.  (And if they became “angry women”, well, they are very justified.)  Perseus’ mother and step father are good people.  And there are so many ordinary people, living ordinary lives, and behaving decently.

The rest of the crew are wicked, but who can take them seriously.  The idiot Olympians are so idiotic, it is comical.  Perseus is such a moron, it’s funny.  The magical Nereids are so ditzy, they could be from California.

And so on.

We have to laugh at the tragedy, or we’ll go mad with despair.

I don’t think this story is a morality lesson, but if there is any moral lesson here, it must be to beware of stories about Monsters, especially Female Monsters.  These tales are probably not the whole story, and quite possible not even the real story.

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1. Natalie Haynes, Stone Blind, New York, HarperCollins, 2023.

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