All The Violet Tiaras: Queering the Greek Myths

by Jean Menzies

Genres: Non-fiction
Pages: 88
Rating:

Synopsis:

For a period in time that gave us Sappho, and the love affair of Achilles and Patroclus, the Ancient Greek relationship with queer folk is a lot more complicated than at first glance. Myths were altered and adapted throughout antiquity to reflect the values and issues of the day. All the Violet Tiaras navigates queer reimaginings, explorations of gender, and more.

Jean Menzies’ All The Violet Tiaras is quite short, more a long essay than a book really, which means it doesn’t waste much time, plunging straight in to discussing the modern takes on Greek myths, and the way that queer people in particular have adopted and adapted them, seeing ourselves in them, etc.

Menzies discusses some books/stories I was aware of, and some I wasn’t, which means I now have a little wishlist of books/stories I want to look into (oh no). I think she handles well the line between what we think of as queerness now and how identities worked in Ancient Greece, without trying to project that kind of thing backwards.

It’s a minor point, but it is a bit weird to have a book that so relies on Twitter/X as being an institution that eveeeeryone uses that @usernames are included just like that (not “@username on X”, just “@username”). It feels especially weird for a book published in 2024, as X crumbles and every week there’s a new spurt of users heading off to Mastodon, Bluesky, and other alternatives. This might look very strange in a couple more years. It already feels weird to me; not having used it for two years makes me very conscious how inessential it actually is. The book could also use a solid proofread.

Rating: 4/5