Weight: the Myth of Atlas and Heracles

by Jeanette Winterson

The publisher Canongate has begun a new book series, The Myths, asking contemporary authors to retell ancient mythological stories. Among the first volumes published in the Myths series is Weight: the Myth of Atlas and Heracles by Jeanette Winterson. It's a short book - some 150 pages - with a heavy topic.

Winterson tells the story of Heracles: his godly father Zeus, his mortal mother Alcmene, the wrath of Zeus's consort Hera, the divinely provoked insanity that causes Heracles to kill his wife and children, and the twelve impossible tasks he must do to atone for the murder of his family.

To complete the eleventh task, Heracles must travel to the end of the world and steal the Apples of Hesperades from a fruit tree belonging to his enemy, Hera. He arrives to find that the apples are guarded by Ladon, a hundred-headed snake, and he enlists the help of Atlas, a Titan commissioned with the task of shouldering the world.

Though the story is a timeless one, Winterson gives her characters modern psychologies. In their quest for the Apples of Hesperides, Heracles and Atlas come to consider the paths that their lives have taken:

Which is what [Heracles] said to Atlas when they ate together under a wedge of stars.
"Why are we doing this, mate?"
"Doing what?"
"You're holding up the Kosmos and I'm spending twelve years clobbering snakes and theiving fruit. The only good time was chasing Hippolyte, Queen of the Amazons, and she didn't want anything to do with me when I caught her...."
"What happened to Hippolyte?"
"I killed her of course."
"I knew her once."
"Sorry mate."
There was a pause. Atlas was silent. Heracles drank another skinful of wine. He didn't want to think. Thinking was like a hornet. It was outside his head buzzing at him.
"What I mean to say, Atlas, is why?"
"There is no why," said Atlas.
"That's just the trouble," said Heracles.
"There is why, here, or here, or here," and he started hitting the side of his head, trying to squash the droning thought.
Atlas said -
"Bent under the world like this, I hear all the business of men, and the more I hear them questioning their lot, the more I know how futile it is. I hear them plan for tomorrow and die during the night. I hear a woman groaning in labor and her child is stillborn. I hear the terror of the captured man, and suddenly he is set free. I hear a merchangt traveling home from the coast with all his goods, and robbers set upon him and take all he has. There is no why. There is only the will of the gods and a man's fate."
"I'm the strongest man in the world," said Heracles.
"Except for me," said Atlas.
"And I'm not free...."
"There is no such thing as freedom," said Atlas. "Freedom is a country that does not exist."
"It's home," said Heracles. "If home is where you want to be."

Winterson's version of the Atlas and Heracles story is chock-full of such witty and probing passages. Her mythological superheroes find ways to liberate both mind and body from the tasks that life has given to them. In this way, the story becomes a modern one, full of questions about why we do the things we do.