Helen was complicit.

Helen of Troy betrayed her husband and ran off with Paris. In doing this, the Trojan war started, and many died.

It took a female poet to state the obvious: Helen, unlike Penelope, was complicit.

French Girl (1895) by Elizabeth MacNicol (1869–1904)

Helen

All Greece hates
the still eyes in the white face,
the lustre as of olives
where she stands,
and the white hands.

All Greece reviles
the wan face when she smiles,
hating it deeper still
when it grows wan and white,
remembering past enchantments
and past ills.

Greece sees, unmoved,
God’s daughter, born of love,
the beauty of cool feet
and slenderest knees,
could love indeed the maid,
only if she were laid,
white ash amid funereal cypresses.

Hilda Doolittle

One thought on “Helen was complicit.

  1. In a society that sees women in a healthy light, this would not need to be said.With third wave feminism, women are attempting to duck all responsibility. I can see the parallels to this and what is going on with Harvey Weinstein. While he is responsible for his actions, not a word is being leveled at the women who were complicit.

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