Virtual Author Talk: Madeline Miller

You’re invited to a fascinating conversation with Madeline Miller, bestselling author of The Song of Achilles and Circe, about her body of work and her process of retelling Greek classics into modern epics in fiction.

In The Song of Achilles, Achilles, "the best of all the Greeks," son of the cruel sea goddess Thetis and the legendary king Peleus, is strong, swift, and beautiful—irresistible to all who meet him. Patroclus is an awkward young prince, exiled from his homeland after an act of shocking violence. When word comes that Helen of Sparta has been kidnapped, all the heroes of Greece are called upon to lay siege to Troy in her name. The two men join the cause.

In Circe, a daughter is born to Helios, god of the sun and mightiest of the Titans. The book tells the story of Circe, a strange child--neither powerful like her father nor viciously alluring like her mother. Turning to the world of mortals for companionship, she discovers that she does possess power: the power of witchcraft, which can transform rivals into monsters and menace the gods themselves.

About the Author: Madeline Miller is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of two novels: The Song of Achilles, which won the Orange Women’s Prize for Fiction 2012, and Circe, which was short-listed for the Women’s Prize for Fiction 2019. Her books have been translated into over thirty-two languages. Miller holds an MA in Classics from Brown University, studied in the Dramaturgy department at Yale School of Drama, where she focused on the adaptation of classical texts to modern forms, and taught Latin, Greek, and Shakespeare to high school students for over a decade.

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This is part of a series of author talks in partnership with the Library Speakers Consortium.  See all upcoming talks here.

The Author Talks series is made possible by Friends of the Library.