Healing Pandora: The Restoration of Hope and Abundance

By Gail Thomas
North Atlantic Books

The mythic Pandora has long been misunderstood as one who brought evil into the world. She was thought to be the first mortal woman created and sent to Earth by the gods. Her infamous box, once opened, leads to the escape of diseases and other ills, resulting in a lasting curse upon humankind.

But this is not Pandora’s original story; in fact, the modern retelling of this myth is vastly different from Pandora’s true nature. In Healing Pandora, author Gail Thomas explores the origins of the Pandora myth, how it evolved into the tale we accept today, and Pandora’s influence on our culture.

Thomas asserts that long before Pandora’s myth became twisted, she inhabited the role of a goddess. Pandora was not just any goddess. She was the Earth Mother and maker of “all things, all gods, and all mortals.” But like many other female figures (historical or mythical), Pandora’s role as life giver transformed into one who bestows misfortune upon the world, and men in particular.

The first half of Healing Pandora takes a thorough look at the goddess and the vessel she carries, while in the second half, Thomas focuses on how people can apply Pandora’s lessons to modern culture. Thomas describes Pandora as “an archetypal image of culture, an image no longer in the consciousness of our world today.” She invites the reader to consider Western culture as a living entity and describe its appearance. The author bets the image would be one of “competition and scarcity.” By viewing culture through the Pandora myth, however, Thomas states that we will find “a bountiful feminine figure with outstretched arms and hands, waiting to provide everything we need.” The latter outlook seems most assuredly a rarity for Westerners.

Some solutions Thomas offers for transforming culture include women and men embracing their feminine side and also to become true stewards of the earth who recognize that spirit exists in all matter. She also suggests considering how different the world would appear to each of us if we imagined it as a bountiful place instead of one that is always deficient in some way or another.

Of course with a book titled Healing Pandora one would expect the author to spend some time analyzing myth. Thomas does this and takes liberty by discussing Pandora and many other mythic figures in great detail, so much that it’s difficult to keep track of the book’s main purpose. On the other hand, she does raise many valuable and thought-provoking insights toward culture today that are worth contemplating, and Thomas provides a much-needed background of Pandora before her myth became corrupted.

Review by Beverly Jenkins-Crockett

Baba Yaga Laid an Egg

By Dubravka Ugresic
Canongate

When she sleeps, her nose scrapes the ceiling of her small cottage. Her breasts hang from a pole over the fireplace, and she has a leg made of iron. She lives alone in a hut on chicken legs, and her gates are topped with human skulls. Passing heroes can flatter her and order her to do their bidding, but heroines must serve her in order to win her favor. Baba Yaga, a complicated crone from Central and Eastern European mythology, is a theme explored and exploded in Dubravka Ugresic's Baba Yaga Laid an Egg.

The novel has three parts, all set in Central and Eastern Europe. In the first, a woman deals with her aging mother's increasing senility and travels to their hometown in search of memory and meaning. In the second, three old women visit a health resort to relax and rejuvenate; romance and death follow. The final part is a meta-level, scholarly treatise of Baba Yaga written written from the perspective of a minor character in the first story and as though a folklorist had teased out all the feminine symbols woven throughout the previous two stories.

Baba Yaga Laid an Egg is an exploration of women growing older in a post-Soviet state where distance between people is becoming the norm. Like Baba Yaga, the older women in these stories are dealing with their aging bodies, are often alone or isolated, and are frequently misunderstood, though they help or hinder other characters as they please. While these women are marginalized, they are definitely not powerless. They have the power to transform lives, and this is usually done through wealth they've accumulated during their younger years.

At its core, this is a book about women, bodies, and journeys. While Baba Yaga Laid an Egg is a thicket of fairytale symbols and references to life in the former Soviet bloc, it can be enjoyed by those who don't have a prior interest in either fairytales or the locale. Ugresic is a clever writer who shows in this book that imaginary lands are dangerous places and little old ladies aren't as toothless as they may appear.

Review by Catherine Nicotera