Clytemnestra

Giving voice to a woman condemned by history, this debut is an epic feminist retelling of the story of notorious Spartan queen, Clytemnestra

‘When vengeance calls and the gods stop watching,
what do we do to those who harm the people we love?’

Wife. Mother. Fighter. Conspirator. Queen. CLYTEMNESTRA.

This is the story of a daughter betrayed by her father. Who watches her sister be destroyed by violence and rape. Whose child is sacrificed to ensure her family’s power. Who fights as fiercely as any warrior. Who falls in love with her husband’s enemy. Who is hungry for otherworldly retribution against both men and gods…

This is Clytemnestra, the most notorious heroine of the Ancient World. Know her name.

Condemned by Homer and the Greek poets as a sexually faithless, deceitful, murderous woman, Clytemnestra’s voice is obscured by the spiteful judgement of history. A judgement that refuses to see her strength and her cunning, her grief and her rage. Costanza Cosati’s dazzling debut isn’t just a retelling of the consequences of war on women – it is about how women fought their own wars. Because Clytemnestra understood something that the others didn’t:

If power isn’t given to you, you have to take it for yourself.