Margaret Atwood’s Re-creation of the Philomel myth in ‘Nightingale’
Margaret Atwood’s Re-creation of the Philomel myth in ‘Nightingale’

Summary/Abstract: Myth is what Steiner calls the ‘code of instantaneous recognition’1. Myth still remains ‘the story of the story of the story…’ which can immediately stir recognition and evocation through the recognized allusions and accumulated associations. The myths, as Geoffrey Miles rightly points out, need not be any fixed code (Miles 1999: 4); instead their interpretations can always vary with varying periods and writers. The myths, thus re-employed across spaces and times, come to manifest themes and preoccupations of different cultures and ages. When an author rewrites an ancient myth in the 21st century it is of course a new text, which is nevertheless enriched by all the old associations and significances that accumulate around it in its various prior versions through the ages. A new interpretation thus does not necessarily cancel the old ones, but rather involves a process of palimpsestic re-layering of interpretations and evocations. Margaret Atwood’s brief crystal-like prose-piece, ‘Nightingale’, – rewriting the ancient Philomel myth – can be considered in this light.

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