House of Muses: The Latter Days of Sappho of Lesbos – Review

By Bill McCormick

“But you, O Dika, wreathe lovely garlands in your hair,

Weave shoots of dill together, with slender hands,

For the Graces prefer those who are wearing flowers,

And turn away from those who go uncrowned.”

– Sappho of Lesbos, circa 500 B.C.

Pam Harrison’s House of Muses: The Latter Days of Sappho of Lesbos is not your typical graphic novel fare. The poems written concerning a woman named Dika deal with some hard truths of what women of the day endured as the world around them evolved. Some scholars even believe some of Sappho’s poems were actually written by Dika, possibly under the tutelage of Sappho, and then just included in works published later.

Either way, we are granted a detailed view of life at the time and, more importantly, a look into how the love of women for other women was perceived by the patriarchy. Sappho’s poems have been reviled and revered throughout history usually for the same reasons.

Here, Harrison takes one element, the life of Dika, and uses it as the thread to tie everything together. Instead of the grand wars, or the various machinations of courts, although they do play their part, we are treated to a look into a single, fascinating, life.

The life of a young girl, full of questions and doubt, as she traverses the terrors of being a raped slave before hitting puberty, to her travels through the Grecian world, to finally finding a life, of sorts, with Sappho of Lesbos, is not an easy tale to tell. Harrison tackles it head on, without any salacious side roads. By doing so she makes the characters real, their lives interesting, and avoids making the magnificent mundane.

In the hands of a lesser talent this could have easily been dumbed down and tarted up. Be grateful it wasn’t.

This is a book you will savor as you go. A rich tapestry of stories woven around 3D graphics.
On sale now at IndyPlanet. Also available on Amazon Kindle for $5.99.

Author’s Note: Want to find out more? Check out the web archived series House of the Muses.

If you’re just curious or want to binge-read without a commitment, the 50¢ two-day pass to our Saturday Matinee is tailor-made for you!

OR you can subscribe to a MONTHLY commitment for 99¢, or pledge $5.00 to read the first five issues. OR you can go the distance and give $10 to read BOTH 300 page graphic novel collections (that’s 600 pages of award-winning graphic novel goodness!) of the series along with news, reviews and memorabilia from the series heyday.