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Aphrodite and her Sisters
Fremi, S. (2016). Aphrodite and her Sisters. The Lancet Psychiatry, volume 3, no 2, pp 111-
113, February issue
The act of tearing down the boundaries between the male and the female gender
has different significance for different members of society. For transpeople,
tearing down the rigid gender distinctions based upon identified sexual
characteristics at birth it is an important step towards achieving happiness and
personal fulfilment. In the eyes of conventional society however, transpeople are
thought of as being ‘not normal’ and their continued presence in established
psychiatric manuals seems to confirm this. From Krafft-Ebing’s “Psychopathia
Sexualis”, an 1877 taxonomic study of what he considered to be profound
psychosexual disturbances, to the current diagnoses of ‘gender dysphoria’ and
‘transvestic fetishism’ included in the latest edition of the Diagnostic and
Statistical Manual (DSM 5, APA 2013) of Mental Disorders, the pathologizing of
transgender is ongoing. Regardless of how their ‘condition’ is described, the
reality remains that transpeople face discrimination and prejudice on a regular
basis. Their place in society is threatened, their rights are minimized, and the
strain of all these limitations placed upon on their day-to-day existence frequently
becomes intolerable.
Personal accounts of transitioning paint a somewhat different picture; they refer
constantly to these hardships, but accept them as an essential evil. What is more,
such ‘classical narratives’ describe transition as a progressive process, starting
with the disclosure of intense unhappiness in the individual’s birth gender,
followed by relocation to a different environment, preferably toa bigger city that
is far away from their place of birth. Protected by anonymity, they cross-dress
more and more frequently, before moving on to hormones and undergoing a
variety of irreversible procedures, which usually culminate in genital surgery. The
net result is generally positive and its portrayal of life is optimistic. In the vast
majority of cases following ‘transition’, transpeople have successfully dealt with
the multitude of problems faced, and achieved a measure of happiness within
their chosen gender.
The metaphor of Aphrodite surfaced unexpectedly, as I was contemplating the
simultaneous incidence of these opposing interpretations. In my readings of the
literature, I came across a rather poetic description of the climate of trans-gender
politics which Susan Stryker characterised it as “a wild profusion of gendered
subject positions, spawned by the rupture of ‘woman’ and ‘man’, like an
archipelago of identities rising from the sea”. The blending of the words ‘rupture’,
‘archipelago’ and ‘rising’ within the sentence triggered in my mind a graphic
image of the birth of the Goddess Aphrodite. I thought of her as becoming a
symbol of the desired final act of transitioning, her beauty the embodiment of
happiness and progress. In fact, I felt that her story has some clear resonances

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with ‘classical’ transgender narratives. For one thing, the myth of Aphrodite is a
story of birth, and personal accounts of transition are about re-birth. Both feature
suffering as prelude to fulfilment.
For instance, classical transgender narratives begin with a detailed account of the
protagonist’s general unhappiness, a state which corresponds to the social unrest
preceding the birth of the goddess, namely the war between the Titans and the
Olympians for control of the mortal world. The power clashes between the ‘old
order’ and the ‘new order’ escalate into the murder of Uranus by his son Cronus,
who cuts off his father’s genitals and throws them into the sea. This act may be
seen as symbolizing the tearing down of the binary gender order, and the
symbolic gesture itself amounts to a form of ‘relocation’. Not only does the piece
of flesh becomes dis-embodied from its physical body, but also from its territory;
it descents from heaven, straight into the sea. The impact of this move is
profound, and as the cut flesh reacts with the water, Aphrodite rises from the
crest foam. Beguiled by her beauty, the gods invite her to take up residence at
Mount Olympus, thus cementing her status as a goddess among gods. This offer
of divine residence is mirrored in the transpeople’s aspiration that the newborn
transgendered self will enjoy a similar reception.
My critical perspective on Aphrodite’s myth draws upon the famous scene which
Botticelli immortalized in his 1486 painting The Birth of Venus, an image which
when taken metaphorically, presents an idealized version of gender transition.
The painting draws its influence from the Renaissance, a cultural movement with
its origin in Italy, within which European art and literature was reborn under the
influence of classical models. A feature of this period was the development of
techniques for achieving the representation of a more natural reality in art.
Ironically, the reason why I find Botticelli’s work relevant lies in its selective
interpretation of that reality. Instead of showing the chaos and disorder
surrounding Aphrodite’s birth, it presents an image of enchantment. It features
the newborn, fully formed goddess who, being swept away gently on a beautiful
seashell, is heading for a welcoming shore, surrounded by protective deities and
colourful nature. The point to be made here is that this scene captures but a
fraction of the myth. The cutting of Uranus’s genitals initiated the processes
which bore both Aphrodite and the Furies; but the Furies are not included in this
image.
In the complete version of the myth, the goddess of beauty has sisters. As the
blood from Uranus’ cut flesh mixed with the seawater, the Furies, or Erinyes,
arose alongside Aphrodite. Unlike her, they were monsters, whose bodies
combined elements from human and animal physicality, such as vulture-like
wings and claws, serpent-entwined hair and arms, and blood-dripping eyes. They
are described by scholar Walter Burkert as “the embodiment of self-cursing
contained in an oath” and their role is to avenge crimes against the reigning
order. The Furies are notorious for their wrath, which manifests itself as

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tormenting madness, illness, or natural disaster, inflicted upon any mortals or
immortals who have sworn a false promise, or have committed a crime. The
Furies embody the heavily pathologized transgender legacy which sees people
who defy rigid gender distinctions as ‘not normal’. Their hybrid, appalling
physicality echoes critics’ descriptions of transpeople as monsters sent to disturb
the social order. Their bodies bear the insignia of a creature which does not ‘fit’
within the ideal of ‘normality’, and are suggestive of an unpleasant nature.
Threatening as they are perceived, the Furies are excluded from Botticelli’s
picture in much the same ways as transpeople are excluded from ‘normal’ society.
What is more, when they re-surface on the social terrain, they are seen purely as
examples of what an individual should not be and should not become, presented
and exposed as the ‘celebrated’ subjects of pathology.
With these thoughts in mind, I went back to Botticelli’s Venus, thinking that as
the vast majority of societies exclude those individuals who tear down rigid
gender distinctions based upon physical sex characteristics at birth, the need to
banish the monsters from the image in order to maintain its appeal is
understandable. It promotes an idealized version of transition, where the
newborn goddess is being supported by a ‘network of divine hands’ which carry
her safely, first to the shore and then to Mount Olympus. On closer inspection of
the painting however, I detected an aura of stillness emanating from it. Aphrodite
neither looks back, nor sets foot on the land, but remains standing on the shell,
not moving. The painting captures her in a state of impasse, possibly her reaction
to the chaos she is witnessing underneath the shell, which carries and supports
her. Aphrodite can see her Sisters floating in the archipelago, whilst she realizes
that her immortal self has risen well above the troubled water.
The point to be made here is that the goddess of beauty and her beastly sisters
originate from the same act and float side by side. They embody twoconflicting
and yet inseparable states of being trans-gendered; on the one hand a measure of
happiness and self-realization, but on the other hand a taste of pathos and
turmoil. Any attempted separation of these mythical progenies creates a false
dichotomy, within which Aphrodite is seen as somehow detached from the Furies.
The consequences of preserving such a dichotomy can be disastrous. In real life,
those who actively challenge innate gender distinctions are torn away from society
as a punishment for their offence. They run the gauntlet of politically-motivated
institutions and individuals who obscure their path. Though these might appear
protective as they block out the deluge from view, they leave the ‘mortal
Aphrodite’ to make her way into the world alone. Unsupported and unprepared,
she might make it to the shore, but it is not guaranteed that she will make it to
heaven. She might as well remain by the shore, her deceptive calmness masking
her fear of stepping forward, as every step she takes brings her closer to a fall.
Stella Fremi