The Murderess
SynopsisPlot
Set on the dirt-poor Aegean island of Skiathos, it is the story of Hadoula, an old woman living on the margins of society and at the outer limits of respectability. Hadoula knows about herbs and their hidden properties, and women come to her when they need help. She knows women’s secrets and she knows the misery of their lives, and as the book begins, she is trying to stop her new-born granddaughter from crying so that her daughter can at last get a little sleep. She rocks the baby and rocks her and then the terrible truth hits her: there’s nothing worse than being born a woman, and there’s something that she, Hadoula, can do about that.
Story
About this book
The Murderess is set on Skiathos, a small island in the Aegean Sea that was also the birthplace of its author, Alexandros Papadiamantis. The story follows Hadoula, an elderly woman living at the edges of village society. She is known locally for her knowledge of herbs and their uses, and other women seek her out when they need help. Hadoula carries a deep awareness of the suffering that shapes women's lives on the island, a place where poverty is constant and options are few.
The novel opens as Hadoula tends to her newborn granddaughter, rocking the baby so her exhausted daughter can sleep. In that quiet domestic moment, a grim conviction takes hold: that being born female on this island means a life of hardship, and that she has the ability to intervene. What follows is a story driven by that conviction and by the question of where such reasoning leads when it is taken to its conclusion.
Papadiamantis published the book in 1903 as a serial. It is considered one of the central works of modern Greek literature. The narrative draws on the customs, dialect, and landscape of Skiathos to ground its events in a specific, closely observed place.
