By Christina K.
- What I am to do? ... Who to choose? ... This one? ...No, perhaps that one! ... Or maybe all of them! Moooommmmy!! Can't I choose all of them?
- No, my dear Helen! I have told you a hundred times: Polyandry does not exist anymore, and now we must be contented with only one husband!
- Oh, how boring!
- Well, I don't think so! The Nature is a good company in times of boredom! So many beautiful trees, ... flowers, ... rivers, ... birds, ... swans ...
- You said ... a swan?? As a second husb ...
- Now, Helen, enough with this nonsense! Just choose a god husband, All right?
In the year of twelve hundred and something BC, the beautiful Spartan Princess Helen, the Top Model of her age, was ready (or maybe not so ...) to pick a husband among approximately 30 suitors, all of them brave Achaian princes. As you can see it, it was a hard contest. And it was Helen herself who chose that Menelaus! What a madness! Why did she choose him? Only Zeus could know it! Well, but it is said that he wasn't all that bad: tall, blond hair, blue eyes, athletic body ... And better still, he was the younger brother of King Agamemnon, the powerful King of Mycenae. It was if young Menelaus was the titular of an account in the "Mycenae's National Bank Corporation". Oh, almighty gods! It was obvious that Helen, who was not a silly maid, choose Menelaus soon. To tell the truth, she thought it would be won-der-ful, since she would have Beauty and wealth together. They married at once, and in the beginning, everything was perfect.
But ... time passed ... and then began the problems! Helen was fascinated with the simple idea of .... hum ..... oh ... hum ... well, how can I say it? Well, simply put, she loved to "do it", I'm sure you understand what I am talking about! But Menelaus ... well ... please, don't misunderstand me ... I'm not saying that he was not very found of it ... but maybe it was just his shyness that made things worst. ... Poor Helen ...
HELEN: My love, will you not come to bed?
MENELAUS: Not now, darling ... I think I have a headache ....
Oh, dear! But then, suddenly a guest came to Sparta .... Some Trojan Prince called Paris ... or maybe Alexander? Or both? Well, whatever ... he was an "Adonis", or, better saying, the playboy of the moment, Helen's solution to her problems. Paris had a perfect shaped body ... he seemed like a "professional lover", and had an interesting advantage: He was so much richer than Menelaus! He had a Vip-Gold account in "Troy's City Bank", and besides, he was King Priam's spoiled favorite son.
Hehehe .... And the poor, silly, fool Menelaus, what did he decide to do??
MENELAUS: My dear Helen, I have to go to Crete ... It seems that my granddaddy has died ...
HELEN: But ... now? You have not even known that old man! And have you forgotten what he has done to your mommy, the Cretan princess Aerope? He sold her as a slave ...
MENELAUS: Yes, I know it ... but it's my family, anyway ...
HELEN: And I?? Am I not your family too? And our little Hermione? What we have to do with that old man? What will be of us?
MENELAUS: Oh, Helen, please, don't be so melodramatic! I will be back in a few weeks. You stay here in our palace ... and take care of our guest from Troy ...
Hehehe ... of course Helen took care of Paris ... she was very "careful" of him. Just take a look at this dialogue between them, just after Menelaus left for Crete:
PARIS: I'm just curious, Helen, tell me, please ... Are you not afraid to be alone at night, in the dark, in this large palace?
HELEN: Well .... oh ..... hum .....no .... yes ... not really ..... but ... sincerely ... maybe ...Yes, ... alright, .... I agree with you, ... let's go bed ... right now!!
At that same moment, in Crete, Menelaus begun to feel some strange boring itch in his forehead ...
Next morning, in Sparta, Helen said goodbye to her people:
HELEN: Mimi, my dear child, come here! .... Mommy will just go out for a while with gentle Paris, all right? Say daddy he does not need to worry about me!
HERMIONE: But, mommy ... you will leave us!
HELEN: Don't be silly, Mimi! Be a good girl!
HERMIONE: Moooooommmmmyyyyyy!!
Of course daddy worried about mommy, worried a lot! He worried so much that he immediately went out to try to bring her back, taking an army with him! Next day, the headlines of the "Achaian Times" said: WAR AGAINST TROY, with the following subtitle: King Agamemnon chosen to lead Achaian Army, in military expedition to avenge family honor.
Well, the Trojan War as a very, very long war. It lasted ten years, to be precise. It was a bloody war, to both sides. But there were also many nasty things among the Greek soldiers and heroes. Interesting enough, the war was made to avenge Menelaus' honor, a victim of his wife's adultery. But just guess what all the other heroes had done when they were not in battlefield! Hahaha! Very simple, they all betrayed their wives with the slave girls and concubines they got as war spoils. And then, they still wanted to come back home when the war was over and find their wives waiting chaste and faithfully for them! Hehehe ... Except a good lady called Penelope, all others had "done it" with someone else - and this according to Homer ... because some other less trustful sources tell that not even Penelope was saved ...).
But in the ninth year of war, even Helen began to feel uneasy with her adulterous condition. Well, in the Greek camp, and even in Troy, everybody was calling her a "sl...", well ... saying that she was not a very nice woman. And she was dead afraid of die, that is, ... she feared to be killed by her countrymen, if they won the war. For this reason, she began to use the "classical argument":
- I am not guilty, I couldn't think for myself ... It was all Aphrodites's fault. To tell the truth, I still love Menelaus ...
And besides, that boy called Paris was so much like men of our time! He was of no use at all, except for "that". And he was not very found of battles, and this, to the Homeric people, was, no doubt, a Homeric offense. But in a sunny day, finally, Paris decided to fight Menelaus in a single combat. Hehehe, "the cuckold and the cuckold maker". Everybody stopped to see this spectacle. But the result was inconclusive: Menelaus' sword broke in four pieces (hehehe ... even Homer had already some "Freudian" insights about phallic symbolism). And even with his opponent left without weapons, the coward Paris run away ... went his way home, and called Helen:
PARIS: I'm back my dear! Come hear and kiss me!
HELEN: Paris, you coward! I hate you! You bring only shame on me!
PARIS: No more of that, pretty one! ... Let's go bed!
HELEN: Don't you dare!! ... And besides, I think I have a headache!
PARIS: Oh, really, dear?? So, look at this! (Taking his tunic off)
HELEN: Oh! ... Oh, Paris, delicious Paris! How I long for you!
Well, but this ardent love did not last forever, since it was Troy's destiny to fall at the hands of the Achaian army. Some months later, the city was destroyed thanks to the wooden horse trick. And at that night, in the ruins of the old city, Menelaus finally met Helen again. Well, let me tell you something: although all the other Greek heroes had committed some nasty things with the slaves girls and concubines, Menelaus remained all these ten long years absolutely chaste, a male Penelope perhaps! You can guess his state when this meeting took place!
MENELAUS: Worthless wife! You left me for that coward Paris! What he had that I do no not have??
HELEN: Well .... maybe ... humm ... well .... nothing really! ...Forget it! It's not important anymore, he is already dead!
MENELAUS: I will kill you, unfaithful woman!
HELEN: Oh! ... No! ... Forgive me! ... It was not my fault ... I'm not guilty ... It was all Aphrodite's fault!
MENELAUS: Oh, dear! And where is she now to prove that?
And there went Menelaus, lifting his sword to kill Helen.
HELEN: Oh, really, dear?? So, look at this! (Taking her tunic off)
MENELAUS: Oh, no! ... Oh, Helen, my dear Helen! How I have longed for you!
And Menelaus threw away his sword to the floor!! But some trustworthy witness also said that some other little sword began to get up ... Well, What I can say is that they both fell into each other arms ... Hehehe ... Do you see my point here? It?s obvious that Helen was right about Aphrodite! And you know why? Just because in that time, the Greeks knew nothing about psychoanalysis, and Aphrodite was just a rationalization for Libido! And, of course, there were always some chauvinistic authors, like Aeschylus or Euripides to call her a 'wife of many husbands' or a 'shameless traitess'!
And then, after all these happenings, one still could ask why Hermione was a so jealous and temperamental young maid! Ask Neoptolemus in Hades, if you doubt! Hermione (or Mimi) was Helen and Menelaus' little daughter. She was a very good and beautiful young girl, until the age of nine years old. But then, since "mommy went out for a while" and daddy "went out to bring her back home", she had to live during 10 years with aunt Clite (Clitemnestra, of course). People said aunt Clite was a soooo bad woman, because she killed uncle Aga with an axe! Of course, after all she had endured, poor little Mimi could only end as a study case of Hysteria! >