Love, Joy, Feminism
Voice in the Wind, pp. 160-179
This week Marcus visits Julia in Capua. Rivers descries the journey there—it takes him two days on horseback—and everything Marcus thinks about during that time. His business is going well, he is royally bored with Arria but she won’t leave him alone, and his father is complaining about Rome and considering a move back to Ephesus. In other words, same old, same old.
When Marcus arrives, Julia is delighted to see him.
She had grown up some in the months since he had seen her, and she was more lovely than ever.
PSA: People should already been grown up before they marry.
Marcus doesn’t see Hadassah and becomes concerned. So he asks about her.
“Did you sell that little Jewess Mother gave you?”
“Hadassah? I wouldn’t part with her for anything! She’s devoted and obedient, and she’s been most useful to me over the past few months.”
There was a hidden message in the last part of her statement, for bedevilment shown in his sister’s eyes. He smiled wryly. “Indeed?”
“Claudius is quite taken with her,” she said and seemed amused.
A sudden hot flood of dark emotion burst inside of Marcus. He couldn’t assess his feelings, for what gripped his stomach was far too uncomfortable. “And you’re pleased with the situation?” He asked in quiet, controlled tones.
“More than pleased. I rejoice!”
This conversation feels very predictable.
Her smile dimmed at the look on his face. She bit her lip like a child suddenly unsure of herself. “You needn’t look at me like that. You can’t understand how awful it has been, Marcus. I could hardly bear it.”
Growing angrier, he caught her wrist as she looked away. “He was cruel to you?”
“Not cruel, exactly,” she said and looked up at him with embarrassment. “Just persistent. He became tedious, Marcus. He wouldn’t leave me alone for even one night. Then I came upon the idea of sending Hadassash. There’s nothing wrong with it, is there? She’s just a slave. She’s to serve in whatever way I decide. Claudius seems perfectly content with the arrangement. He hasn’t complained.”
The blood was pounding in Marcus’ head. “A find scandal it will be if she becomes pregnant before you.”
“I don’t care,” Julia said. “He can do whatever he likes to her as long as he leaves me alone. I can’t stand him touching me.”
Egads.
I’m curious whether Roman literature addresses this—the “close your eyes and think of England” issue. But honestly, this is hard to read and not be upset with Marcus. Good god! His sister married off at age fifteen to a man of fifty, shuddering when describing sex with her husband. No, not sex with. Julia doesn’t want Claudius’ attentions but has no way to tell him no—it’s not sex with, it’s rape. But it’s Hadassah Marcus is concerned about.
And perhaps that’s what’s most disturbing about this section—Julia would make a moving and complex tragic figure in the hands of a different writer, but in Rivers’ hands she’s selfish and self-centered—the problem is not what has happened to Julia (being forced into marriage as a child, regularly subject to unwanted sex she cannot say no to), it’s what Julia does (sending Hadassah in her place). Julia is the bad guy, not the victim.
A different writer would explore a fascinating tension at play here—a slave like Hadassah would have had no choice but to go to Claudius if sent by her mistress. She would be another victim. How much should we blame Julia for sending her to Claudius? Julia is trying to navigate within her situation to gain some respite, some space for her own humanity—Hadassah becomes collateral damage. Julia is both victim and aggressor, caught up in a toxic web of power structures she cannot escape. I want to see this explored, not treated in a flat, one-dimensional way.
And then there’s Marcus. Marcus tries to tell himself he’s only concerned about his sister’s marriage, but he knows that’s not true. After all, he admits to himself, such arrangements were not uncommon, and so long as Julia was happy (and visited often enough to produce children) all was well. He ultimately realizes that he’s actually upset because he wants her all to himself.
I’m trying to remember why Marcus made my heart beat swiftly when I read this book as a teen. Reading it now, he’s an ass, a complete and total ass.
As afternoon turns to evening, Marcus joins Julia and Claudius for the evening meal, and concludes that while Claudius treats Julia politely, he is no longer in love with her. He also notices Julia’s treatment of Claudius—she ignores him, and acts bored when he enters the conversation, which is rarely. After the meal Julia tells Claudius she wants some one-on-one time with Marcus, and they sit in the garden and talk about gladiatorial contests. Julia begs to be taken to the local ludus.
After Julia retires, Marcus visits the baths, has a massage, and heads to his guest chambers. Restless, he summons a slave and asks for Hadassah. Really, Marcus? He’s told that she is with Claudius. The slave offers to send him Catya, a maid Julia had earlier pushed in his direction. Marcus declines. He grows angry.
He was going to put a stop to whatever was between Claudius Flaccus and Hadassah. He couldn’t imagine why Julia had been so foolish as to allow it to go this far.
Really, dude? Really? In Ancient Rome, there were different kinds of marriage, but the kind of marriage Decimus chose for Julia and Claudius is the kind that hands Julia over completely to Claudius—Julia’s male relatives no longer have any authority over her or her property. Marcus has absolutely no authority here.
Marcus storms into Claudius’ library to find the two of them engaged in conversation—and sitting too close together for his comfort. Hadassah is quoting Jesus’ words in response to Claudius’ question about what laws, out of all of the Jewish laws, are most important. This is in some sense curiously accurate—at one point Jesus would have been seen as yet one more Jewish rabbi interpreting the Jewish scriptures.
Marcus interrupts, angry at the scene before him.
Claudius glanced up in surprise. Obviously, he did not welcome the intrusion. Marcus didn’t care and returned his attention to Hadassah. She was standing, eyes downcast, awaiting her master’s dismissal.
“You may go, Hadassah,” Claudius said and stood.
Marcus didn’t move from the doorway and she couldn’t pass. He studied her from the top of her dark head down to her small sandaled feet. He waited for her to raise her eyes and look at him, but she didn’t.
Such a catch, this Marcus.
Finally, he lets her pass. Claudius naturally assumes Marcus has come to inquire about his sister’s well-being. He tells Marcus he’s perfectly welcome to take Julia to a ludus, as she’s been asking. Marcus says that what he actually wants to know about is what is going on between Claudius and Hadassah.
Claudius tells Marcus how happy he has been with Hadassah, “the first Jew who has spoken freely about her religion” to him.
She knows a great deal about their Scripture, despite the fact that most Jewish women are excluded from studying their Torah. Her father apparently aught her. He must have been a freethinker.
Oh ho hey, look at that, a backhanded dig at Jews.
Claudius goes on, discussing Hadassah’s ideas about why Jerusalem was destroyed:
“She says her god uses war and affliction and suffering as a means of drawing his people back again. An interesting concept, isn’t it? Affliction as a means of protecting and hedging them in their faith! She said something else that was intriguing. Apparently a man named Jesus of Nazareth prophesied the destruction of Jerusalem. His own people crucified him, but she says all he Jewish prophets came to a bad end. Some of the Jews worship this Jesus as the incarnate son of their god. Christians, they call themselves. It’s a Jewish cult.”
Wait. Wait wait wait. We went from Antigonus and Patrobus talking about how awful the Christians were, how Nero was right to slaughter them, to this?
“You will remember Nero tried to annihilate them after the burning of Rome,” Marcus said.
“Yes. One of their beliefs is that the world will come to a fiery end, and this Christ will return with an army and create his own empire on earth.”
This feels incongruous. Rivers must have learned, in her research for this book, that Christianity was initially a “Jewish cult,” and that Jesus was initially seen as one more wandering prophet. I’ll repeat again that at this time the term “Christian” was not in wide use (if at all) and terms like “followers of the way” would have been more prominent. The trouble was, Rivers did not delve into what historians believe about Nero’s persecution, preferring to stick with Christian mythology.
So we get a weird mish-mash.
Consider, again, how much more interesting this storyline could have been in different hands. We would have no discussion of Nero’s persecution, either here or earlier. This would be the first time we’d see Christianity mentioned. Hadassah would be concerned about proselytizing for different reasons—not for fear of being found out as a Christian, but because few people would even know what that was, and because there are a million and one reasons a Roman would not have listened to someone trying to get them to join a small Jewish sect. She would be concerned about eating pig’s udders both because such would have been anathema in the society in which she grew up, and because she would question whether it was worth alienating those few Jewish comrades she had, given how few people any of them had left, after the destruction of their homeland.
One last thing: In 70 AD, the Book of Revelation had not yet been written. Unless I’m mistaken, that’s where the fiery end and Christ returning with an army to create his own empire stuff comes from. You could argue that it was all floating around—but wasn’t this supposed to have come to the Apostle John while he was on Patmos, where he then wrote it down? And even in this book, the Apostle John is still living.
But as you likely could have guessed, Marcus doesn’t care about any of this. He wasn’t interested in Claudius’ study of religion. He was interested in something else entirely.
“Then am I correct in assuming you are not sleeping with her?”
Claudius looked up from his scrolls. “With Julia?”
“Hadassah.”
“Hadassah? She is but a child.”
“She’s the same age as my sister,” Marcus said coolly.
Claudius blushed.
DAMN STRAIGHT HE DID.
Oh wait. Apparently the reason he blushed is not that he’s been bedding a child but rather that being accused of infidelity made him think of his late wife, Helena.
No, really.
Scene change. Julia has just learned that the gladiator she saw on the road, Atretes, is now in Rome. She’s very upset, and feels more stuck in Capua than ever.
“[Hadassah] was relieved the gladiator was gone. Perhaps now Julia would put him from her mind and turn to her husband. Claudius wouldn’t disappoint her. He was kind and intelligent, sensitive and tender. Knowing Julia’s feelings, Claudius wouldn’t press her for his marital rights. If Julia just gave herself time, she could learn to love him for the man he was.”
Oh come on, Hadassah! Are you that naive? As though Claudius doesn’t know his wife does not appreciate his attentions! She appears to make this Julia’s fault, for not telling Claudius directly enough that she doesn’t want to have sex with him! Any actually kind, intelligent, sensitive, and tender man married to a fifteen-year-old given no say in the matter would recognize that he should probably communicate with her about sex—because she’s probably freaking out—and give her some say in the matter (such as the option to wait until she’s older / more comfortable around him / etc.).
Actually, though, this is something that would also be interesting in the hands of a different writer. Ancient Rome was very patriarchal. How would a man like Claudius actually have approached this situation? Would a tender and sensitive man be able to put himself in the shoes of a girl like Julia, or would he the patriarchal culture in which he was raised have given him blindspots that short-circuited his tender and sensitive side? But that is definitely not what is actually being discussed here.
Hadassah spends time time musing, on Claudius, on Julia, and on her failure to tell either of them about her faith—Claudius especially. “She wanted to tell him of Christ. But how could she?” Hadassah has also become bothered by the extent to which Claudius is distancing himself from his wife and turning to her instead. One of his’ faithful servants thanks her for giving him “reason to live again,” and Claudius begins calling for her in the middle of the day, when Julia is occupied with Marcus.
He sighed. “Are all men slaves to their own passions, Hadassah? Are all men fools when it comes to women?” He looked straight ahead, his thoughts distant. “… As I was a fool when I married Julia?”
Distressed by his words and mood, Hadassah stopped in the pathway and, without thinking, put her hand on his arm. She wanted to give comfort. “Do not think so, my lord. It was not a mistake to marry my lady.” She searched frantically for a way to explain and excuse her mistress’s faults. “Julia is inexperienced. Give her time.”
There’s more back and forth like this, Claudius complaining about Julia and Hadassah, clearly uncomfortable, trying to put him off this track. Then there’s this:
“Good things have come from my marriage to her.” He touched her cheek gently. “I have you.” He smiled ruefully as hot color poured into her cheeks and she looked down. “Don’t be distressed, my dear. After the first few weeks of marriage to Julia, I saw my life stretched out ahead of me like a wasteland. Now, as long as I have you, I can bear all things.”
Claudius tipped her chin and gazed down into her tear-filled eyes for a long moment, studying her tenderly. “Passion lasts but for a moment, compassion for a lifetime,” he said quietly. “A man needs a friend, Hadassah. Someone he can talk to and confide in.” He bent and kissed her forehead, as her father used to do. Straightening, he slid his hands down her arms and grasped her hands firmly. “I am grateful.” He kissed her knuckles and released her, then left her alone in the garden.
When I read this book as a teen, Claudius came across as a good guy. He makes a mistake in marrying Julia, blinded by his grief for Helena, but once the mistake was made, he did everything he could to make Julia happy and to make good. When Julia rebuff him and sends him Hadassah, he doesn’t sleep with her. Instead, they talk about religion and theology. Claudius is described over and over again as a good man, a faithful man, a kind man, an intelligent man. Reading this now, I am repulsed.
Let us remember that Hadassah is a child. Let us also remember that she is a slave. The way Claudius talks to her is emotionally abusive—she is being told that the emotional wellbeing of the master of her household depends solely and alone on her. That is too much, and it is something she has neither asked for nor wants. You do not put that on a child. Or on anyone, really!
Also, all this physical contact—between a fifty-year-old man and a sixteen-year-old girl—is really weirding me out. Again, Hadassah can’t say no. She can’t say “please don’t touch me like that.” This has a distinctly Gothard-like feeling, this head-touching, hands-touching, face-kissing. Dude. Just stop. It’s not as though it’s not obvious that she’s uncomfortable.
While Claudius never does bed Hadassah, I get the distinct feeling that he would eventually have done so, if he’d had the chance. The way he talks and acts, it feels headed in that direction regardless of all his talk of faithfulness and his late wife.
This post is long enough already, but I’m going to go ahead and finish this chapter, since it all gets at the same main theme. And no. It does not improve from here.
In the next scene, Hadassah is washing Julia’s feet while she complains about her trip to the ludus with Marcus. Oh yes she enjoyed it, certainly, but that German they saw had gone on to Rome. Octavia would get to see him fight before she did!
Marcus entered the room. Hadassah’s stomach quivered oddly when he greeted Julia. She felt her pulse quicken as he came closer; it was as though his mere presence made her skin tingle and her blood grow warm.
Okay, here’s what confuses me. Hadassah is human and certainly subject to sexual desires, and Marcus is reportedly very good looking, and not always fully clothed. But. Marcus has been an absolute ass to her, and has taken pleasure in scaring her. When abusive people enter the room with me in a situation I have no control over, that I can’t just leave, my pulse quickens and my blood pressure goes through the roof. It’s a fight or flight response. But we’re to believe that Hadassah’s physical response is a result not of her increasing fear of him but of her growing attraction to Marcus?
Marcus tells Julia that she needs to be more interested in Claudius. Julia gets angry and storms off to have a walk alone thank you very much.
As Julia left the room, Hadassah gathered up the damp cloth, the vial of scented oil, and the basin of dirty water. She moved to leave, but Marcus blocked her way.
“Don’t be in such a hurry. My feet are dirty too,” he said.
Notice that he can’t just use his words, he has to physically prevent her from leaving the room before telling her what he wants from her.
She could feel his attention fixed on her as she poured oil and rubbed her balms together before beginning to massage his feet. He made a deep sound in his throat that caused a burst of strange sensations in the pit of her stomach.
Knowing that Hadassah is uncomfortable and scared out of her mind clearly isn’t preventing Marcus from deriving pleasure from his ministrations. Marcus begins quizzing Hadassah about what she does with Claudius. She says all they do is talk about religion, but Marcus becomes violent and angry.
“Only about your religion?” he said, dubious. “Nothing else?” He suddenly reached out, caught her chin roughly, and herded her head up. Seeing the heightened color in her cheeks, he grew angry. “Answer me! Have you become his concubine?”
Marcus isn’t interested in what goes on between Hadassah and Claudius because he cares about what she wants. Oh no! He is only interested because he wants Hadassah in his bed. Marcus isn’t just selfish, he’s also jealous—and fiercely so!
Hadassah answers Marcus’ questions, and then goes on:
“I pray you. Talk to your sister, my lord. Encourage her to be kind to her husband. No more than kind, if she so wishes. He is a lonely man. It’s not right that he should have to turn to a slave for companionship.”
“Are you daring to criticize Julia?” Marcus said. He watched Hadassah’s cheeks flame and then go deathly white. He went on . “By your words, she is neglectful of her wifely duties and unkind to her husband.”
“It was not my intent to criticize, my lord. May god do so to me and more if I lie to you.”
Marcus is a terrible, horrible person. He has spent this entire chapter criticizing Julia, often in Hadassah’s presence, but when Hadassah says it he acts as though it’s a crime to admit what he has been saying for days. He’s playing head games with her, royally scaring her, and enjoying it. This is disgusting.
He didn’t need Hadassah to point out to him that his sister’s marriage was disintegrating, and Julia was doing nothing whatsoever to stop him. That concerned him—but what ate at him even more was the thought of Hadassah spending hours with Claudius in the privacy of the library.
This is ridiculous.
Deal with it, dude! Such is slavery, but also, such is humanity! People don’t always do what you want them to do! If Hadassah were free and had her own way, she sure as hell wouldn’t spend her time with Marcus! He’s angry that he can’t control her, but it’s not as though he’s doing anything to make her like him—instead, he’s going out of his way to treat her roughly and frighten her. What a freaking ass.
As Hadassah puts things in order and prepares to leave, Marcus studies her:
He could see she was shaking badly, and he felt an odd pang of guilt for having frightened her so. She was just a slave. Her feelings shouldn’t matter to him, but they did. They mattered too much. He hated the way Claudius looked at her.
No, dude. No, they don’t. Her feelings don’t matter a whit to you, or you wouldn’t constantly go out of your way to tighten her and treat her harshly.
Also? Her feelings mattering is not a natural segue into hating the way Claudius looks at her. I mean my god, Marcus hasn’t even asked Hadassah what she wants, and I dare say he would be more angry, not less, if Hadassah was happily carrying on with Claudius, perfectly content with the situation.
What we’re seeing, here, is the mind of an abuser. I’m going to give you some spoilers, though I’m sure you can guess where this story will go fairly well at this point. This book is part of a trilogy, though only two of the books actually deal with Marcus and Hadassah (the remaining book is about Atretes and his return to Germania). Marcus and Hadassah do ultimately end up together. Before this, though, Marcus has to become converted and repent at length of his worldly ways.
I just flipped to the end of this book and noticed that there’s a sort of book-club questions section about each character. “In looking at Marcus’ life and the decisions he made as a result of not knowing God,” it reads, “read the following Bible verses for possible insights into his motivations—as well as finding challenges for yourself, too.” The listed verses are Proverbs 10:9, 16:2, and 13:2. What bothers me is that Rivers clearly believes Marcus is acting the way he does because he is not saved—and that is the message she presents to her (frequently) teenage readers.
Unsaved men are abusive louts; saved men are upstanding and honorable. I’m itching to reread the second book that covers Marcus and Hadassah’s storyline, because I’m curious whether the abuse and jealousy truly disappears. But even if it does (which I rather doubt), this is a terrible message to send teenage girls, as it suggests that men who are believers cannot be abusive, when in fact there are abusive (and non-abusive) people in all walks of life.
He watched Hadassah pour the water into the potted palm and then go back to set the empty pitcher in its basin. All he had to do was command her. His heart beat faster.
Rivers describes Marcus watching Hadassah put the basin and pitcher away, tracing her path back and forth across the room, presumably to let us know just how closely he is scrutinizing—and what he is likely imagining.
Marcus looked down over her slender body, clothed in a brown woolen dress belted by a striped garment that proclaimed her heritage. A Jew.
Well, you guys have your answer to that question, now! Atretes was supposed to recognize Hadassah’s Jewishness by her stripped belt. Color me skeptical, but I don’t have the time to look it up right now.
Jews had a ridiculously rigid sense of morality. Virginity until marriage, fidelity until death. Their restraints defined the nature of man, but he could make her break all her laws by a single word. All he had to do was command her and she would have to obey. If she didn’t, he could punish her in whatever way he chose, even unto death if he so desired. He held the power of her life in his hand.
No, dude, I’m pretty sure that you don’t have the legal right to kill someone else’s slave. Especially when her sister is married to Claudius with the form of marriage that makes all of her possessions his. Now certainly, he could call Julia in and get Julia to order Hadassah to let Marcus have his way with her, and then there would be a showdown. I’m honestly not sure what Hadassah would do. I think she might well just accept death. Regardless, Marcus is on a serious power trip.
And then, at the very end of the chapter, comes this bit:
She looked up at him. “Do you wish anything more, my lord?”
Every woman he had ever been with had come to him willingly or sought him out—Bithia, Arria, Fannia, and numerous others before and after them. If he commanded Hadassah, would she melt in his arms or cry copiously that he had defiled her?
He knew. She wasn’t like the others.
“Leave me,” he said tersely.
It didn’t occur to him until he was riding back to Rome that for the first time in his life, he had put another’s feelings above his own.
Sigh.
No, realizing that you prefer sex with a willing partner to sex with a crying partner is not the same as putting another’s feelings above your own. Really? Really? This is how low we’re holding the bar?
Let’s take a moment to assess the four characters at play here.
Hadassah is good, devoted, and kind. Her main flaw is her fear of letting those around her know she is a Christian. Claudius is also good, devoted, and kind. His main flaw is having been so blinded by grief at his first wife’s death that he married Julia. Except that Claudius is putting Hadassah in a terrible spot without so much as a care for her feelings. Claudius is not the good, kind, selfless man Rivers believes he is. For her part, Hadassah is being terribly hard on Julia.
Julia is selfish and hedonistic. She only virtue is that she is beautiful—but she is vain, so that is canceled out. There is no nuance for Julia, no admission that she is a child forced to marry a fifty-year-old man against her will, and regularly raped. Marcus is also hedonistic, but he has always been portrayed with more nuance and depth than Julia—we are given more window to his inner thoughts, his desire to build something, to leave something behind. He is not so shallow as Julia.
It is Marcus I am most caught up on, here. He is an abusive, manipulative, controlling, and jealous man, but in Rivers’ hands his main flaw is his hedonism, his lack of the gospel which leaves him directionless, looking for something to fill an aching void. Marcus is abusive toward Hadassah, taking pleasure in scaring her. As for Julia, well, Marcus cares more about what Julia is doing with Hadassah than he does about whether Julia is happy, or the fact that she is regular being raped. Notice that I said he cares what Julia is doing with Hadassah, not that he cares more about Hadassah’s happiness, because he doesn’t.
Ugh. This whole section is a train wreck.
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In