Ed Stephan has created a web site called The World of Mary Renault located at https://ac.wwu.edu/~stephan/Renault/renault.html.
The Perseus Project is a non-profit venture, located in the Department of the Classics at Tufts University. This developing digital library engineers interactions through time, space, and language. Their primary goal is to bring a wide range of source materials to as large an audience as possible. The site is located at https://perseus.tufts.edu/ and is most interesting to anyone fascinated with history.
By following the bright blue Perseus Project links that are all based on fact, readers who are interested in anything related to Renault’s books can find information and pictures about the people, places and things that she used in her five books about male love in ancient Greece and three books covering the life and times of Alexander the Great.
Subjects linked are people, places, animals, maps, vase paintings and coins. Scenes of Knosos and other information are also included. If you like archeology and Greek history, you will find this site most interesting. The fictitious characters from Renault’s novels are in listed black and without links; you’ll have to read the novels to find out about them.
Here are some brief synopses of Renault’s books as listed on the The Perseus Project site. I have taken the liberty of paraphrasing what I found; the titles have been arranged in historical order.
The Bull From the Sea
Theseus the bull-jumper returns to Attica from Crete. The Minotaur is dead and the boy-king must now be High King. He has destroyed the Labyrinth, brought down the Minoan dynasty and now he must learn to rule like a god. He finds out that Greek kings are also pirates and he must go out a-raiding. He seeks the Golden Fleece, the secrets of the centaurs (the horse-men) and the magical rites of the Amazons. “Mary Renault writes about a time when men became heroes and heroes became gods; when myths became history and history became myth.”
The King Must Die
This gripping blend of myth, legend, history and imagination is the story of Theseus, a prince of ancient Greece, who was said to have been conceived of a union between a royal priestess and the powerful god Poseidon. It’s the story of a boy in search of his heroic birthright, of a young man whose strange fate was to be revealed in the deadly bull ring and decadent courts of Crete. Extraordinary adventures challenge his passion, wit and daring in a strange kingdom where the mother goddess rules as queen and the king is a pampered consort condemned to death at the end of his year’s reign.
The Praise Singer
This novel covers the world of the poet and the life of Simonides, who lived in sixth-century Greece during the time of the tyrants, the Persian wars, and a great flowering of the arts. Simonides follows a sign from Apollo and finds his master and teacher. He accompanies him to Samos, where he carries out his apprenticeship. After the death of his teacher he goes to Athens to the court under the patronage of Hipparchos, who gathers to him a glittering group of artists of all kinds. There is murder and subterfuge at court and Simonides survives all this upheaval to retire to Sicily, where he looks back over his long and eventful life.
The Last of the Wine
The central character of this story is Alexias, an aristocratic boy who is not only handsome but also skilled in running. He becomes a disciple of Socrates and meets another of the philosopher’s followers, Lysis, a man a few years older than himself. The two become friends and, eventually, lovers. The narrative follows Alexias as he grows from a boy of fourteen into a man, and spans perhaps six or eight years of his life during the 5th century BC.
The Mask of Apollo
The Mask of Apollo’’ revolves around the adventures of Nikeratos, a young actor who travels the countryside of ancient Greece and Sicily while performing in various plays. In one play, Nikeratos is required to wear an old mask of Apollo as part of his costume. The mask is fifty years old and is rumored to bring good luck. Nikeratos is impressed with the mask and comes to believe that it possesses special powers. The author uses the character of Nikeratos as a method of engaging the reader in an exploration of Greek life. “Rather than cite dates and events in a textbook manner, the author uses a storybook style to teach the reader about this segment of history.”
Fire From Heaven
This is the first of three books based on Alexander the Great’s life. This one takes us up to age twenty, when he assumed the kingship after his father’s assassination. Renault has woven known anecdotes together with her imagination. In this novel we find out about his mother’s tumultuous relationship with his father, his training in philosophy under Aristotle, killing his first man at age twelve, his riding of the great horse Beaucephalis, his meeting with Demosthenes and the development of his relationship with Hephaistion (a real general and a lover).
The Persian Boy
This book is unique in that the narrative voice is that of Bagoas, a beautiful Persian eunuch (a castrated male) who at the age of fifteen was given to Alexander as a peace offering. History tells us that Bagoas was indeed a real person. This book is both a fictional biography of Alexander and the story of an equally great boy-courtesan. Although it’s difficult to know what their relationship was, we can be pretty sure that they were lovers. Renault discovered male homosexuality as it really was in the ancient world and addresses it as such. She shows two young men who are desperately searching for love in their lives and her passages about Bagoas as an adolescent are especially uncanny and realistic.
Funeral Games
This novel follows the events of the fifteen years after Alexander’s death. His empire is disintegrating and the scene shifts all over Greece and the Middle East, following the actions of his successors. They include a posthumous child and a half-wit brother with his youthful but militant wife. There are the generals and Alexander’s mother competing for power and the regency. There are the provincial satraps seeking independence. A silent onlooker is Bagoas, the Persian Boy, who wants no prize except the chance to serve his dead lover’s memory.
If you want to know more about the author, please read my review of Mary Renault: A Biography by David Sweetman. It discusses her life in England and her move to Cape Town, South Aftrica, where she wrote these stunning historical novels.