Unwritten Rules

Women in Classics and the Echoes We Still Hear

Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash

“All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”
(That haunting opening line that frames the personal and societal weight Anna faces.)

Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina

When you read the great novels, you start to notice a pattern. Women so often stand at the center of the story—but not al…