Hey Anjali,
I want to write a mythological re-telling…but I don’t know what to do.
Hey Anjali,
I would like to write a classic tale with a modern twist…maybe a fake dating trope- do you have any resources I can look at?
You asked. And I answered.
Writing your first novel or novella is difficult. And in a time where people are craving familiarity in terms of characters and tropes but unique twists in terms of story and word-play, writing a re-telling just makes sense.
And as someone who has edited and written mythological re-tellings, I know just what not to do. Shall we?
Be Respectful to the Source Material
“Read as many retellings, theories, and fan versions as possible.”
Rags, author of Hear Ye
Before you can twist and change something, you need to know what it actually means. Read about it as much as you can, and know your source material. Look, if you aren’t respectful to the source material, bestie, you are inviting flames. And we don’t wish to start our writing careers with a war, now do we?
The writing of a retelling is a tightrope act. You have to tell the story you wish to share but keep in mind the sentiments and important points from the story you are reinventing. Think of it like making your grandma’s signature cookies but vegan. You cannot change the taste, despite the new ingredients.
Of course, in writing you can change the taste, but if you wish to utilize the existing fanbase, you will be hard pressed to.
I wrote my first retelling, Abduction of a Queen: Yet Another Hades and Persephone story when I was sixteen. I was inspired by a lot of fanfiction and what Hades-Persephone tales I had read in school. The story took on elements of a bildungsroman almost with Persephone finding her true self and learning to stand up for herself. But my cultural notions of motherhood, right and wrong, and such impacted the story, without me realizing how inappropriate it could be to re-tell another culture’s mythology without input from them. Of course, I tried to find sensitivity readers and such, but not having the work read by someone who has an intimate knowledge of Greek culture still stings and the problems this caused showed strongly in the early drafts.
Early reviewers called Kore, my protagonist, whiny and child-like in what teenage me felt were just complaints.
As an adult when I went to publish the story, while I could not completely divorce my culture and personal values from the work, and nor would I advise you to for that would mean the story becomes a beat by beat copy rather than something unique, on the recommendation of Anuraag Chatterjee, I looked further into the story trying to keep in mind that is the mythology of a culture and not just my playground.
I came across people’s anger at modern re-tellings which make Demeter a bad mother, and more, which shaped the story further to what it is today.
While yes, your re-telling can fit whatever narrative or trope you wish for it to take, it has to come from a place of respect and knowledge.
Know Your Characters and Their Motivations
Another important aspect of writing a re-telling is knowing the characters and what drives them. Not just in the original but also in your work. For example, in Beauty and the Beast, Belle is driven by an urge to save her father. In Eros and Psyche, Psyche wants to repent and save her relationship after being manipulated by her sisters.
Now say, we were writing feminist retellings of these tales. Do we move away from these motivations? Or do we change the circumstances?
How much can we change these characters before they are unrecognizable? While parts of their arc are important to keep to ensure the story bears a resemble to the original.
For example, In Disney’s Once Upon a Time, the beast is also Rumpleslitskin. For many, this could mess up the character, because now Belle isn’t taken in exchange of her father’s freedom but as part of a deal. But by keeping Belle’s motivation the same- ensuring the safety of those she loves, keeping her love for books and how her and the beast, here Rumple, connected on them, and ensuring that she was pivot in his return to the light as well as keeping characters like Gaston in the story, the writers ensured that the story was unique but still resembled the original enough to be understood as a re-telling.
After all, a re-telling simply isn’t just characters with the same name.
Which leads us to the next point. Know your why.
Your Re-Telling Needs to Have a Purpose
Like any story you need to know what your re-telling is trying to say. Your why. But at the same time, with re-tellings, your re-telling needs to have a purpose which suggests a re-telling was needed. Are you trying to make a story more diverse- why and what does it add to the tale? Are you showing a different side of the characters? Basically, answer why is this re-telling needed, even if the answer is these characters in this new situation is entertaining. Or these characters fit these archetypes, such as florist!Persephone and billionaire!Hades.
In my opinion though, the best retellings, answer a deeper why. They answer a what if. What if Belle was a man? What if Helen never went to Troy? Or like in Epic the Musical, what if everything Odysseus faced was to turn him into someone who could face the suitors?
I am not saying retellings for retelling’s sake or to try a different time or form or medium aren’t good. They can be. But here’s a quote from the author of Fame, Fate, and Fury: A Collection of Poems on the Iliad and the Odyssey:
“Your retelling needs to have a purpose. If it is a retelling just for the sake of it, then it is plagiarism. Any story needs to answer a what if but for a retelling the angle you are taking is equally important. For example, if your Red Riding Hood is a feminist story, then isn’t the original woman feminist too? By asking women to think before they trust?”
Anuraag Chatterjee
Essential, you have to decide your audience and what your story gives them. But that’s true for any story. In re-tellings you just have to answer the question in a way previous versions have not.
Know Why You are Making the Changes You Are
Knowing your purpose clarifies the reason you are making the changes. Is it to fit a genre? Make the story palatable to the modern audience? Or do you just wish to have fun exploring various plot points?
As long as you go into the story with a clear intention, whether you are writing Girl, Goddess, Queen, a fake dating Persephone-Hades AU, or you are writing Palace of Illusions, the Mahabharata from the point of Draupadi, you will have a story worth telling.
And like always, don’t forget to do what I did with the first draft of Abduction. Let the story flow. After all, despite all efforts you can’t read every source on the story and sometimes, you have to take a route which some may call disrespectful. Sometimes, a single source can give you an idea, which later sources allow you to expand on and sometimes, you cut out what the later sources say.
At the end of the day, it is your story. And as long as you approach it with respect and craft, you are golden.
Oh, and last tip, but the most important one?
Get a Sensitivity Reader if Possible
When writing about another’s cultural tales, or even your own from a POV that isn’t your lived experience, I always recommend trying to get a sensitivity reader when looking for beta readers. Editing and being open to reader feedback is what allows you to improve as a writer after all.
So, what do you think?
Ready to show the world what great tales would be like in your hands? I know I am! And it starts with Abduction of a Queen.
Updated- 15/05/2025
