Summary

In Part Three, “Blind,” “Cassiope,” the “queen of Ethiopia,” Cassiope, loved “to admire herself” in the mirror (125). Afraid her husband Cepheus would “tire of her,” she was eager to bear a child as soon as possible (125). Although she had been told she would have a boy, she prayed for a girl, eager to have “another iteration of her beauty” (127).

Cassiope gave birth to Andromeda. As Andromeda grew up, she proved to be as beautiful, if not more beautiful than Cassiope. Because she could “have had any Ethiopian prince,” Andromeda was devastated when her parents said she must marry Cepheus’s brother Phineus (129). Cepheus wanted her to marry Phineus so she and Cassiope would be safe if he died. Meanwhile, Cassiope increasingly feared losing her status and beauty. Her “anxiety rather than [her] arrogance” inspired her to declare herself more beautiful than the...