In the short story “Granite” by Julia Armfield, a woman who is almost in her thirties finally finds love. She lives alone in the building with a landlady who lives downstairs of her apartment. In the end, the man turns to granite and falls apart in her hands.
This story reminds me of Medusa and how she lives alone and how she turns men to stone when they look at her. When the landlady and Maggie are talking, the landlady says, “‘Difficult,’ she had said, apparently to herself. ‘Trying to keep a man. Always safer not to look directly at them.’ ” This right here definitely reminds me of Medusa and how she does not want to look at people in the eye because to me she does not want to harm them and have more people come after her.
The man whom Maggie falls in love with is like a statue of the man that was perfect in Ancient Greece. He can cook, is good-looking and tall and works outdoors with nature. Since he is perfect, he starts to turn into granite statue because he is not real but is Maggie’s imagination of what she wants. We all have flaws, and no one can look like the statues in Greece because the sculptures used their imagination on what a perfect man looks like. The men in Ancient Greece did not look like the statues either.
Maggie is always looking for love but is so picky about the men whomshe meets. When she finally meets and falls in love for the first time, she is surprised and weary, but she opens her heart completely. And when she looks at him, slowly he turns into stone and falls apart in her hands.