The White Goddess - Criticism

Criticism

The White Goddess has been seen as a poetic work where Graves gives his notion of man's subjection to women in love an "anthropological grandeur" and further mythologises all women in general (and several of Graves's lovers in specific) into a three-faced moon goddess model. Graves's value as a poet aside, flaws in his scholarship such as poor philology, misdating texts (for example, the Hanes Taliesin a 16th-18th century text which Graves believed originated centuries earlier), and use of out-dated archeology have been criticised. Some scholars, particularly archeologists, historians and folklorists have not received the work favourably. Graves was disappointed that his work was "loudly ignored" by many Celtic scholars; however, it was accepted as history by many non-scholarly readers and, according to Ronald Hutton, The White Goddess remains a major source of confusion about the ancient Celts and influences many un-scholarly views of Celtic paganism. Hilda Ellis Davidson criticized Graves as having "misled many innocent readers with his eloquent but deceptive statements about a nebulous goddess in early Celtic literature", and stated that he was "no authority" on the subject matter he presented. While Graves made the association between Goddesses and the moon appear "natural," it was not so to the Celts or some other ancient peoples. Some Neopagans have been bemused and upset by the scholarly criticism that The White Goddess has received in recent years, while others have appreciated its poetic insight but never accepted it as a work of historical veracity.

Michael W. Pharand, though quoting earlier criticisms, rebutted, "Graves's theories and conclusions, outlandish as they seemed to his contemporaries (or may appear to us), were the result of careful observation."