Everett and his men come across three beautiful singing women who get the men drunk and slow down their journey. In the Odyssey, falling under the spell of the sirens is much more serious and results in death. This memorable part from The Odyssey has frequently been depicted throughout history. One famous example is The Siren Vase Seals left. This ancient Greek vase shows a painting of Odysseus and his men being tempted by the magical singing sirens on their boat.
It is an adaptation. Upon their return home, both Odysseus and Everett are faced with yet another challenge. Everett and Odysseus appear in disguise and reveal a talent that gets their wives back. This is also illustrated differently between the two narratives. In the festival scene, Everett is about to play his well-known song on stage in front of Penny.
She knows it is her husband but is unaware of his popularity. When Everett starts to sing, the rest of the crowd stands and cheers. Everett and his crew are dismissed of their crimes. Penny is shocked and impressed, so she accepts Everett back as her husband. In the Odyssey Odysseus, unrecognized by his wife, joins a group of suitors pursuing Penelope in an arching contest, the winner of which will become her husband. This scene is presented in the image above right.
Everett and Odysseus both unveil their true identity and win back their wives through their talents. Challenges, including temptation are something both Odysseus and Everett go through. They are challenged by their wives and the sirens, and meet other foes along their journey. These scenes are a perfect illustration of how similar themes and ideas can be crossed over to fit other mediums.
Literature, film, and art can all portray the same meaning in completely different ways. As more recreations are made, it inspires others to make their own stories with these mythological elements. Colin Curran is in his basement and has just finished a project…a project that, if successful, will change the course of billions of lives. The time machine he created is capable of transporting any single being to any point in time, an invention only dreamt of in the past.
His machine takes up all of the room on his downstairs wall. It has a silver glow to it and many gadgets and wires protruding from the side.
Colin flips a few switches, taps a few buttons and his creation starts to hum with life. Where will he go? Will he meet Abraham Lincoln? Watch the first moon landing? Or will he visit the ancient egyptians and watch the pyramids being built? In fact, he will do none of these. His whole life he has wanted to visit ancient Greece, fascinated by their stories of Incredible gods, goddesses, heroes and terrible monsters and villains. Colin steps up to the machine and in the blink of an eye, he is gone.
The next thing he knows he is standing at the base of Mt. Olympus, staring up at its glory. He starts walking through the vast land of Greece, taking it all in. First he sees Odysseus. Odysseus is with his wife, Penelope , they both look very happy together. He runs up to them and frantically informs Odysseus that his story has been told for centuries and how every single contemporary high schooler has to read The Odyssey.
He explains that there is a mythological theme he learned about called Nostos and that the story of Odysseus is a prime example of it. Odysseus says that it was a long and challenging fight to get back to his wife, but the prophet , Tiresias, assured him he would be safe and Odysseus had to trust him.
Colin recognizes the name Tiresias as a prophet. A prophet is one of many archetypes, also including The Hero and The Villain. Odysseus simply nods his head in humility. Before they say their goodbyes, Colin asks where the best place to find Perseus would be.
Colin practically sprints over and sure enough, Perseus is there, swinging a sword around. They will continue to be told until the end of time. Perseus is intrigued by this new thing called a movie he has just learned about. Colin explains all the themes of the movie, one of which being feminism. You did this not only to save your city, but to save Andromeda, the princess of Argos. Medusa lives in the underworld, where she suffers from her traumatic past because she was raped. You had to kill Medusa after being guided by Io , a female character, who teaches you how to fight.
He separates myth from tales of other kinds by wisely focusing upon the literary distinctions to be found in a variety of stories. One of the principal aims of myth is to negotiate between binary pairs or pairs of opposites e.
In this pattern Propp identified 31 functions or units of action, which have been termed motifemes. All these motifemes need not be present in one tale, but those that are will always appear in the same sequential order. The understanding of classical mythology can be made both easier and more purposeful if underlying structures are perceived and arranged logically. The recognition that these patterns are common to stories told throughout the world is also most helpful for the study of comparative mythology.
Walter Burkert has attempted a synthesis of various theories about the nature of myths, most important being those having a structuralist and a historical point of view. To support his synthesis, he has developed four theses:. Oral and Literary Myth. Many insist that a true myth must be oral and anonymous. The tales told in primitive societies are the only true myths, pristine, timeless, and profound.
The written word brings contamination and specific authorship. We disagree with such a narrow definition of mythology. Myth need not be just a story told orally. It can be danced, painted, and enacted, and this is, in fact, what primitive people do. Myth is no less a literary than an oral form. Despite the successive layers that have been grafted onto Greek and Roman stories and their crystallization in literary works of the highest sophistication, comparative mythologists have been able to isolate the fundamental characteristics that classical myths share with other mythologies, both oral and literate.
Joseph Campbell. A comparative mythologist, perhaps best known for his series of PBS interviews with Bill Moyers, Campbell did much to popularize the comparative approach to mythology.
Though his attention was largely devoted to myths from other traditions, many of his observations, as he himself was well aware, can be profitably applied to classical mythology. Feminist critical theory focuses upon the psychological and social situation of female characters in terms of the binary nature of human beings, especially in the opposition or complementary relationship of female and male.
Feminist scholars have used the critical methods of deconstruction to interpret myths from their points of view about political, social, and sexual conflict between men and women in the ancient and modern world. Their conclusions are sometimes determined by controversial reconstructions of two major topics: the treatment and position of women in ancient Greece and the theme of rape. Here are four out of many observations that could be made about the treatment and position of women in Greek society:.
What are we today to make of classical myths about ardent pursuit and amorous conquest? Are they love stories or are they all, in the end, horrifying tales of victimization and rape? The Greeks and the Romans were obsessed with the consequences of blinding passion, usually evoked by Aphrodite, Eros, or Dionysus and his satyrs, and of equally compulsive chastity, epitomized by a ruthless Artemis or one of her nymphs.
The man usually, but by no means always, defines lust and the woman chastity. Often there is no real distinction between the love, abduction, or rape of a woman by a man and of a man by a woman. Stories about abduction, so varied in treatment and content, have many deeper meanings embedded in them, e. The supreme god Zeus may single out a chosen woman to be the mother of a divine child for a grand purpose, and the woman may or may not be overjoyed.
Thus the very same tale may embody themes of victimization, sexual love, and spiritual salvation, one or all of these conflicting eternal issues or more. Romantic critics in the past sometimes chose not to see the rape; many today choose to see nothing else. Homosexuality was accepted and accommodated as a part of life, certainly in Athens. There were no prevailing hostile religious views to condemn it as a sin.
Yet there were serious moral codes of behavior, mostly unwritten, that had to be followed to confer respectability upon homosexual relationships and individuals who were homosexual. Homosexuality may be found as a major theme in some stories, e.
Thus Greek and Roman mythology embraces beautifully the themes of homosexuality and bisexuality but, overall, it reflects the dominant concerns of a heterosexual society from the Olympian family on down.
Female homosexuality in Greek and Roman society and mythology is as important a theme as male homosexuality but it is not nearly as visible. Sappho, a lyric poetess from the island of Lesbos sixth century B. We have provided a representative and by no means exhaustive sampling of influential definitions and interpretations that can be brought to bear on classical mythology. It should be remembered that no one theory suffices for a deep appreciation of the power and impact of all myths.
Certainly the panorama of classical mythology requires an arsenal of critical approaches. Let us end with a definition of classical mythology that emphasizes its eternal qualities, which have assured a miraculous afterlife. It may be that a sensitive study of the subsequent art, literature, drama, music, dance, and film, inspired by Greek and Roman themes and created by genius, offers the most worthwhile interpretative insights of all.
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