Slide 1A The DYT Production
The Golden Ass of Apuleius
So
P. Terentius Afer (195-159 BC)
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Philip the Arab (244-249 AD)
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Apuleius Madaurensis
Lived from 125-180 AD
Performed speeches to great assplause
“Golden Ass” actually entitled “Metamorphoses”
better known because of its hero Ass-Lucius
Incidentally a big honking katabasis story
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The Golden Ass as katabasis
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Allegory
Metaphor = uses a image, an object, or a story to represent a complex or obscure idea
“Life is like a box of chocolates.” – F. Gump
Allegory is an extended metaphor, usually a story, in which characters can stand for complex or obscure ideas.
Can also be associated with the “parable”
Parable of the Good Shepherd (Luke15.3-7) explains God’s love for all creation
Prometheus’s Bad Career Move
Prometheus = Titan, “Mr. Foresight”
teaches Mankind how to sacrifice an animal while saving the meat and skin
Pile A = guts and gristle covered with fat
Pile B = steak and hide covered with entrails
Zeus picks pile A, gets mad, takes away FIRE
Prometheus steals FIRE and brings it back
Prometheus punished by being chained to a rock
Gutter eagle eats his gizzard every day
It’s all good, though. Prommy knows he’ll get off
Mankind punished by creation of… WOMEN
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The Creation of Womankind
Pandora = name means “all gifts”
She gets beauty and charm
Lots of misogynistic “qualities”
Heart of a bitch, mind of a thief, etc
Given a jar filled with all of the evils in the world: hate, death, suffering, lies, Plain White T’s
Told not to open it under ANY circumstances
Hooks up with Epimetheus = “Mr. Hindsight”
Lets all the evils out of the jar
Only “Hope” remains inside
The Creation of Womankind
Pandora = name means “all gifts”
She gets beauty and charm
Lots of misogynistic “qualities”
Heart of a bitch, mind of a thief, etc
Given a jar filled with all of the evils in the world: hate, death, suffering, lies, Plain White T’s
Told not to open it under ANY circumstances
Hooks up with Epimetheus = “Mr. Hindsight”
Lets all the evils out of the jar
Only “Hope” remains inside
Pandora’s Jar
Pandora’s Jar
Basically misogynistic: blame the woman for everything wrong
“Pandora” can also mean “All-giving”
Jar is metaphorically the womb: thanks, Mom
Only Hope remains: good or bad?
Good: hope is all we have at times, and it helps
Bad: hope is delusional, and causes only pain
What was the Greek Weltanschauung ca. 800 BC?
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Allegory of the Cave
Socrates and Plato
Allegory of the Cave
The Assification of Lucius
The Ancient Greek Sphinx
The Ancient Egyptian Sphinx
Setting of Cupid and Psyche
Ass-Lucius and his owners are kidnapped
forced into a deep cave by the robbers
shout-out to Plato’s Allegory of the Cave
old woman begins to tell story (wisdom figure)
Female wisdom figures = Anticleia, Siduri
Cupid and Psyche = allegory
Cupid – Latin cupido, “lust”
Psyche – Greek ψυχ, “soul”
Plucky Princess Psyche
Psyche is so beautiful that Venus is jealous
Venus tells Cupid to make Psyche falls in love with the worst scumbag on earth
Psyche gets sick, oracle tells Psyche’s dad to marry her off of the mountain top
“an evil beast shall claim her bed’ (Cupid)
Plucky young princess goes up the mountain and waits for something worse than death
Wind gently wafts her down to a pleasant glade
She feels better and falls asleep
In the distance she sees a palace
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Happy Married Life
Palace is filled with invisible servants who do her every bidding
Falls asleep in big comfy bed
At midnight Psyche’s “husband” comes by in the dark and makes love to her
They keep sexing but she can never see him
Husband finally agrees to let her sisters come for a visit: by now she is pregnant
Sisters trick Psyche into looking at him after he falls asleep
One night she looks at him with a lamp: OMG!
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A Tight Spot
Cupid berates Psyche and kicks her out of the palace
She tries to drown herself but the river god refuses to cooperate
She cajoles both of her sisters into jumping off of the mountain
Venus ties into Cupid for not obeying her orders
Venus asks for hints on punishing him, but Juno and Ceres don’t want to offend Cupid
Psyche cleans Ceres’s temple and pleads for help but Ceres doesn’t want to offend Venus
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Welcome to Symbolic Hell
Venus gives Psyche four tasks
Sort out huge pile of mixed grains (ants help her out)
Collect wool from man-eating sheeples (reeds give her advice)
Collect water from a waterfall which is sourced by the river STYX (eegull fetches it)
Bring back a box of Persephone’s beauty (friendly tower gives her advice on how to get to the underworld)
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Music Break
The predictably happy ending
Poor Psyche opens the beauty box
Cupid comes in to save her
Jupiter to the rescue: orders all the gods and goddesses to attend a banquet
Cupid and Psyche are married, Psyche drinks ambrosia to become immortal
They become parents of a daughter named Voluptas
Soul + Lust; Greek + Roman; Female + Male
Traditional Greek deities are reality trash
Isis, on the other hand, ROCKS