3-28

Redemptive power of art
Art redeems us from the horrors of the world because it transforms the world into art.

Buddha as baby, tried to avoid three things
*sickness
*old age
*death

Shakespeare was inspired by Ovid...try and think of one of his works that doesn't contain any influence from the Metamorphoses

What does Dr. Sexson say that James Joyce, Shakespeare and Ovid all have in common....
if you read all of their works it can and will transform your life.

James Joyces' Finnegan's Wake is a version of the Metamorphoses
-this story (along with many in the metamorphoses) ends in the same place that it started

James Joyce wrote a book called "the portrait of an artists as a young man" this book is said to be his autobiography. The name that he gave to the main character was : Steven Daedalus. Hmm, i think that name sounds familiar...maybe because the name Daedalus comes straight from book eight of Ovid's Metamorphoses

You don't have to understand it, you only have to be there, to be apart of it....this was said when talking about James Joyce, but really i think it can be applied to anything in life.

weaving is a metaphor for art

imagination - keeping your imagination open

Ovid changes similes to metaphors the person goes from being like a bird to being a bird

In the book of Tereus, Procne and Philomela each of these people turn into a bird. Today you can see
Philometa as a nightingale, Procne can be seen as a swallow and Tereus is a hoopoe

tragedy - what's the worse thing that you can possible imagine

Ovid is not a moralist

3-26

Ovid is the most visual poet

The Stories from Ovid’s Metamorphosis that Dr. Sexson wants you to pay attention to
-Io and Jove pg. 25
-Syrinx pg. 31
-Europa pg. 71
-Arachne pg. 177
-Pygmalion pg. 335
-Tereus, Procne, Philomela pg. 193
-Daedalus and Icarus pg. 254
-Pythagoras pg. 515

Some of the stories that were picked as favorites from the class
-Callisto
-Pythagoras
-pyramus & thetis
-Arachne
-Peleus & thetis
-alcyone & ceyx
-perseus & redusa
-ceres & prosepia
-baucis & philemon
-daedalus & icarus
-The Calydonian Hunt
-Phaethon
-Rumor
-Death of Achilles
-Alpheus
-Erysichton’s sin

3-23

Garden of Adonis

Adonis was born from a daughter than slept with her father. She was turned into a tree while pregnant with her fathers baby, she gave birth to Adonis, a beautiful baby boy

Poets use the image of flowers that bloom early and die young to represent tragedy – a life wasted

Demeter –bread (grain)
Dionysus –wine
You need both Demeter and Dionysus to live

Anagnorisis – recognition

Stickomythia is once again depicted, page 17-21 of the Bacchae illustrate this idea

The picture below is a depiction of a thyrsus – stick with a pine cone on it

3-21

Grace
-a gift from god
-god’s presence is all around

Penthues means grief or sorrow

Dionysus was born from the leg of Zeus

The city of Thebes grew from the teeth of a serpent that Cadmus killed and then planted.

Cadmus and Harmonia had four daughters
-Agave
-Semele
-Autonoe
-Ino

Unfortunately all of these daughters turned out bad.

Invasion aka rape – this term is used a lot when talking about the gods

Liberal – freedom – to be freed from the constriction of the society or even your life

The moment of your greatest horrors of life are rescued by art

Metaphor – to carry over – to be carried away – imagination

A movie that resembles Bacchae is Sex, Lies and Video

Tragedy – when there is a huge gap between the crime and the punishment. Dionysus punishes the whole town for the mistake of a few, it doesn’t seem fair

Omophagia – eating of live flesh

3-19

Day of the Dead or Dead Day is the one day a year when the women had the power. They could do what they wanted and the next day they would not be held accountable of what they had decided to do on that day.

Make sure to read through Commentary #3 at the end of Lysistrata, it is titled Athenian Women

Lysistrata

they do two things to the councilor
1. Dressed him as a woman
2. Dressed him as a corpse

The first one, dressing him like a woman, is the most humiliating thing that can happen to a manly, man in greek mythology

The councilor is turned into a scapegoat

the word scapegoat derives from the idea of the community getting a goat and telling all of their sins to it and then sending it out into the forest. They do this to clear their slate, when the goat leaves, the sins that they told to the goat also left.

Happy endings are for comedies - they also tend to end with either dancing or feasting or a combination of the two.
-a way for this to happen in most comedies is through a wedding
a new comedy would wed a young man to a young woman
an old comedy would wed an old man to a young woman

Elvis and Dionysus
The cover of the Bacchae is Elvis, I had no idea why they would use such an icon to depict Dionysus. In class though Dr. Sexson.. Dionysus drives you out of your mind, much like Elvis does. Women riot for both of these guys because they are hypnotizing (Evils actually uses his hips to do this). Both Elvis and Dionysus have the ability to bewitch people, women especially.

Dionysus is also not aggressive.

Dionysus means deconstruction
His saying would be something like…”You think too much, lets party”

Dionysus is not worried about people being smart, instead he just cares about doing things that are natural.

Dionysus and Apollo are the opposites of each other

Ecstasy – standing outside our self

3-7

Tragedy emphasizes the individual
Comedy emphasizes the community....with comedy "it's not all about you"

Comedy is void of shame. There is a notion that whatever is human is ok. Life can and is crude messy and not perfect.

With Greek mythology there is something for everyone.

Old Comedy consists of three points
*polis - current politics
*obscenity
*death and rebirth (regeneration)

Northrop Fry suggests that the last point, death and rebirth or regeneration, is the main theme.

the movie Little Miss Sunshine is a modern day example of old comedy

Comedy often celebrates stupid people....the hero tends to be dim witted

Aristotle
*comedy deals with people who are worse than they are
*comedy originates from the phallic procession

Comedy has happy ideas..."Wouldn't it be nice if...."

carnal - of or relating to the flesh

Steve Martin suggests that "comedy is not pretty"

3-5

Contrivance - made up

Poesis (Greek word for poetry) - to make up

Mythos- story
Logos - Greek word for truth
*myth + logos = mythology...the story of truths

Diotima's speech is so interesting because it tells a story

There are 3 levels
1. naivete
2. skepticism
3. where story and truth come together

Stage two can be very scary. In class we discussed this stage relation to finding out that Santa Clause was not real or when Dorothy and the gang found out that the wizard was just a man behind a curtain.

The Speech of Diotima suggest that the parents of Eros are poverty (or want) and contrivance.

Diotima also suggests in this speech that everyone is pregnant, both in body and in soul

"Everyone would rather have such children than human ones, and would look up to Homer, Hesiod, and the other good poets with envy and admiration for the offspring they have left behind - offspring, which, because they are immortal themselves, provide their parents with immortal glory and remembrance" (pg.57)

Philosophers are the greatest lovers of the world because the greatest lovers of the world are those who purse wisdom

We have defined extreme tragedy as "Life is not worth it" now we define comedy as "even shameful life is better than no life at all...Give me Life!!"

There are two types of comedy
*old comedy - talks about current politics, old men which at the end of the play they are regenerated somehow
*new comedy - which is simply boy wants girl - boy can't have girl - boy gets girl at the end

Aristophanes is the only survivor of Old Comedy

3-2

The Symposium, on page 27 Dr. Sexson has decided that the first part of the last paragraph was not a preferred translations. In his opinion the translation that follows is more fitting...

"Each of us then is the mere broken tally of a man, the result of a bisection which has reduced us to a condition like that of a flat fish, and each of us is perpetually in search of his corresponding tally"

His decision for this translation revolves around the word tally. A tally is a roman coin that used to be broken into two pieces. Two individuals would take a half as they went separate ways, that way if after years and years apart if they ever met they would have the broken tally to connect back into one, this would prove that they were a match.

Dr. Sexson gave us a demonstration in class by having Katie and Katey tear in index card in half and each keep a half. If by chance they happen to run into each other in some South African cafe years from now they will have the torn card to connect themselves to each other.

Henry James' Turn of the Screw is a frame story and the movie Innocence is a visual depiction of this text.

The subject of the story is the story