I wish to thank all of you for the comments you have written. The invitation to rate my posts is proof that people are reading my posts, including moliéristes. It’s a forum, not an arena.
As you know, I was ready to write my book during a forthcoming sabbatical, but I was assigned the preparation of new courses, one of which was Animals in Literature. It took away my sabbatical. I’m not writing my book online, but I am reading Molière and sharing this endeavour with my WordPress colleagues.
I realize that students can get information from my posts and other online sources. That’s fine. They may quote me, acknowledging their source, and posts can be republished. If writing my book proves impossible, I will nevertheless have discussed Molière publicly for a brief period of time and in a manner that introduces Molière to the general public. Quoting Molière in French and English is time consuming, but it is an imperative.
Comedy Scene from Molière by Honoré Daumier (WikiArt.org)
Les Fourberies de Scapin
My Pléiade edition of Molière was published in 1956. It is an old edition that does not contain the lines where Scapin tells Argante that he himself, Argante, will not break Octave’s marriage because he loves his son. However, these lines are part of the editor’s Notes et Variantes. Occasionally, Molière recycled parts of his comedies. These were his. The conversation I quoted is all but repeated in Le Malade imaginaire. The editors of the 1682 edition of the complete works of Molière excluded that part of the conversation. But the Molière 21‘s editors of the Pléiade 2010 edition have re-entered the relevant dialogue in the latest Pléiade edition, which we are using.
In Les Fourberies de Scapin, Molière juxtaposed the power of fathers and a father’slove. This juxtaposition is essential to an understanding of the play. Molière knew that there were forced marriages. Octave barely believes that his father will let him marry Géronte’s daughter Hyacinte. So, Molière also knew that fathers loved their sons and that this love was more powerful than tradition: parents choosing their children’s spouse. Molière used a subtle path, a kind destiny. Our fathers, Argante and Géronte, had chosen to marry their sons to the women their sons love, one of whom, Octave, has already married Hyacinte.
According to Professor Matthew Strecher’s magic realism is “what happens when a highly detailed, realistic setting is invaded by something too strange to believe.”[1]Magical Realism is a main characteristic of Latin-American literature, but it has gained adherent elsewhere and it is not new. It present readers with a juxtaposition of what is usually considered the “real,” the “unreal,” and the “surreal.” An angel just may enter a room and play a role in a fictitious text. (See Magic Magic Realism, Wikipedia,)
The author of Wikipedia’s entry on magic realism states that “[t]his critical perspective towards magical realism as a conflict between reality and abnormality stems from the Western reader’s dissociation with mythology, a root of magical realism more easily understood by non-Western cultures.” (See Magic realism, Wikipedia)
Marc Chagall
In the visual arts, Marc Chagall (6 July 1887 – 28 March 1985) presents us with better examples of what could be called “magical realism,” whatever “school” his paintings are attached to. In the so-called “real” world, people seldom float in mid-air. But the world is not always real and the human imagination pushes its limits. We know that angels do not exist, but we nevertheless make room for them. In fact, we swear on the Bible, in which, ironically, angels dwell.
Apuleius‘ (c. 125 – c. 180 CE) Golden Ass is a novel, the first novel we have inherited in its entirety from Greco-Roman antiquity. First entitled Metamorphoses, the novel was renamed by Augustine of Hippo (St. Augustine). It is rather lewd, but The Tale of Cupid and Psyche isn’t, and mere mortals mix with immortal gods. This may confirm that magical realism has replaced mythology, but it may not.
It consists of a frame story and inner stories called “digressions.” One of these digressions, the third, The Tale of Cupid and Psyche, belongs to mythology and is a distant forerunner of magical realism in that its dramatis personæ includes mortals and immortals who mingle informally. Venus, the immortal Roman goddess of love, whose Greek counterpart is Aphrodite, is featured next to Psyche’s father and seems a mere mortal.
In The Golden Ass, Lucius is transformed into a donkey, which normally is not possible. Metamorphoses belong to a realm most would look upon as “unreal.” It is fantasy. Yet Ovid‘s (20 March 43 BCE – 17/18 CE), Metamorphoses is one of Western culture’s most influential books. Human beings do not float in mid-air, with the exception of astronauts, nor can they fly, but the human imagination can imagine another reality and that reality possesses a form of “truth.”
It remains, however, that Apuleius’ mythological third digression, The Tale of Cupid and Psyche, is pure fiction. Psyches lives in a world where gods and mere mortals mingle, which is not possible outside fiction. Consequently, The Tale of Cupid and Psyche seems an instance of magical realism avant la lettre, i.e. before the term was coined.
For instance, early in the narrative, Psyches’ father, who would like his unfortunate daughter to find a suitable husband, went to Milet, an ancient Greek city, now found in Turkey, and called Miletus, “to receive the Oracle of Apollo, where he made his prayers and offered sacrifice, and desired a husband for his daughter whose elder daughters are married to kings.” Although Apollo is a Greek god, he replies in Latin and says:
Let Psyches corps be clad in mourning weed
And set on rock of yonder hill aloft:
Her husband is no wight of humane seed,
But Serpent dire and fierce as might be thought.
Who flies with wings above in starry skies,
And doth subdue each thing with firie flight.
The gods themselves, and powers that seem so wise,
With mighty Jove [Jupiter] be subject to his might,
The rivers blacke, and deadly flouds of paineAnd darkness eke, as thrall to him remaine.
(Apuleius, The Golden Asse, Book 4, Chapter 22
Translated by William Adlington
The Gutenberg Project [EBook #1666])
Having heard the Oracle, Psyches’ father does take her up a hill and sets her “on rock of yonder hill aloft” where she is left “weeping and trembling,” but is “blowne by the gentle aire and of shrilling Zephyrus, and carried from the hill with a meek winde, which retained her garments up, and by little and little bought her downe into a deepe valley, where she was laid in a bed of most sweet and fragrant flowers.”
Instead of taking her where “she may fall in love with the most miserablest [that word should be reinvented] creature living,” as Venus has asked Cupid, Venus’ son, makes himself invisible and has the wind “Zephyrus” transport her to a “bed of most sweet and fragrant flowers.” Here again, we have an example of magical realism, even if Psyches is “clad in mourning weed,” which suggests that she has died. However, her sisters, mortals, visit her.
The “fairy tale” begins and, after the compulsory tasks—three in most fairy tales—have been performed, Psyches is transformed into a goddess, which may be her rightful self. In the “real” world, she is the victim of envy. In fact, Venus herself, a goddess who mingles with mortals, which is magical realism, is so envious of her that she wants her destroyed. However, In fact, Venus herself, a goddess who mingles with mortals, which is magical realism, is so envious of her that she wants her destroyed. However, as the most beautiful woman in the world, Psyches is an oddity, so her becoming a goddess seems appropriate.
The Golden Legend
We may have forgotten the names of the god and goddesses of mythology. However, the human imagination is such that if mythology did not exist humans would probably invent a replacement, such as magical realism. The bestseller of the Middle Ages was not the Bible, but Jacobus de Voragine’s fanciful Golden Legend(LegendaAurea), an embellished hagiography or telling of the lives of saints, in general, and martyrs (martyrologies), in particular.
[1] Matthew C. Strecher, “Magical Realism and the Search for Identity in the Fiction of Murakami Haruki,” Journal of Japanese Studies, Volume 25, Number 2 (Summer 1999), pp. 263-298, at 267.
In November 2011, I wrote a post on Apuleius‘ Golden Ass, the only novel that has come down to us from Latin Antiquity in its entirety and which happens to be about metamorphoses. I am revisiting the Golden Ass because we have looked at fables in which a cat and a mouse are metamorphosed respectively into a woman and a maid. In the world of fables, a realistic world, nature will out, so our cat and mouse return to their natural selves.
Fairy tales are home to metamorphoses. Beast is turned into a beast and will remain a beast until Beauty accepts to marry him as he is, i.e. as Beast. The moment Beauty tells Beasts that she will marry him, a curse is lifted and beast returns to his former princely self. Such is the stuff of fairy tales. But let us look at sources.
Ovid and Apuleius
The theme of metamorphosis is rooted mainly in Ovid‘s Metamorphosesand, to a lesser extent, in Apuleius‘ The Golden Ass, first entitled Metamorphoses. In The Golden Ass, Lucius is accidentally metamorphosed into an animal and that animal happens to be a donkey, which may explain why Augustine of Hippo (St Augustine) “demoted” Apuleius’ Metamorphosesby giving it a different title. Augustine renamed the book The Golden Assand The Golden Ass it has remained, despite one rather lofty “digression,” the tale of Cupid and Psyche. Psyches, the most beautiful woman in the world, will be metamorphosed into a goddess by the ultimate fairy godmother, the gods of Greco-Roman antiquity assembled.
The Golden Ass
The Outer Story
The Golden Ass combines an outer story and inner stories. The outer story is called a frame story. The inner stories are sometimes called in-set stories. In the case of The Golden Ass, the outer story is a rather lewd account of the transformation of Lucius, as in Lucius Apuleius (Apulée), into a donkey.
Lucius wishes to become a sorcerer, or a witch, so he can transform himself into a bird and is told by his friend Milo that Milo’s wife is a witch who can transform herself into a bird. Lucius watches her metamorphosing herself into a bird and accidentally turns his own person into a donkey. At the end of the novel, after all sorts of trials and tribulations, Lucius retrieves his human form, assisted by Isis, a goddess and a magician.
By and large, the inner or in-set stories or tales bear some resemblance to the outer story. The story is different but the tone is that of Lucius, now transformed into a donkey. The exception is Cupid and Psyche. We are transported into a world filled with gods and goddesses, but these gods and goddesses sometimes mingle with mere mortals. We therefore have a taste of magic realism. Professor Matthew Strecher defines magic realism as “what happens when a highly detailed, realistic setting is invaded by something too strange to believe.” (See Magic Realism, Wikipedia.)
In psychology the word “psyche” refers to the mind but to a large extent, it also refers to the soul, which is immortal. The “digression,” or in-set tale, is entitled Cupid and Psyche, but Psyche’s name is Psyches. She is the third daughter of a King, a motif which links her to fairy tale protagonists. Moreover, Psyches has two married but jealous sisters, as does Cinderella. However, the third daughter marries a god. Cinderella has to settle for a mere prince.
Consequently, the tale of Cupid and Psyche is a “digression.” The main link between Cupid and Psyche and The Golden Assis a metamorphosis, except that Psyches does not turn into an animal. On the contrary, her appearance does not change and her story is one of upward mobility. Psyche means soul. She escapes mortality, the human condition, by becoming a goddess. The soul is immortal.
(quotations, including the spelling, are from[EBook #1666]Book 4, Chapter 22)
The Romans borrowed Greek mythology but changed the name of each god. Venus is the Latin name for Aphrodite.
The story has several variants, but basically it is aboutjealousy. Venus (Aphrodite), the goddess of love is jealous of a human being, Psyche or Psyches, the third and only unmarried daughter of a King and Queen. She is considered more beautiful than Venus and people travel long distances to see her. Venus is jealous and sends her son Cupid (Eros) to find “the most miserablest creature living” and make him Psyches’ husband.
Meanwhile, Psyches has been placed at the top of a hill as her parents think a man might take her at last. She is not married. Cupid, who has made himself invisible, does not perform his dastardly deed. Psyches is “blowne by the gentle aire and of shrilling Zephyrus” to a castle. They become man and wife: “after that hee had make a perfect consummation of the marriage.” But he only visits during the night and he has directed her not to look at him during his nightly visits.
Psyches is pregnant and misses her sisters, so Cupid allows them to visit. When they arrive, they praise her: “O dear sister Psyches, know you that you are now no more a child, but a mother: O what great joy beare you unto us in you belly?”
Both older sisters are unhappily married and jealous of Psyche who lives in a castle. To get rid of the husband she is not allowed to see, they fool Psyche into thinking that Cupid is a monstrous serpent and must be killed. As her sisters suggest, Psyches carries a candle so she can see Cupid and kill him: “with your bare feet goe and take the lampe, with the Razor in your right hand and with valiant force cut off the head of the poisonous serpent, wherein we will aid and assist you: and when by the death of him you shall be made safe, we wil marry to some comely man.” Psyches sees Cupid and falls in love, but a drop of hot wax falls from the candle and burns Cupid inadvertently. He wakes up and leaves as he had warned he would: “hee commaunded Zephyrus to carry me away from the bounds of his house.”
After she has been abandoned, Psyches goes looking for Cupid. At one point, she seeks the help of Venus, not knowing that Venus is her enemy. Venus asks Psyches to perform impossible tasks, the last of which is deadly. Venus wants Psyches to fetch beauty from Proserpina, Queen of the Underworld, put some of that beauty into a golden box, and return the box to her. Alas, one does not return from the Underworld, which means that Psyches will die if she goes to the Underworld.
Knowing that she must die, Psyches climbs to the top of a tower and is about to throw herself down when the tower starts to speak. She is told how to appease Cerberus
(Kerberos), the three-headed dog who guards the entrance to the Underworld. Proserpina (Persephone) gives Psyches the box, but instead of beauty, it contains infernal sleep. Psyches is curious, opens the box, and lapses into a coma.
By then, Cupid (Éros), who has wings, the equivalent of a magic carpet, has forgiven Psyches and flies to her rescue. A kiss revives her and they then go to Jupiter (Zeus). Cupid asks Jupiter to transform Psyches into a goddess. Jupiter appeases Venus and he then convenes the gods who, after deliberating, grant Cupid’s request. Cupid’s Psyches is therefore transformed into a goddess by drinking ambrosia(“ambroisie,” or Nectar), the drink of Greek gods, and therefore escapes the human condition: mortality.
“And then he [Jupiter] tooke a pot of immortality, and said, Hold Psyches, and drinke, to the end thou maist be immortall, and that Cupid may be thine everlasting husband. By and by the great banket and marriage feast was sumptuously prepared, Cupid sate downe with his deare spouse between his armes: Juno likewise with Jupiter, and all the other gods in order, Ganimedes filled the port of Jupiter, and Bacchus served the rest. Their drinke was Nectar the wine of the gods, Vulcanus prepared supper, the howers decked up the house with roses and other sweet smells, the Graces threw about blame, the Muses sang with sweet harmony, Apollo tuned pleasantly to the Harpe, Venus danced finely: Satirus and Paniscus plaid on their pipes; and thus Psyches was married to Cupid, and after she was delivered of a child whom we call Pleasure.”
Proserpina, by
Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1874),
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
In Apuleius, Psyche is Psyches and has parents. She seems a human being. Moreover, in mythology, gods lose their godliness through sexual contact, generally, with a mortal being. Psyches is a human being and, therefore, a mortal. So it is not possible for her to be transformed into the mortal she already is. Therefore, Apuleius presents us with a complicated “digression.” Psyches is metamorphosed into a goddess, an immortal being, by drinking ambrosia, and then gives birth to a child named Pleasure. It is all very fanciful. Psyche means the soul and the soul is immortal.
A Fairy Tale: to a certain Extent
The tale of Cupid and Psyche provides us with a template associated with fairy tales: the rags to riches narrative of Cinderella. Psyches becomes a goddess. We also have jealous sisters, not to mention a jealous Venus, a mother-in-law (a stepmother). As for the invisible Cupid, he could well be a monstrous beast, in which case,Cupid and Psychecould be associated withBeauty and the Beast.The tale of Cupid and Psycheis in fact associated withBeauty and the Beast.
“The fairy tales which modern scholars most often discuss in relation to an antecedent myth are those which involve an animal as bride-groom, best known by versions of ‘Beauty and the Beast’.”[iii]
According to the Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales, the story of Cupid and Psycheis both a myth and a fairy tale, but the theme is not consistent with fairy tales. Unlike Beauty, Psyches does not have to lift a curse by saying she will marry Cupid. She must perform chores, imposed by Venus, to be reunited with Cupid, but there is no disenchantment, i.e. no curse has turned Cupid into an animal-groom, so no curse has to be lifted.
“In fairy tale versions the question normally ends with a disenchantment motif as the heroine regains her partner by ending the spell which has enchanted him.”[iv]
Conclusion
Although Cupid and Psyche has affinities with fairy tales, it may be prudent not to classify it as such, except loosely. Classifications are helpful, but they should not be a Procrustean bed. The bed would always be too short or too long, and limbs therefore stretched or amputated. In Cupid and Psyche a man, albeit a god, comes to the rescue of a damsel in distress who is despised because she is the most beautiful woman in the world. The story moves forward propelled by a feeling inextricably linked with love which, in literature, may be jealousy.
However, in Cupid and Psyche, the wedding that constitutes the proper ending of fairy tales and comedies seems out of place, but is it? Cupid and Psyche became man and wife after he flew her to her castle: “after that hee had made a perfect consummation of the marriage.” She was not allowed to look at him, but when night fell, he “visited” her. This seems consistent with a myth. However, the tale of Cupid and Psyche is that of a pre-existing union. Consequently, the wedding takes on other virtues. It could well be the official celebration of a threatened marriage. “All’s well that ends well.”
[i]The Golden Asse. Translated by William Adlington, first published 1566. This version is as reprinted from the edition of 1639. The original spelling, capitalisation and punctuation have been retained. [EBook #1666][ii] A werewolf, also known as a lycanthrope is amythological or folklorichuman with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf or antherianthropichybrid wolf-like creature, either purposely or after being placed under a curse or affliction (e.g. via a bite or scratch from another werewolf). Early sources for belief in lycanthropy arePetronius (c. 27 – 66 BCE)and Gervase of Tilbury (c. 1150 – c. 1228 CE).
(SeeWerewolf, Wikipedia.)
[iii] John Stephens, “Myth/Mythology and Fairy Tales,” ed. Jack Zipes, The Oxford Companion to Fairy Tales (Oxford University Press, 2000), pp. 330-334.
[iv]Loc. cit.
César Franck (10 December 1822 – 8 November 1890)
Psyché et ÉrosWilliam Revelli (12 February 1902 – 16 July 1994)
Micheline Walker
4 August 2013
WordPressPsyche Revived by Cupid’s KissAntonio Canova (1757 – 1822)
Musée du Louvre
(Please click on the image to enlarge it.)
We associate metamorphism with Ovid (20 March 43 BCE – 17/18 CE) and Apuleius (c. 125 – c. 180 CE), but metamorphism is also frequent in fairy tales and has a dark side in lycanthropy, or werewolf stories.
Ovid’s Metamorphosesis our fundamental text on this subject. There were Greek stories of metamorphoses, but Greece did not have an Ovid. Nor did it have an Apuleius. For the time being, I will leave Ovid’s Metamorphoses aside and take a peak at Apuleius’s version of the myth of Cupid and Psyche. That story is a ‘digression’ in Apuleius’s The Golden Ass, a novel in which a man becomes a donkey, at least temporarily.
Apuleius: TheGolden Ass
Apuleius’sGolden Assis the only complete novel we have inherited from Greco-Roman antiquity. It was written in the 2nd century AD. Its structure resembles that of Ibn Al-Muqaffa’s Tales of Kalilah wa Dimna. There is a main story in which are inserted many stories or ‘digressions.’ For this reason, it could be labelled a picaresque novel, except that an old woman tells the myth of Psycheand Cupid, as a digression, which seems very odd, given the outer narrative and other inner stories.
The Outer Story
In the outer story, the protagonist is Lucius who wishes to become a witch so he can transform himself into a bird. He is told my his friend Milo that Milo’s wife is a witch who can transform herself into a bird. Lucius watches her turning herself into a bird and, accidentally transforms himself into a donkey. At the end of the novel, after all sorts of trials and tribulations, Lucius retrieves his human self, assisted by Isis, a goddess and a magician.
The Inner Stories
As for the inner stories, they too are lewd, except for the beautiful myth of Cupid andPsyche, the last of the inner stories. It is told by an old woman through several books and it resembles fairy tales.
As the story goes, Venus (Aphrodite), the goddess of love, is jealous of a human who is the most beautiful woman in the world, Psyche, and claims to be more beautiful than Venus.
Venus is jealous and therefore sends her son Cupid (Eros) to kill Psyche with one of his arrows. However, Cupid, who has made himself invisible to perform his dastardly deed, falls in love with Psyche and takes her to a castle. They become man and wife, but he only visits with her in the night. Moreover, she is directed not to look at him during his nightly visits. One night she is fooled by her sisters into carrying a candle and killing Cupid who, they claim, is a monstrous serpent. She does as her sisters suggest, sees that her husband is Cupid and burns him with her candle. She falls in love, but Cupid leaves her as he had warned.
After she has been abandoned, Psyche goes to Venus to request help. Venus tells her to perform four impossible tasks, three of which she performs through the mediation of ants, a river god and an eagle. But the fourth task is truly impossible. Venus asks Psyche to fetch beauty from Proserpina(Persephone), Queen of the Underworld, which means that Psyche must die. So she climbs to the top of a tower and is about to throw herself down when the tower starts to speak. She is told how to go to the Underworld. However, the box she is given does not contain beauty; it contains infernal sleep. She therefore falls into a coma.
By then, Cupid (Eros), who has wings has forgiven her and flies to rescue her. He goes to Jupiter (Zeus) to ask the gods’s permission to transform Psyche into a goddess. Jupiter and the other gods deliberate and end up granting Cupid’s request. Psyche is therefore transformed into a goddess by drinking ambrosia. She has escaped the human condition: mortality.
* * *
Questions
In Greek mythology, Psyche is the soul. Her role in the myth we have just glimpsed is therefore quite different. In fact, she is a human being, but a human being promoted to the state of godliness, which is the reverse of most myths. Usually, gods lose their godliness though sexual contact with a human.
The myth of Cupid and Psyche is part of mythology and does not seem to belong to folklore. As in The Golden Ass, the narrative seems once again out of place, yet is not. Could this be an early manifestion of magical realism? I must investigate further.
There is definitely more to metamorphism than meets the eye.
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