ulysses/odysseus and the sirens
DESCRIPTION
Interpretations of the story of Odysseus and the Sirens using poetry, songs, Joseph Campbell, Carl Jung & Margaret AtwoodTRANSCRIPT
Odysseus
and
the Sirens
Every time just like the last
On her ship tied to the mast – Golden Brown
What’s the story?
• Homer’s Odyssey
• the journey home
• Circe’s warning
• the Siren’s song
• the pact
• tied to the mast
• wax in the ears
The ‘story’ lived in the ancient world
Greek vase circa 470BCE
Etruscan art circa 525BCE
The ‘story’ is revived in Victorian
period art & literature
JW Waterhouse 1891
Herbert Draper 1909
Stamps, mugs & albums
(sadly no pencil topper)
Pop culture, top culture
Song to the Siren
– Tim Buckley
Did I dream you dreamed about me?Were you hare when I was fox?Now my foolish boat is leaningBroken lovelorn on your rocks,For you sing, 'touch me not, touch me not, come back tomorrow:O my heart, o my heart shies from the sorrow'
What’s it all mean?
Just a great adventure story about the canny hero Ulysses?
Is it the archetypal story of
the hero’s quest?
The hero’s
return home
with a boon?
Is it the story of avoiding sidetracks on
the spiritual quest?
Being set on the ideaOf getting to Atlantis,You have discovered of courseOnly the Ship of Fools isMaking the voyage this year,
Again, should you come to gayCarthage or Corinth, take partIn their endless gaiety;And if in some bar a tart,As she strokes your hair, should say"This is Atlantis, dearie,“
Atlantis - WH Auden
Is it about a man showing his strength?
Able to resist the feminine?
Tied to the mast in power?
Is it a story like Eve in the Garden
of Eden?
Women as the femme
fatale? Temptress?
Seductress?
Margaret Atwood defends women in
the 1976 Siren Song poem
I don't enjoy it here
squatting on this island
looking picturesque and mythical
with these two feathery maniacs,
I don't enjoy singing
this trio, fatal and valuable.
Atwood’s take
I will tell the secret to you,
to you, only to you.
Come closer. This song
is a cry for help: Help me!
Only you, only you can,
you are unique
At last. Alas
it is a boring song
but it works every time.
Like Circe, Atwood is right on the money!
Is there one and only one for us?
“Help me. Only you, only you can,
you are unique”
It’s not just a boring song
it’s a deadly song.
The song of the sole soul mate!
The beached skulls
Looking for another to “save” you, to
make you complete?
Anima & Animus
• anima (Latin for “soul”)a wildly imaginative, seductive feminine power within man; the Eros...sometimes carrying the emotional charge of the 'ideal woman or lover'.
• animus (Latin for “spirit”)a fiercely willful, visionary masculine luminosity within woman; the Logos...sometimes carrying the emotional charge of the 'ideal man or lover'.
Love at first sight
Jung gave an example of a man who falls head over heels in love, then later in life regrets his blind choice as he finds that he has married his own anima–the unconscious idea of the feminine in his mind, rather than the woman herself.
Ulysses is “tied” to the mast, hearing the song but able to resist death. This is working Jung’s “masterpiece of life” recognising and incorporating your anima (or animus).
Why do the sirens sing?
In the myth if a ship went past the sirens would die.
Perhaps siren women think they have to be this way or they will “die” in some way (be without a man?, be unattractive? lose power?)
The song of shipwreck
Try this song insteadYour love is one in a million
You couldn’t buy it at any price.
But of the 9.999 hundred thousand other loves,
Statistically, some of them would be equally nice
With all my heart and all my mind I know one thing is true:
I have just one life and just one love and, my love, that love is you.
And if it wasn't for you, baby,
I really think that I would have somebody else.
If I didn’t have you – Tim Minchin
Sailing home to Ithaca
Do not chafe and strain at
the ropes that bind you:
in their time these too will fall away. (Ynes)
Melbourne Art Gallery
Enjoy the journeyIthaca has given you the beautiful voyage.Without her you would have never set out on the road.She has nothing more to give you.
And if you find her poor, Ithaca has not deceived you.Wise as you have become, with so much experience,you must already have understood what Ithacas mean.
Ithaca Constantine P. Cavafy (1911)
The end ……or ……..