Week 3, extra reading diary

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Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss

Apuleius's Cupid and Psyche

For my extra reading this week I chose to do the unit of Cupid and Psyche. I had not read much of classic literature before this current semester. The first few weeks of this semester I have had the opportunity of reading bits of Ovid's Metaphorophes in every class. It has really been a great read and I am drawn to keep reading all of it. So I was supposed to read a half unit for the assignment. I plead guilty that I could not stop at half. I had to keep reading. 

So I have learned that I love Ovid. I have learned that the Gods are mean, and it is a bulls-eye on your back if you are born beautiful. These old myths don't seem to have happy endings at all. It seems like they are bragging rights to Gods and Goddesses that they can interfere with humans and cause all kinds of heartache with little or no consequence. I think that modern day-time television and maybe all our reality tv shows are templates from the old Gods and Goddesses antics.

I don't really understand why Cupid had to be invisible to Psyche in the fist place though. Or why a drop of candle would cause a God so much grief. Why is it too that all the Gods and Goddesses are so fickle with their love relations? My heart breaks for this poor girl Psyche. My heart also breaks for Cupid. I think they both get a raw deal.

In the stories, Cupids mom is making his life miserable, as well as his wife who really loves her husband and also misses her dysfunctional family. It goes to show many morals I think too. The one about money and all you can want are not the same as having friends and family. It just doesn't replace love at all. If you do have beauty, wealth and an amazing Greek God of a husband it will end badly. Jealousy is going to move the heavens to cause you harm if you have it all. Geez. 

I guess this may be where we get the whole ignorance is bliss. If you have a normal boring life, not too much to write home about, you may live long enough to be happy.

Week 2, Brainstorm for Storybook topics

Melusina

jinxmim.deviantart.com

I was beside myself happy to find this particular myth available and an option for this assignment. I just ran across the myth of this River Goddess that is briefly mentioned, a few months ago while binge watching the television series called The White Queen by Phillipa Gregory. I immediately was drawn to find out more about her. I want to write a book about her. I think it would make a super interesting fantasy novel. This could help me to develop a really good start on some research for this personal side project!
So I think it is safe to say that anything to do with the topic of Mermaids will help me to find inspiration and resources are fair game for this topic. But I really like the Legend of Melusina in France story, as I feel it may hold more truth to the tale since it has to do with the Crusader Raymond. It would also explain historically how it genetically ties into the bloodlines of the blood royal for France and England. I love that there is historical roots, and that it is myth, so it lends to use of imaginative creativity!
Bibliography Information:
Source: Thomas Keightley, The Fairy Mythology, Illustrative of the Romance and Superstition of Various Countries (London: H. G. Bohn, 1850), pp. 480-82.

Aprhodite

www.pinterest.com

I am attracted to the myths of women and water, so naturally Aphrodite comes to mind with the story of how she was created and it's connection to water. I am currently studying a lot of Roman information with my class load this semester, so I may also want to look at her counterpart of Venus in that pantheon of deities. I think the water and women motif has a particular archetype that is important in our human consciousness. The Greeks of course did everything first so I want to start with the Greek ideas and expand into a more modern tale that is someone we identify with now. I think this may relate also to the connection to the Melusina story line for me as well, if I can find a way to incorporate it.

Bibliography Information:

Source:http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/Aphrodite.html

Inanna

owlandcrow.saladd.com

The ancient Sumerian Goddess Inanna Queen of Heaven and Earth is my personal favorite Goddess of all time. Her stories are amazing. I have ready many books on her by V.S. Ferguson many years ago. I have a fixation with the Anunnaki and the Planet Nibiru. It is part of why the television series Ancient Aliens is my favorite show. I spent twenty years reading books about what they have put into television shows in neat little hour long episodes. The absolute coolest job I can imagine would be to write and do the research for that show. They use evidence, and then speculate and always say, "I am not saying it was aliens, but it was the aliens." It is fun and we do not have hard evidence, but it does seem to point to the origin of the deities and human origins or  are not of this planet, no matter which creation myth or religion you choose. 

I like that the aspect of Goddess is a young empowered woman. She seems to also be an aspect of the later Greek myth of the deity of Aphrodite, and I did not know that but it makes sense somehow. Now I see why I chose the ideas I have been attracted to, they may all be of the same archetype as the brilliant psychologist Carl Jung would point out.

Bibliography Information:

Source: Ancient History Encyclopedia http://www.ancient.eu/Inanna/

Isis

themotherhouseofthegoddess.com

I love the story of the Goddess Isis. She has the wisdom to put Osiris back together and be a single parent. I actually own a print of the image above. I have had it for about 18 years. Isis is a very powerful female figure that is often thought to be a earlier archetype of the Christian concept of the Virgin Mary, and many other archetypal images of other Goddesses of other cultures. I think I can find all kinds of information on Isis from the untextbook, to the sacred texts. 

I think that all four of my choices are good choices that could lead to great stories, with enough information to find on all of them. I love them all. It is hard for me to choose one. I am also more drawn to do a portfolio rather than to do a storybook. But it sounds like sometimes people may change their minds after doing the first few class projects. I will try to be open minded with my ideas.

Bibliography Information:

Source:This story is part of the Ancient Egypt unit. Story source:Egyptian Myth and Legend by Donald Mackenzie (1907).

Week 3, Reading Diary B, Ovid's Metamorphoses,Reading Diary

Perseus and Medusa

www.gutenberg.org

 Neptune raping Medusa in Minerva's Temple

 "They say that Neptune, lord of the seas, violated her in the temple of Minerva. Jupiter’s daughter turned away, and hid her chaste eyes behind her aegis. So that it might not go unpunished, she changed the Gorgon’s hair to foul snakes. And now, to terrify her enemies, numbing them with fear, the goddess wears the snakes, that she created, as a breastplate.’"

My goodness there is so much raping of the poor unwilling human virgins  or any female, and then angry jealous goddesses punishing the rape victims for being a victim to add insult to injury. It would appear that it is detrimental to be born beautiful. You are not even safe from the Gods and Goddesses, in fact it puts a bulls eye on your back. Medusa got a rough deal. Just like Callisto. Just like a lot of women who were punished for being victims. In so many ways I see the parallels with modern times. The more that times change, the more they stay the same. I wonder if we just keep being stuck in the old archetype roles and retelling the same old story, just with an updated look or language. At least for the sake of mythology and folklore I think this is the case.

Ovid is telling the story of Perseus and Medusa in a strange point of view. Perseus is the archetype hero and he of course is known for his heroic deeds and so Andromeda's family is asking about the Medusa head that he drags around everywhere turning things into stone,like Atlas into Mount Atlas.

Week 3, Reading Diary A, Ovid's Metamorphoses,Reading Diary

Callisto

nihilnovum.wordpress.com Callisto being asked by Dianna to leave

I chose to read the Classic Ovid's Metomorphoses because it is a classic and I have not read it, but have translated Latin sentences into English from the great story. It is interesting  how Ovid is telling the story of many Roman myths as a seamless story to explain the accepted ideas by the Romans of his day, but in a more exciting way through verse in Latin which is not easy to do. In my first Latin course at the University of Oklahoma I started reading Percy Jackson books by Rick Riordan for part of my culture points. Yes, the first series of the books are about Greek myth, but, the second part of that series is about Roman myth. I think in many ways I compare what Ovid did in his style of telling us about Metamorphoses in much the same way. An old story being told in a new way, one that we can identify with and be entertained by. I feel amazed when I read Rick Riordan's books and I am also intrigued by Ovid's stories of changes of all the many characters of the myths. 

I especially like the story of Callisto, it is a sad one, but the imagery is vivid. I like the part where Hera grabs Callistos hair and face and she transforms into a bear. This is so heartbreaking that this poor girl that was raped, gets kicked out of her career path basically because you have to be a virgin to be a part of the hunt with Dianna, then cannot even raise her child because a jealous Goddess turns her into a bear. She sadly watches her life being trapped inside of an animal. Nobody said life was fair. I find it interesting in the difference too of how in Ovid's stories, bad things happen, really bad and it doesn't end well. But in modern times, telling stories almost always requires needing a way to wrap it up nicely so it has a happy ending.

Week 2, Extra Reading Diary, Celtic Fairy Tales

Celtic Fairy Tales

Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree

www.mariyarosedesigns.com

I chose to read the half unit of Celtic Fairy Tales. I was most taken in by the story of Gold-Tree and Silver-Tree. It was very familiar to me from childhood Disney cartoon films of Snow White's wicked step mother the Evil Queen. Except this Queen did not consult a magical mirror, she consulted a fish in a pond. He told her that her daughter was the most beautiful in the land. I can see how the scrying in a ponds reflective surface can lead to the eventual usage of a mirror in later stories.


Also, much like the story of Disney's Snow White, the beautiful daughter whom the father adores, causes the mother (but not step mother) jealousy who uses witchcraft to cause the girl, Silver-Tree to fall into a sleep that is under a magical spell. I like this Celtic version better that the mans second wife finds her asleep and removes the magical thorn spell and wakes her from her sleep. It is less creepy than a prince finding a random dead body in the woods being compelled to kiss it.

At first I am very drawn to the subject of the mother, Gold-Tree using the water scrying because I am interested in finding out more information about the River Goddess connected to Melusine. I want to pursue a story based on the magical lore of the magical line that is connected to the families of the Plantagents, Anjou, the White Queen.
The Horned Women
The other story that really intrigued me was the horned women. Parts of the story reminded me of an alien abduction story, that they did something to the sleeping family that made them unable to move or to do as they commanded.
Connla and the Fairy Maiden
I liked Connla and the Fairy Maiden. It reminds me of some of my favorite books by Marian Zimmerman Bradley, the Mists of Avalon series. I do believe that the fairy folk are still there in a mist hidden from those with eyes that can't see. I do believe that there are thin spots in the veil, and that sometimes a fairy person will bring a person into the fairy realm. I often wish I too could go to the fairy realm.

I really didn't like the other stories too much, they were kinda creepy! I don't like the ones with monsters and scary things. Or the repetition that makes reading monotonous like the little creepy creatures that burst.

babbeyhalle10.blogspot.com

Week 2, Reading Diary B, Noah: The Tower of Babel,Reading Diary

Noah: The Tower of Babel

en.wikipedia.org Tower of Babel

The enterprise was neither more nor less than rebellion against God, and there were three sorts of rebels among the builders. The first party spoke, "Let us ascend into the heavens and wage warfare with Him;" the second party spoke, "Let us ascend into the heavens, set up our idols, and pay worship unto them there;" and the third party spoke, "Let us ascend into the heavens, and ruin them with our bows and spears."

This is interesting to me that at this point the people believe that God dwells in a physical place that can be reached by humans and that God could be hurt by humans.

 I chose this story because this story has always seemed strange to me. How all the different languages came about. I do not know much about linguistics but I doubt that they believe this bit of mythology either. I think that the story is very old and has some misunderstood aspects. I understand this story more as a cosmogony to answer how many languages and cultures were made, but this is not really what happened.

I think about the most amazing megalithic buildings that exist all over our planet and the tales of Atlantis a time of great technology. I believe that perhaps the time of Noah corresponds to the timeline of Atlantis-the deluge. I think the story of the tower of babel may predate the deluge.

Many, many years were passed in building the tower. It reached so great a height that it took a year to mount to the top.

Holy cow that is a tall building. Nope, I do not believe that they have or will find this place archeologically. I think it sank to the bottom of the ocean.

They never slackened in their work, and from their dizzy height they constantly shot arrows toward heaven, which, returning, were seen to be covered with blood. They were thus fortified in their delusion, and they cried, "We have slain all who are in heaven."

Are you kidding me? Shooting arrows into the sky? Were they actually killing each other while building this thing? What could possibly motivate a large cultural civilization to undertake this type of physically demanding feat of building this massive building to start a war with God. Would it not beg to ponder that maybe it was a rocket ship they built to launch into the sky? If you remember the stories in the Bhagavad Gita it sounds like some of their stories of the wars in heaven with gods.

To every nation a peculiar language was assigned, Hebrew being reserved for Israel--the language made use of by God at the creation of the world.

And the beginning the word was god. things that make you go, Hmmm.

Week 2,Reading Diary A,Noah: The Punishment of the Fallen Angels

Weeks 2-3: Classical and Biblical

Noah: The Punishment of the Fallen Angels

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I chose this one because it is a story that I am familiar with through Ancient Aliens. The story seems straight out of science fiction. Yet, this is what people believe as truth as it is written in the Bible that the sons of God mated with the daughters of men. The Nephilim, the giants. Is the story prescription or description?  Where do we find the earliest version of this story?
The woman who learns and says the ineffable name of god, reminds me more of the Adam and Eve fall from garden of Eden story.
"Shemhazai saw a maiden named Istehar, and he lost his heart to her. She promised to surrender herself to him, if first he taught her the Ineffable Name, by means of which he raised himself to heaven. He assented to her condition. But once she knew it, she pronounced the Name, and herself ascended to heaven, without fulfilling her promise to the angel. God said, "Because she kept herself aloof from sin, we will place her among the seven stars, that men may never forget her," and she was put in the constellation of the Pleiades."
This block quote from the story leads me to believe that this is Ancient Summarian in origin.
I love love love the use of the names of the sons as the sounds, Hiwwa and Hiyya-as men cut or haul stones, or launch vessels, they shall invoke your names, Hiwwa! Hiyya!