The Hungry Myth

"Hunger knows no friends but its feeder."-Aristophanes

This subject may be one we've beaten to death, but giving respect to the upcoming holiday, I think hunger needs its due via blog form.

Hunger, in its most basic form, represents the most basic of needs; it should come as little surprise then that over time it has come to take near-center stage in the mythic. The various forms hunger assumes range from its original physical manifestation to the symbolic and even to the obscure.

The physical form of hunger is easily observable in the Ovidian account of Erysichthon. The all-consuming hunger  he bears empties him of coin and house and eventually leads him to consume his own flesh. The consumption of human flesh has for most of history been considered a strict taboo, such as with the cases of Lycaon and Tereus. And there is a strict punishment for the consumption of human flesh, but in the case of Eryichthon the consumption of his own flesh only swerves to fulfill a punishment. This strange contradiction can be explained using Christianity.


 As a creation of the god(s), human flesh is sacred, having been formed by the divine. To Christanins, harming the flesh is akin to sinning against god, as the flesh was created by god; this is why suicide is considered a grave sin worthy of eternal damnation. To consume another's flesh is to take the creation of god away from the divine creator, it is also a perversion of the taking of Eucharist(this may not directly relate to poor Eryichthon's tale); and as most of us know, the gods do not like to be mocked. Therefore, cannibalism is traditionally taboo in order to prevent the wrath of the gods. But in the case of Erysichton, the self-cannibalism is all the more fitting, he not only falls prey to gluttony and loses all he has to own, he commits an even bigger fault by consuming his (sacred) flesh. His insult to himself is so large as to serve as an acceptable punishment in Demeter's eyes. He has been robbed of his his own flesh by his own hand. And therein lies the mythical power of physical hunger; it is a thief and a burden that leads to direct actions and punishments. 

The symbolic presence of hunger can be seen in fire. Fire could be seen as a mythical form of hunger due to its ability to consume endlessly, usually towards either the goal of destruction or recreation. For poor Phaethon, his hunger to assume the responsibilities of his father drove the very world to a fiery brink. The boy's greed thus led to his destruction by Jove. Fire can be seen here as the hunger that consumes those who disobey or ask too much, a scene often portrayed with most criminals and sinners from history. "Naturally enough the people who continued to burn his image came in time to identify it as the effigy of persons whom, on various grounds, they regarded with aversion, such as Judas Iscariot, Luther, and a witch."-page 781, The Burning of Effigies in a Fire. Fire consumes the wicked in a hunger parallel to the various acts of greed the wicked committed. But in the rare mythical case, fire serves to both destroy and create, such as with the case of Hercules. As he lay writhing on his funeral pyre, the flames from his shirt destroyed the mortal half of Hercules, but then allowed his divine half to take a place in the stars, allowing him to become a god. The flames also helped to destroy the mortal mistake of Deinera in her acceptance of Nessus's  venom-encrusted shirt. Her fault in her husband led to his death, a fault which the fire burned away. Fire is thus able to cleanse in its hunger as it is able to destroy. For physical proof of the mythical fire, simply look at today's volcanic eruptions and forest fires. Untold destruction followed by untold fertility.

I would very much like to continue this blog, but a helpful classmate has ever so kindly reminded me that I have a 10 a.m exam tomorrow, so until later, I shall have to forfeit the need to finish this blog and try to pick up the need to study. But some hungers don't come so easily...

Book VI of Ovid's Metamorphoses

Seeing as I haven't been keeping up with my Ovidian sentences, I thought it might be prudent to play a little catch-up today.

Book VI

Arachne: There's something to be said for humility in a craft.

Niobe: How many myths does it take for one to understand that braggarts rarely get anything but pain?

Marsyas: You want a piece of me?

Pelops: Unlike a certain modern-day vampire, Pelops really can claim to have skin of ivory...

Tereus, Procne, Philomela: How can you now say that a nightingale's song is soothing?

Refusing the Immortal

"Only in autumn days, as summer slowly faded, would their confidence again be dashed by doubts and misgivings at symptoms of decay, which told how vain were all their efforts to stave off for ever the approach of winter and of death."-The Myth of Adonis, page 390, James Frazer.


While enjoying the long weekend, I happened upon a copy of Pan's Labyrinth; having never seen the movie and having been told that it contained a wealth of mythology, I took it upon myself to give it a try, disturbing creatures and all. 


While entire tomes could be written about the material displayed in Pan's Labyrinth, what struck a particular cord with me was a Fairy Story Ofelia told to her unborn brother. The tale goes a little something like this:

Many, many years ago in a sad, faraway land, there was an enormous mountain made of rough, black stone. At sunset, on top of that mountain, a magic rose blossomed every night that made whoever plucked it immortal. But no one dared go near it because its thorns were full of poison. Men talked amongst themselves about their fear of death, and pain, but never about the promise of eternal life. And every day, the rose wilted, unable to bequeath its gift to anyone... forgotten and lost at the top of that cold, dark mountain, forever alone, until the end of time. 


How many times has mankind lamented death and aging, how many times have the poets and the artists portrayed a wasted life? In my estimation, the count would number in the thousands. And yet when given the chance to end pain, aging, and death; the journey is often met with fear. Refusing immortality is a theme I've found in both Ovid and Henderson the Rain King. Immortality is presented within an easy distance, but the person to whom it is presented refuses the gift or fails to reach it. This persistent failure to achieve immortality has a perplexing quality about it; what we yearn for most we can never acquire. But perhaps it is not that the desire for the gift of immortality is insufficient, but the poisonous thorns that surround it...

Often times, there is a price to pay for an endless, ageless life. Hercules gained his immortality only through a fiery rebirth, Ariadne suffered heartbreak for her place in the stars, and Callisto had to give up her very humanity to live in the heavens with her son. The Sybil of Cumae was granted her heart's desire, but in return lost her youth. Perhaps even more telling of the price of immortality are the stories where the gift fails to be received by its seeker. The Epic of Gilgamesh describes the intense need to remain in life, as so stated by the hero when he finds that his attempt to stay awake for 6 days and 7 nights has failed:
O woe! What do I do now, where do I go now?
Death has devoured my body,
Death dwells in my body,
Wherever I go, wherever I look, there stands Death!

Luckily for Gilgamesh, Utnapishtam takes pity and tells him where the plant of immortality resides, and yet, after his long and perilous journey, the plant is only stolen by a serpent. The great and heroic story of Gilgamesh thus ends with a lesson, one cannot defeat death. The great price of immortality would seem to be beyond the purchase of humanity. Certainly poor Henderson takes notice of the steep cost, here was a man with the potential to be a king, and thus have his name become immortal..and yet there is the fatal price to pay for such glory. It would seem that immortality cannot be reached without a most dire return. Which leads me to ponder the question of rules in respect to immortality.


It can be easily said that the gift of an eternal life requires an equal return, the question is why. What about the lonely rose sitting so prone at the top of the mountain demands life? Why must there be thorns on the rose? The answer is easily put; death. An immortal life suspends death, suspends the person or animal who attains the immortal from the normal cyclic motions of the universe. To look at it from Mircea Eliade's point of view, the cosmogonic cycle cannot be completed with death. Those rituals of renewal, of rebirth, cannot take place without the completion of the circle. Immortality thus breaks the strands of time and threatens the overall well-being of the universe. With no apocalypse, how can there be a new Eden? There is also the issue of suffering associated with Immortality, if the eternal subject is caught in a time of suffering, then they are doomed to continue in their suffering. Middles bring about misery, the full wrath of the stage of rape without any hope of moving forward to indifference or even returning to the stage of conviviality. The Sybil of Cumae has certainly found herself caught in this web, she continues her pain in her immortal life; she has broken with the normal cycles of the universe. but perhaps Henderson, the lucky fellow who so wisely refused immortality can sum up why the passage of time is necessary. 


"But maybe time was invented so that misery might have an end. So that it shouldn't last forever? There may be something to that."-page 314. As Henderson said, time keeps the cycles moving, and to be suspended from time to is prolong and dam the evolution of the cosmos. As Eliade states "...a true beginning can come only after a real end." Immortality denies ends and by doing so denies beginnings. So in truth, Immortality is less like eternal life, and more akin to eternal stasis, limbo in the great wake of time. This, then, is the reason for the poisoned thorns, if a life is to be put on eternal hold, there must be some sort of compensation for the break in time. The lonely rose of Ofelia's tale was meant to be so, the threat of death acted as a deterrent for the greater tragedy of Immortal life. 

 But do not fret the implications of achieving immortality, the rules that surround eternal life can be easily slipped past. While physical immortality is problematic, immortality within the arts is all too easily attained. Should you wish for your name to persist throughout the ages, simply turn to mythology. Ovid achieved his place in time, and so may anyone, if they have sense enough to write down their stories. When bodies lay in their graves, mythologies will prance around the headstones and dance along the roads, singing of immortality to anyone who listens. 

What's What in Chapter 4 of Myth and Reality

One had to cram all this stuff into one's mind for the examinations, whether one liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems dis”

Albert Einstein  I've read it, I've highlighted it, and now I'm here to summarize (and/or note important passages)it in convenient cram-style bullet points. Here's to the exam! The end of the world is not final, rather it is often the end of one human race, followed by the appearance of another. The end of the world in the past and that which is to take place in the future both represent the mythico-ritual system of the New Year festival projected on the macrocosmic scale and given an unusual amount of intensity. Andamanese language has no future tense The rarest myths among "primitives"  are those that do not mention the recreation of the world.  The punishment of sins usually means the subsequent creation of a new humanity. "I have devoured too many corpses, I am filled from it, and I am exhausted. Do make an end of it, my father!"-myth of the Guarani. The cycles of degradation prey on the universe as well, and as such, it requires renewal. Doctrine of the destruction of the world-Pralaya  Four ages of the world-Yugras, Indian culture "And then everything will begin over again-ad infinitum." The indian doctrine: man does not want eternal re-creation, his goal is to escape the cosmic cycle." "The end has no meaning except for the human condition; man can halt the process of transmigration in which he is blindly carried along." Aristotle-2 catastrophes occurred at 2 solstices, the conflagratio(summer) and the diluvium(winter). Judaeo-Christian belief: There is a judgement, a selection, and only the chosen will live in eternal bliss. The reign of an antichrist is in some sense equivalent  to a return to chaos. Nazism and Communism are loaded with eschatological elements.  Large millennialist movement-Melanesian "cargo-cult". Artists seek to return to chaos in order to pave the way for their own artwork. This is important work as artists encompass the largest percentage of their culture's creative force. Artists can at times anticipate what is to come a few generations down the line. The destruction of artistic languages has coincided with the rise of psychoanalysis.  Artists are healthier psychically than many modern men.  Artists understand that only true new beginnings can happen only after a real end.  Artists destroy their world so that man can live and dream and contemplate.  We can do it!

Parasites

"In ancient times infection by parasitic worms was common. The filarial worm Dracunculus medinensis aka "the fiery serpent", aka "the dragon of Medina" aka "the guinea worm" crawled around the victim's body, just under the skin. Physicians treated this infection by cutting a slit in the patient's skin, just in front of the worm's path. As the worm crawled out the cut, the physician carefully wound the pest around a stick until the entire animal had been removed. It is believed that because this type of infection was so common, physicians advertised their services by displaying a sign with the worm on a stick."-Keith Blayney, Independent Hawera General Practitioner 




Allow me to indulge in an extended metaphor, perhaps it may prove to be tenuous but as I said, indulge me. This might be a bit of a stranger blog...

Asclepius, son of Coronis and Apollo carried with him a rod with a snake wound about it. In and of itself, the rod is a harmless thing that has now become a world-wide symbol for the art of healing. However, as explained in the above quote, parasitic infections in ancient times were quite common and it is entirely plausible that the method used to rid one's body of Dracunculus medinensis evolved into the myth of Asclepius' rod. The snake being exchanged for a leg-dwelling nematode of course. The point I try to make here being the relationship between the mythic and the parasitic. I use the case of the nematode and the rod only as physical proof that the  mythological does indeed carry the characteristics of parasitic relationship with humanity.

Looking back on the three stages in our relationship with the Gods, I'll bring up the first stage; conviviality. The point at which the gods and humans lie with one another in peace. The Golden Age where balance is present and active. In respect to parasitic relations, optimum virulence is in effect. Host and parasite coincide peacefully. Lycaon has yet to offend the gods, and Jove hasn't eyeballed poor Io yet. In this stage of the "infestation"what is mythic serves only to enrich life. However, as Mircea Eliade tells us "Whatever endures wastes away, degenerates, and finally perishes." Alas, conviviality must yield to the second, far more violent stage.

It is the stage of Rape that perhaps offers the greatest look into the parasitic relationship the gods hold between themselves and humanity. It is this penetrating stage that the gods begin to demand prayer, sacrifice and open acknowledgment. They directly and often times painfully intrude themselves into the lives of mortals. Jove, for example, successfully forces himself upon a great number of humans and leaves with a wake of both physical aftershocks as well as emotional. Minerva doles out her rage against poor Arachne and also leaves a violent footprint. The stage of Rape allows the mythic to take on a "physical" presence within humanity. The twisting, squirming characteristics of myth burrow so close to humanity that they causes direct suffering. The mythical has achieved a life of its own and finds acknowledgment in daily life. As for the hosts, the mortals, life must be lived according to the parasite; prayer, sacrifice, ritual ect. The gods ride along with their hosts, be they daemon or demon. Is it any wonder then, that humanity would start to search for a "cure" to the mythic, start seeking the stick in which to draw the myth out; to have the shocking, living myth exorcised, and the stage of rape completed?

"Sometimes, instead of chasing the demon of disease from their homes, savages prefer to leave him in peaceful possession, while they themselves take flight and attempt to prevent him from following in their tracks"-Frazer, The Public Expulsion of Evils, pg. 660.  Much like the "savages" that Frazer mentions, modern day society has managed to expel the parasitic mythological. We live in the 3rd stage of indifference, where myth only interacts with those in a forceful way in the darker regions of the world, where science has yet to stake a hold. We've left the stage of Rape and prevented it's following us through science and logic. These are the sticks which draw the intrusive mythological from the world. Without the living myth writhing within popular society, it has continued on only as a background. Science allows us to say "Plagues are caused by bacteria and viruses. There are no angry deities that send forth misfortune and death. We are in control of our own lives." And without the need or drive to appease and give thanks to potentially volatile gods, we are content to look at Asclepius' rod and say that while it is a lovely story, it is not a true or relevant tale. The parasitic myth now lies cured.

There's a slight issue with curing a particularly old disease. Sometimes the body itself denies the fact that the disease is no more and launches into extreme measures whenever the slightest little bug is detected. See Chrohn's Disease for example; it just so happens to be a disease of the rich. Too much clean water has led the development of a chronic illness that causes a great deal of pain with no hope of a cure. In respect to the mythological, there's a similar issue with trying to "cure" it. Living with myths has flooded and nourished the creative souls of our many cultures over the millenniarises, trees whisper to one another, and artists constantly refer to their lazy muses.

Perhaps I was too harsh in saying that what is mythological is parasitic and painful; as I've learned to see in everyday life myths permeate every fiber of the life around us. The stage of indifference then, is more marked by a symbiotic relationship with myths. We take what we need of the mythic, and in return, myths get to live on inside of us. A quiet, but essential part of our humanity.

Imago

"The multitude being assembled, the priests solemnly incensed the girl who personated the goddess;then they drew her on her back on the heap of corn and seeds, cut off her head, caught the gushing blood in a tub, and sprinkled the blood on the wooden images of the goddess..."-Frazer, Killing the God in Mexico, page 709


The God of death lay still and silent upon the floor, sapphire eyes locked upwards towards the blue roof of his world. His enchanting limbs lying prone and listless, his flesh pale, his animated mouth still. In this tiny transparent world, the apocalypse had come. Shiva, Hindu God of Death, was gone. And it was with a heavy heart that the goddess of Shiva's own world flushed him down the dorm toilet. Just one of the many apocalypses that day.

"...the end of the world has already occurred, although it is to be repeated in a more or less distant future." States Mircea Eliade in chapter 4 of his Myth and Reality. I find this particular statement to be correct, the world has ended, and it continues to end each and every day. The apocalypse is a regular event in my own opinion, required for a normal and productive life.

World and Earth  have two very different meanings if viewed with the right perspective. Worlds are fragile, frighteningly insecure places we build around us. My world would be vastly different from anyone else's, and the world according to those whom are featured in Myth and Reality would be even more alien. But no matter what worlds we concern ourselves with, they routinely meet destruction and mayhem. As they are supposed to. However, when looking at Earth, I can only say it suffers minor changes. Tectonic plates move, the atmosphere changes, volcanoes erupt, but all in all the earth itself remains the same. I have yet to witness our Earth undergo an apocalypse and explode into flame while being sucked into the dark vortex that used to be our sun. That particular end is still some time off in the distant future.

But back to the subject of the everyday apocalypse, back to those spider-spin worlds we construct. Say your house burns down or your loved one leaves you, or even if your garden fails; apocalypse. Say your favorite jeans become so worn they must be thrown away, your cherished mug cracks and must be replaced, your grandmother fails to see you with her poor sight; apocalypse. Our tiny worlds so often and so daily meet their ends that I cannot help but agree with Eliade's statement. The end of the world has already been, and will soon again be. We build our Edens and we strike them down only to build them up again. And like the Phoenix Pythagoras describes, we rise new and young from the ashes of our worlds.The Apocalypse is merely change in some form or another. As Eliade tells us at the close of chapter 4 "They have understood that a true new beginning can come only after a real end.". Therefore, before change can enter, our worlds must meet their own apocalypses.

While destruction and change are never quite without pain, there is comfort at the end of the world. "For all things change, but no thing dies." says Pythagoras, the mythic is there to remind us of the comfort and safety at the world's end. Hercules nearly burned on his pyre, but he did not die; and Ariadne nearly lost her heart, but Bacchus offered her a place among the stars. No matter the brutality of the end, it is merely a change into another state. To look at Frazer's quote above, the Aztec corn-goddess(the girl impersonating her anyways) met with a particularly nasty end. And yet, in her end there is a beginning; "Lastly, the concluding act of the sacred drama, in which the body of the dead Maize Goddess was flayed and her skin worn, together with all her sacred insignia by a man who danced before the people in this grim attire, seems to be best explained on the hypothesis that it was intended to ensure that the divine death should be immediately followed by the divine resurrection."(Frazer 710). Only change here, only the usual end of the world so a new one might be brought in.

The ancient and the mythic bring us relief and respite in those times our worlds lie dying in their tiny glass cases. And those cases, like the cocoon Caterpillars must weave,offer a "little" death to become something greater. The apocalypse is simply change, the cliche transformation of worm to winged. Your fish dies, and your skin wrinkles. But in the end of the world, there can be only metamorphoses. And it will happen in the more or less distant future, again and again.