Kevin's Watch

I went to see Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses last night, and one of the Ovid stories performed was the story of the girl who falls in love with her dad...whose name happens to be Myrrha, the name of Elena's horse. Unfortunately Myrrha actually gets to...relate to her father in that way, and it's a tragedy and she dissolves or gives birth to Adonis or something...Apparently SRD reads the classics, hmm. I can't believe I just caught on to this possible reference...

Wow. I wonder if that was intentional? SRD seems not to do things like that (names, I mean) on purpose, but his subconscious slips all sorts of things in... at least that's what it seems like to me. A possible GI question?

fightingmyinstincts wrote: I went to see Mary Zimmerman's Metamorphoses last night, and one of the Ovid stories performed was the story of the girl who falls in love with her dad...whose name happens to be Myrrha, the name of Elena's horse. Unfortunately Myrrha actually gets to...relate to her father in that way, and it's a tragedy and she dissolves or gives birth to Adonis or something...Apparently SRD reads the classics, hmm. I can't believe I just caught on to this possible reference...

Thanks!

I'm finding more and more of these kinds of references.

I have a batch I'm waiting until I have enough time to do justice to.

She is punished by the gods and transformed into a myyrh tree while giving birth to Adonis. Why the perfect physical specimen is produced through incest is a curiosity.

Khaliban wrote:She is punished by the gods and transformed into a myyrh tree while giving birth to Adonis. Why the perfect physical specimen is produced through incest is a curiosity.

But a possibility... like incrossing racehorses or other animals to try to maintain or reinforce good characteristics. Maybe it was a "best of both words" scenario... I'm not familiar with the details at all.

So... did the Ranyhyn's death have a greater symbolism than Elena drew from it?

Inbreeding in animals to develop the most desired characteristics has been practiced for centuries.

It generally doesn't quite work the same with humans. But I can imagine that in the mind of classical writers the same ideology was at work.

Although, can you imagine how messed up Elena's and TC's children would have been?

Those are some recessive genes I would NOT want to see expressed! Particularly the "hellfire one"...

The hellfire gene!! Often confused with the bloody damnation gene.

On the thread topic though, does any other author put as much effort into naming charactors as Donaldson?--I doubt it!!

Khaliban wrote:She is punished by the gods and transformed into a myyrh tree while giving birth to Adonis. Why the perfect physical specimen is produced through incest is a curiosity.

It doesn't surprise me that the Greeks thought so--at least among their gods. The Pharoahs, who were also believed by the Egyptians to be gods, believed it too. They married brother to sister all the time, to keep the divine bloodlines pure. If you remember the famous bust of Queen Nefertiti, one of the theories about why she (and many other Pharoahs) wore that distinctive headdress was that she had a hydrocephalic head--a sure sign of inbreeding.

Khaliban wrote:She is punished by the gods and transformed into a myyrh tree while giving birth to Adonis. Why the perfect physical specimen is produced through incest is a curiosity.

It doesn't surprise me that the Greeks thought so--at least among their gods. The Pharoahs, who were also believed by the Egyptians to be gods, believed it too. They married brother to sister all the time, to keep the divine bloodlines pure. If you remember the famous bust of Queen Nefertiti, one of the theories about why she (and many other Pharoahs) wore that distinctive headdress was that she had a hydrocephalic head--a sure sign of inbreeding.

Khaliban wrote:She is punished by the gods and transformed into a myyrh tree while giving birth to Adonis. Why the perfect physical specimen is produced through incest is a curiosity.

That's not quite accurate. The wife of King Cynrias was heard to boast that her daughter, Smyrna, was even more beautiful than Aphrodite herself. Aphrodite, being a Greek Godess and not easily given to rational action, took her revenge by having Smyrna fall in love with her father and climb into bed with him when he was too drunk to know what he was doing. When Cynrias discovered he was both father and grandfather of Smyrna's child he picked up a sword and chased her from the house. He caught up with her on the brow of a hill, but Aphrodite transformed Smyrna into a Myrrh tree, which Cynrias' sword then split in two. Out of the tree tumbled the infant Adonis, whom Aphrodite concealed in a chest and gave to Persephone to hide away in a dark place. The drops of sap shed by myrrh trees were said to be Smyrna's tears for Adonis.

Looking at the myth it's difficult to see whether Donaldson drew inspiration from it or Metamorphoses or both. My interpretation of the myth as relates to the Chronicles would be that Aphrodite represents Lord Foul in this instance (perhaps implying that he was able to manipulate Elena in some way, maybe through her mother). After that things get a bit too abstract to interpret. Adonis could be seen as the Staff of Law perhaps, being 'hidden away' way down in the earth, and there could be something relating to the Power of Command in there too.

Who knows, maybe I'm looking for symbolism where none exists.