Eurydice - Tumblr Posts
If it makes you feel any better, after Orpheus died he probably reunited with Eurydice in the Elysian Fields.
Thinking about how Orpheus and Eurydice and Penelope and Odysseus are a bit similar in a way.
Orpheus and Penelope, yearning and grieving over their lovers. Doing all they can, above and beyond to keep them "alive".
Eurydice and Odysseus, following wherever their lovers go. They are "dead to the world" and their loves are the only lifeline they have.
Penelope and Odysseus do get to live together afterward but this is eating at me.
I've seen someone claiming not only that Kaos has good trans representation, but that Caeneus' relationship with Eurydice is everything.
I had for the first time in six months a suicidal ideation, after I thought that I'm over it. (Just kidding.)
That moment when an underground romanian artist makes a song refferencing the myth Orpheus and Eurydice and it's better than a *certain* ecranisation.
MYTHICAL LADIES: ↳ eurydice, wife of orpheus
They took the upward path, through the still silence, steep and dark, shadowy with dense fog, drawing near to the threshold of the upper world. Afraid she was no longer there, and eager to see her, the lover turned his eyes. In an instant she dropped back, and he, unhappy man, stretching out his arms to hold her and be held, clutched at nothing but the receding air. Dying a second time, now, there was no complaint to her husband (what, then, could she complain of, except that she had been loved?). She spoke a last ‘farewell’ that, now, scarcely reached his ears, and turned again towards that same place. (in Metamorphoses by Ovid)
In the past I've shared other people's musings about the different interpretations of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Namely, why Orpheus looks back at Eurydice, even though he knows it means he'll lose her forever. So many people seem to think they've found the one true explanation of the myth. But to me, the beauty of myths is that they have many possible meanings.
So I thought I would share a list of every interpretation I know, from every serious adaptation of the story and every analysis I've ever heard or read, of why Orpheus looks back.
One interpretation – advocated by Monteverdi's opera, for example – is that the backward glance represents excessive passion and a fatal lack of self-control. Orpheus loves Eurydice to such excess that he tries to defy the laws of nature by bringing her back from the dead, yet that very same passion dooms his quest fo fail, because he can't resist the temptation to look back at her.
He can also be seen as succumbing to that classic "tragic flaw" of hubris, excessive pride. Because his music and his love conquer the Underworld, it might be that he makes the mistake of thinking he's entirely above divine law, and fatally allows himself to break the one rule that Hades and Persephone set for him.
Then there are the versions where his flaw is his lack of faith, because he looks back out of doubt that Eurydice is really there. I think there are three possible interpretations of this scenario, which can each work alone or else co-exist with each other. From what I've read about Hadestown, it sounds as if it combines all three.
In one interpretation, he doubts Hades and Persephone's promise. Will they really give Eurydice back to him, or is it all a cruel trick? In this case, the message seems to be a warning to trust in the gods; if you doubt their blessings, you might lose them.
Another perspective is that he doubts Eurydice. Does she love him enough to follow him? In this case, the warning is that romantic love can't survive unless the lovers trust each other. I'm thinking of Moulin Rouge!, which is ostensibly based on the Orpheus myth, and which uses Christian's jealousy as its equivalent of Orpheus's fatal doubt and explicitly states "Where there is no trust, there is no love."
The third variation is that he doubts himself. Could his music really have the power to sway the Underworld? The message in this version would be that self-doubt can sabotage all our best efforts.
But all of the above interpretations revolve around the concept that Orpheus looks back because of a tragic flaw, which wasn't necessarily the view of Virgil, the earliest known recorder of the myth. Virgil wrote that Orpheus's backward glance was "A pardonable offense, if the spirits knew how to pardon."
In some versions, when the upper world comes into Orpheus's view, he thinks his journey is over. In this moment, he's so ecstatic and so eager to finally see Eurydice that he unthinkingly turns around an instant too soon, either just before he reaches the threshold or when he's already crossed it but Eurydice is still a few steps behind him. In this scenario, it isn't a personal flaw that makes him look back, but just a moment of passion-fueled carelessness, and the fact that it costs him Eurydice shows the pitilessness of the Underworld.
In other versions, concern for Eurydice makes him look back. Sometimes he looks back because the upward path is steep and rocky, and Eurydice is still limping from her snakebite, so he knows she must be struggling, in some versions he even hears her stumble, and he finally can't resist turning around to help her. Or more cruelly, in other versions – for example, in Gluck's opera – Eurydice doesn't know that Orpheus is forbidden to look back at her, and Orpheus is also forbidden to tell her. So she's distraught that her husband seems to be coldly ignoring her and begs him to look at her until he can't bear her anguish anymore.
These versions highlight the harshness of the Underworld's law, and Orpheus's failure to comply with it seems natural and even inevitable. The message here seems to be that death is pitiless and irreversible: a demigod hero might come close to conquering it, but through little or no fault of his own, he's bound to fail in the end.
Another interpretation I've read is that Orpheus's backward glance represents the nature of grief. We can't help but look back on our memories of our dead loved ones, even though it means feeling the pain of loss all over again.
Then there's the interpretation that Orpheus chooses his memory of Eurydice, represented by the backward glance, rather than a future with a living Eurydice. "The poet's choice," as Portrait of a Lady on Fire puts it. In this reading, Orpheus looks back because he realizes he would rather preserve his memory of their youthful, blissful love, just as it was when she died, than face a future of growing older, the difficulties of married life, and the possibility that their love will fade. That's the slightly more sympathetic version. In the version that makes Orpheus more egotistical, he prefers the idealized memory to the real woman because the memory is entirely his possession, in a way that a living wife with her own will could never be, and will never distract him from his music, but can only inspire it.
Then there are the modern feminist interpretations, also alluded to in Portrait of a Lady on Fire but seen in several female-authored adaptations of the myth too, where Eurydice provokes Orpheus into looking back because she wants to stay in the Underworld. The viewpoint kinder to Orpheus is that Eurydice also wants to preserve their love just as it was, youthful, passionate, and blissful, rather than subject it to the ravages of time and the hardships of life. The variation less sympathetic to Orpheus is that Euyridice was at peace in death, in some versions she drank from the river Lethe and doesn't even remember Orpheus, his attempt to take her back is selfish, and she prefers to be her own free woman than be bound to him forever and literally only live for his sake.
With that interpretation in mind, I'm surprised I've never read yet another variation. I can imagine a version where, as Orpheus walks up the path toward the living world, he realizes he's being selfish: Eurydice was happy and at peace in the Elysian Fields, she doesn't even remember him because she drank from Lethe, and she's only following him now because Hades and Persephone have forced her to do so. So he finally looks back out of selfless love, to let her go. Maybe I should write this retelling myself.
Are any of these interpretations – or any others – the "true" or "definitive" reason why Orpheus looks back? I don't think so at all. The fact that they all exist and can all ring true says something valuable about the nature of mythology.
I got to see Hadestown when the tour came to my city a few months ago! It's easily one of my all time favorite musicals
Scifibeatles (my sis), had never seen/listened to it prior to the performance. Her expressions made the show even better!
-Lasercats6
There’s something about the story of Orpheus and Eurydice that’s held my soul in a vise gripe since I saw Hadestown
And I think it’s the fact that the story is of course, devastating, but it doesn’t mean anything
Not to say that it’s meaningless, but that so many other stories in mythology are used to explain natural phenomena or take down histories or tell cautionary tales about what happens when you mess with the gods
No, in this case, it’s just a tale of two people who loved each other, and would go to the ends of the earth to save one another. It wasn’t about destiny or being forced down some awful path or making terrible mistakes and being filled with regret. At its core, this is just a story about love, in it’s most human vulnerability and strength.
I mean, think about someone you love. Doesn’t even have to be a romantic partner. I know, in my absolute core, that I would go to the ends of the earth and back and around again for my partner. I’d die for my sister. I’d live for my dog.
Sure, Orpheus walks the lonely road to hell and nearly makes it back. And maybe, sometime in history, there was a man named Orpheus who loved his wife and when she was taken from him, he followed, in one way or another, never to return. It’s not vengeance. It’s not destiny. In a way, it’s not even valor or chivalry or bravery. It’s just love. At its core, it’s just love. And maybe the people left behind honored that by telling their story.
So it is a sad song, an old tale. And we sing it again and again, because we hope that if someday we have to follow our lives into hell with no hope of returning, there will be some vestige of our love left behind.
So if I am remembered for anything, thousands of years after I have gone, let it be for my love.
I was here, and I loved, and I left with love, and I didn’t get to come back, so sing my song, in my absence, with love.
Oil painting of Orpheus
So I finished the picture of me and Hawks as Orpheus and Eurydice from Hadestown! I hope you guys like it.
slaughter-house five - kurt vonnegut / orpheus and eurydice - catharine adelaide sparkes / user sawasawako / orpheus mourning the death of eurydice - ary scheffer / metamorphoses - ovid / orpheus and euridice - enrico scuri / talk - hozier / orpheus and eurydice - michel martin drolling
i have often wondered
if the roles were reversed
if hades had to walk into hell
with persephone at his back
would he turn
just as orpheus did
would he turn
full of doubt
would he turn
to exert his godly force
would he turn
Our lady of the underground!
Some of my Orpheus!Charles and Eurydice!Edwin dbd ideas!
Unlike Orpheus, Charles’ Father disliked his singing and thought it was too girly
Since in the series Death hasn’t meet the boys, she only suspects they’re the reincarnations of her nephew and his love, she isn’t 100% sure and doesn’t want to give her brother false hope
The cat king is a child of Desire, making him a cousin to Orpheus
What if the boys met Hob first and he introduces Morpheus to the boys
Hob doesn’t know the boys know Morpheus (maybe the boys don’t remember either)
The reason their lives restarted in such different times was an attempt to try to separate them, but their soulmates so they found each other anyway
Edwin’s soul always has some mark of hell
Reverse reincarnation: Edwin as Orpheus, Charles as Eurydice
Maybe Eurydice was always book smart, but it got lost in time
How would the boys go from being on the run from an Endless to being family to them??
I’ll probably have more but if anyone wants to use any of this feel free. I’m an idea person not a writer.
Adding to my list:
For Orpheus!Edwin, image Dream’s despair in learning his son died the around the same time he was captured, they were so close to being together again, if had noticed him before, what could have changed…
With Eurydice!Edwin, what if he did notice, but when he tried to search out his son, Dream discovered that Edwin was alone in this life. All he could do was give his son’s lover peace in Edwin’s dreams, believing that he would be better off not knowing his former life. For without his Orpheus, Eurydice would always be lonely.
Cont. Because of his time captured, Morpheus believed that Edwin/Eurydice lived a simple life, not knowing that he died and found his Orpheus
Some of my Orpheus!Charles and Eurydice!Edwin dbd ideas!
Unlike Orpheus, Charles’ Father disliked his singing and thought it was too girly
Since in the series Death hasn’t meet the boys, she only suspects they’re the reincarnations of her nephew and his love, she isn’t 100% sure and doesn’t want to give her brother false hope
The cat king is a child of Desire, making him a cousin to Orpheus
What if the boys met Hob first and he introduces Morpheus to the boys
Hob doesn’t know the boys know Morpheus (maybe the boys don’t remember either)
The reason their lives restarted in such different times was an attempt to try to separate them, but their soulmates so they found each other anyway
Edwin’s soul always has some mark of hell
Reverse reincarnation: Edwin as Orpheus, Charles as Eurydice
Maybe Eurydice was always book smart, but it got lost in time
How would the boys go from being on the run from an Endless to being family to them??
I’ll probably have more but if anyone wants to use any of this feel free. I’m an idea person not a writer.
"imagine being loved by me."
Hozier, "Talk" from Wasteland, Baby! [2019]
Orpheus and Eurydice, Because I listened to Hadestown and now I'm obsessed