"Girls, forget what you've read, it happened like this"

Context

 This week I am finishing writing in essay for my English Literature paper. The paper is called 'Classical Traditions in English literature'. We basically look at different interpretations of Classical Greek myth over time. My essay is a comparative piece on an extract from the Orpheus myth from the Ovid and Sandra Gilbert's 'Bas relief: Bacchante'. The essay is going well. Some of the interpretations make me giggle.



Summary

If you don't know the myth, Orpheus is a musician of sorts, whose lyrical delights calm, soothe and sort of control nature, from rocks to animals. Orpheus marries a young girl named Eurydice (You-rid-e-see). On their wedding day Eurydice is bitten by a snake and dies. Orpheus ventures down to the underworld to try and persuade Hades and Persephone to return Eurydice to the state of and place of living. He succeeds in doing so by singing them a song. Hades and Persephone agree to let Eurydice return to the living world with Orpheus...under one condition, that Orpheus must not look back at Eurydice as they make their way out of the underworld. He does. Most Epic. Fail. Eurydice is then left in the underworld forever more and Orpheus is destined to live his life alone. But wait..there's more. Once Orpheus has returned to the land of the living he is so grief stricken that he apparently refuses to sleep with the local women. They hate this. They kill him. Perhaps for holding out? Perhaps for the ill-fated stare?



Theories

Many feminist theories slam Orpheus for even daring to drag his supposed pompous butt down to the underworld in the first place. Many claim that Eurydice was finally free of existing in Orpheus' shadow.

Of course the fact that he stupidly looked back gets them going too.

Then there are those who humorously suggest that Eurydice wanted to be left down there, and did all that she could (*wink wink) to get Orpheus to look back.



The part that I don't understand

Was Orpheus a pig-headed, macho fool to think he could just storm down there and re-claim his woman? Perhaps.

But what if he hadn't?

What would feminists say now?

Well I can't speak for the feminist movement but I can ask, what if he had just left her down there? What would feminists women around the globe have to say about that?



"He just left her down there?!"



"He didn't even try?!"



"He has talents that control nature, and he doesn't even think to march down there and play Hades a song? The cheek of it!"



I conclude

In over 2000 years, women still do not always know what they want.