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Chapter IV
Mythical Resonances
Literature exists either in the spoken form or in the written form or it exists both in the
spoken and in the written too. The spoken form has been termed as Oral Literature. The written
form refers to the composition of the literary artistic work which has an author. The origin of
mythological literature is without one author. It has been the construction of varied societies and
cultures. This mythological literature exists in the form of epics, legends and folk-tales. This oral
mythological literature has passed on from generation to generation and later it had been written
down and applied to written literature. These literatures have been preserved in popular rituals,
cultures and traditions. They have been a part of their religion. Owing to chanting by wandering
minstrels from place to place these continued to be preserved passing through sequential ages
and through the works of varied writers representing different cultures.
Gayley in his book Classic Myths in English Literature (1902) mentions the role played
by mythical prophets in recording myths. For example, Melampus saved a serpent which licked
his legs. Owing to this lick he deciphered the language of animals. Melampus has been
acknowledged as the first Greek person to have acquired the ability to prophecy. Women
characters like Helenus and Cassandra have been projected as to have prophesied the Trojan
Wars. Orpheus, the Greek lyricist, could charm the world by music. The first great source of
classic Greek mythology has been contributed by Homer, a blind minstrel. His long epic poems
The Iliad and The Odyssey mark the beginning of modern literatures.
Gayley refers to the role of lyric poets like Sappho, Arion, Simonides and Pindar in
preserving mythology. Mythology does not get its transference only from Greek and Roman
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literature. Myths from varied cultures like Celtic, Hellenic have also undergone the process of
translation. Translations have not only been done for the process of transferring the thoughts
from one language to another. The main aim of translation was to create an understanding of one
nation and to expand the thoughts of their national literature.
Northrop Frye believes that, “no one genre but genres of literature derive from myth”
(qtd. in. Seagal 81). In his essay titled Tradition and Individual Talent T.S. Eliot insists on great
writers to possess a historical sense which “involves a perception, not only of the pastness of the
past but of its presence.” He further adds that, “the past should be altered by the present as much
as the present is directed by the past”. Frye in his essay, „The Social Context of Literary
Criticism‟ (1973) enlists the factors of tradition which guides authors to present a new writing.
He fixes the society as the original source of thoughts. He further exemplifies its “canonical
importance” as myths try to “explain or recount something that is centrally important for a
society‟s history, religion or social structure” (276). Myths have two different functions in
society and literature. In society, Frye states that these myths urge the members of the society to
unite, to accept the authority and to help each other. Frye further claims that the soul function of
myth in literature is to communicate the joy that brings to pure creation.
The influence of myths has captured the world of American literature too. American
philosophers like Thoreau, Emerson, poets like T.S. Eliot, theorists like Northrop Frye, Joseph
Campbell, novelists like James Joyce, William Faulkner, Joyce Carol Oats and Eudora Welty
have preferred myths to recapture and exemplify the depths of the unknown human psyche.
The word „Myth‟ is a chameleonic term. In modern vernacular it is often confused with
fairy tales, with imaginative or fantastic writings, with that which is not quite real or believable
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and even with that which is false. The term, „mythology‟ is derived from the Greek „Mythos‟
which refers to a tale, and „logos‟ an account. Hence mythology equates an account of tales. The
Columbia Encyclopaedia defines myth as “a traditional story that usually concerns supernatural
events and Gods.” It distinguishes myth from legend or saga which deals with human doings and
from fable or fairy tale which is a mere invention, meant to amuse or teach. Myth, on the other
hand, contains elements of a legendary and fabulous nature. Myth is also regarded as pertaining
to or helping to explain religious beliefs and rituals. It is a story which brings the unknown into
relation with the known, and helps to break down the barriers between men and the intractable
mass of phenomena which surrounds them.
The Greek and Roman myths have had the greatest influence not only upon Europe, but
also the world at large. Murray depicts the glory of Greek myths as:
There is charm in the name of ancient Greece. There is Glory in every page of her
history; there is fascination in the remains of her literature and a sense of
unapproachable beauty in her works of art, there is a spell in her climate still, and
a strange attraction in her ruins. We are familiar with the praise of her beautiful
islands, our poets sing of her lovely and genial sky. There is not in all the land a
mountain, plain or river, not a fountain or grove not hallowed by some legend or
poetic tale. (Murray 1)
Writers, especially poets, who make use of classical mythology, hold out to the readers
the prospect of travelling back to this delightful state of things, enabling them to catch for a
moment at least, a glimpse of that strangely and beautifully animated world. Primitive man did
not depict his world with bright fancies and lovely visions. He looked upon the world at large
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with fear and suspicion. To the primitive man the forests were not a place where, he could hope
to see a wood nymph or a naiad. It was rather a place where horrors lurked and where terror
lived. It was a place of magic and witchcraft. The only way he believed he could counteract this
evil was, by human sacrifice. The only way he knew of escaping the wrath of the divinities was
by some potent magic, and in some offering made at the cost of pain or grief. As the primitive
men the Greeks too lived a brutal, ugly and savage life, but their myths revealed their progress.
There lies no authentic record to indicate when these stories would have been written in their
existing form. Whenever it was, primitive life had been left far behind. These myths are the
creations of great poets like Homer. Homer‟s „Iliad‟ is the first written record of Greece.
Greece has been the master, the guide and the rest of the whole world her faithful
emulators and followers. The Greeks firmly believed that their interests were of special care to
the deities and it was with this belief that the farmer sowed his seeds and watched the
vicissitudes of its growth and the sailor and trader entrusted their life and prosperity to a
capricious sea. Artists ascribed the mysterious evolution of their ideas, and the poets their
inscription to this same superior cause. The Greeks considered man as the centre of the universe.
This was a revolution of thought as human beings were of no significance to primitive man. As a
result the Greeks made their Gods in their own image. The earlier idea of Gods had no
semblance to reality; they were unlike all living things.
To understand the invisible the Greeks made use of the visible. The sculptor watching the
athletes contending in the games felt he could imagine nothing as beautiful as those of young
bodies, and so he fashioned Apollo. Greek artists and poets realized the splendidness of man.
They did not believe in creating fantasies that shaped their own minds. Heaven became a
pleasantly familiar place as it was inhabited by human Gods. They knew just what the divine
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inhabitants did there, what they ate and drank, where they banqueted and how they amused
themselves.
The idea that all myths are about divinity is quite misleading. The stories of Perseus and
Medusa and Oedipus are myths, but they do not represent Gods. Perseus is directed or protected
by Athena, just as the actions of Oedipus are determined by Apollo‟s oracle. The former story
concerns a being who is more than a man and the latter story is essentially about a man moving
in human environment. Critics have classified these tales as myths, legends and folk-tale. Myths
are traditional tales, and they have become so because they posses some significance or enduring
quality. When stories of this general kind are based on some great historical or purportedly
historical event (the siege of Troy, the Return of the children of Hercules) they are often
described as saga. On the other hand, when they are short narratives which are fictional but
attached to a real person or place and given a fairly realistic setting, as for example the stories of
the early kings of Rome, they may be termed legends.
A third variety of myths is folk-tales, simple narratives of adventure, often containing
elements of ingenious trickery and of magic, perhaps involving superhuman creatures, e.g.
monsters and giants; they are characterized by recurring features of character and plot, lost sons
seeking their rightful inheritance, princess slaying monsters to win princesses, etc. Myth can
include any of the features of saga, legend, or folk-tale, but its particular characteristic is that it is
a serious story about the gods (and in Greece about heroes too) and their relations with one
another and with men and women. The abduction of Helen by Paris, the killing of Hector by
Achilles is regarded as legends and not myth.
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Psychologists regard myths as expressions of permanent but unacknowledged psychical
attitudes and forces. This interpretation was launched by Sigmund Freud (1856-1939). He
pointed to the many parallels between famous and widespread legends and the symbols which
occur in dreams to represent powerful instinctive drives. Accordingly, he gave a Greek legendary
name to the most powerful of all, the son‟s love of his mother and jealousy of his father. He
called this, after the tragedy of the royal house of Thebes, the Oedipus complex. The parallel
attitude, in which the daughter loves her father and is jealous of her mother, he named the Electra
complex, because it recalls the tragedy of the princess who hated her proud cruel mother
Clytemnestra. And the self-adoration and self-absorption which may make a man or woman dead
to the whole external world were first and most graphically found in the mythical youth who died
for love of his reflection in a pool: so, after Narcissus, the neurosis is called narcissism.
Freud‟s suggestions are now being elaborated by Carl G. Jung in his Psychology and
Religion, Psychology and the Unconscious and Integration of the Personality. The essence of
this interpretation of the myths is that they are symbols of the desires and passions which all
mankind feels but does not acknowledge. Girls wish to be surprisingly beautiful and to marry the
richest, noblest, handsomest man in the world, who will find them in spite of the neglect and
hostility of their family and their surroundings. They relive the tension of this desire by saying
that it has already come true, by re-telling or re-reading the story, and by identifying themselves
with its heroine Cinderella. Boys wish to be the only object of their mothers‟ love and to expel
all their competitors, of whom father is the chief. They do so by telling the story of a gallant
young man who, as part of his adventurous career, kills an unknown old man who turns out to be
his father, and marries a beautiful queen who turns out to be his mother. Oedipus, Cinderella,
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Helen of Troy, Ulysses, Hercules – all these characters are not so much historical individuals as
projections of the wishes, passions, and hopes of all mankind.
The great legends, even the great symbols, such as the mystic flower, and the mystic
numbers three, seven, and twelve, keep recurring throughout human history and human
literature. They are constantly being remodelled. They emerge again and again as superstitions or
universal patterns of art and ritual. Jung calls them „archetypes of the collective unconscious‟:
patterns in which the soul of every man develops, because of the humanity he shares with every
other man.Every married couple dreams of having a child which will be – not imperfect, not
even ordinary, but superb, the solver of all problems, good, strong, wise, heroic. This dream
becomes the myth of the miraculous baby. And, in the deepest sense, the dream is true. Every
baby is a miracle.
According to Jung, it is because of this universality that the great legends can be
attributed to no one author, and can be rewritten again and again without losing their power. The
work done on them by many generations of taletellers and listeners is truly „collective‟. They
represent the inmost thoughts and feelings of the human race, and therefore they are – within
human standards – immortal.
Eudora Welty‟s short stories belong to a class of their own. Their uniqueness and
originality lie in the author‟s great resourcefulness in adapting ancient myths to modern
situations, enriching the philosophical and psychological depths of her fiction. It is with great
subtlety and skill that Welty weaves Greek and Roman archetypal images into her stories each of
which is a realistic representation of the life and the people around her, seen and recorded by an
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artistic eye. Welty‟s familiarity with Greek and Roman legends and myths has made these stories
a part of her life, a sort of second nature to her, and they become an integral part of her stories.
This chapter titled „Mythical Resonances‟ analyses both the male and the female psyche
with reference to Eudora Welty‟s Greek mythological tales. The thirteen Greek myth based
stories have been classified according to the gender roles played by the characters. From the
point of view of the archetypal male heroes, archetypal female characters and mythical
characters, the male and the female either exist or contradict and transform to co-exist have been
examined. The thirteen stories for analysis and interpretation: i) Shower of Gold, ii) Sir Rabbit,
iii) The Whole World Knows, iv) Music from Spain and v) The Wanderers taken from The
Golden Apples (1949): vi) Livvie, vii) Asphodel from The Wide Net and Other Stories(1943)
viii) Circe from The Bride of the Innisfallen and other stories (1955) ix) Death of a Traveling
Salesman, x) The Whistle, xi) A Visit of Charity, xii) Lily Daw and the Three Ladies and xiii) A
Worn Path from A Curtain of Green and Other Stories (1941).
The Golden Apples is a collection of seven tales. Mississippi, the settings of these stories
is no longer just Mississippi, but a mirror whose range stretches geographically, East , West,
North and South, and from the Mississippi of the 1920‟s at least as far back as primitive Greece
and Rome. Besides the setting, the characters also link these short stories into a unified whole as
also does the network of mythological and literary allusions.
A brief outline of the legendary historical tales of The Golden Apples deems it necessary
to apprehend the parallels with reference to Eudora Welty‟s collection of short stories entitled
The Golden Apples. The title „The Golden Apples‟ immediately recalls to mind, the golden apple
that Eris, the Goddess of Strife, threw into the banqueting hall at the wedding of king Peleus and
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Thetis, a sea nymph. The aspect of this story that the title stresses upon is Paris‟ plight when
affronted by three beautiful Goddesses, with their colossal, unimaginable gifts. Just as Paris was
bribed by these gifts – Hera offering sovereignty over Europe and Asia, Athena, renowned in
war, and Aphrodite, the most beautiful woman in the whole world, so also does this collection of
tales, offer the reader promises of countless sensations, experiences and pleasure.
Paris‟ plight is the reader‟s as well, though with a difference. Paris did not actually have
to judge which of the goddesses was the fairest. He had only to consider the bribes as to who
attracted him the most. “Paris a weakling, and something of a coward too, as later events
showed, chose the last” (Hamilton 179). The reader has to comprehend, assimilate and then
judge a task that would be much easier. Like Welty, the readers are to be knowledgeable with
general impact of legends, myths and fairy tales. These are the keys to unlock the mysteries and
behold the beauty, splendour and power of Welty‟s works, and in this way enabling the reader to
assess and judge the works he has read.
The title „The Golden Apples‟ recalls the legend of Hercules and Atlanta. Hercules had to
serve Eurythens, king of Tiryus, for twelve years as atonement for the murder of his wife and
sons. Eurythens imposed upon Hercules twelve superhuman tasks or twelve labours as they are
called. The eleventh was to fetch the golden apples. These were the apples which he had given to
Hera at her wedding, and which were entrusted to the keeping of the Hesperides and the dragon
Leidon on Mount Atlas. Atlas got the apples for Hercules, while Hercules carried the heavens for
him. Hercules received the golden apples as a gift from Eurythens and he dedicated them to
Athena, who in turn restored them to their former place. Hercules‟ labours and troubles were the
result of Hera‟s hatred of him, as he was the offspring of Zeus. Zeus, like King MacLain of „The
Golden Apples‟ was always on the lookout for new conquests.
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Golden Apples also figure in Hippomenes‟ conquest of Atlanta. Atlanta was a fleet
footed that she outran all the young men who raced against her. Aphrodite, who was always on
the lookout to subdue wild young maidens, who despised love, helped Hippomenes. Hippomenes
knew he would never win a race with Atlanta, and she had promised to marry the one who won
her. With Aphrodite backing him, Hippomenes got hold of three golden apples, as beautiful as
those that grew on the Hesperides, and threw them before Atlanta while the race was in progress.
They were too beautiful to be overlooked, and Atlanta paused to pick them up, and thereby the
youth was able to win the race and Atlanta as well.
These three mythical tales lie embedded in Welty‟s title „The Golden Apples‟, clearly
indicating what lies before the reader. As Paris was bribed, so too is the reader. The bribe offered
is the bribe any good writer offers his readers, delight, attachment, enlightenment and finally
satisfaction. These are beyond the reader‟s reach, unless like Hercules, he is prepared to face the
hurdles before him, the hurdles offered by every good work of art. The greatness of a work
depends on a dual trait – that of comprehending, and yet not comprehending, of having to go
back and re-read with an open and willing mind, as these are the means of attaining the greatest
pleasure, satisfaction and fulfilment, that every great work of art offers. The reader‟s pleasure,
delight and satisfaction at a reading of The Golden Apples is akin to that experienced by
Hippomenes‟, when he wins Atlanta.
The first story titled, „Shower of Gold‟ in The Golden Apples is an obvious reference to
Zeus visiting Dannae in her brazen tower.
So Dannae endured the beautiful
To change the glad daylight for brass-bound walls,
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And in that chamber secret as the grave
She lived a prisoner. Yet to her came
Zeus in the golden rain (Hamilton 142).
King Maclain is the protagonist of „Shower of Gold‟. King‟s mythical counterpart is Zeus
of the roving eye, who involved himself in a series of affairs with mortal women. Maclain‟s
wife, Snowdie, is obviously Danae. Zeus, who could not resist a beautiful woman visited Danae
in her brazen subterranean chamber, and impregnated her in a shower of gold. Snowdie, like
Danae, was established in a house, especially built for her by her father as she was an albino,
with eyes susceptible to light. Shortly after one of King‟s fleeting visits, when Snowdie is
summoned to meet him in the Woods, Snowdie visits Mrs.Rainey to inform her that she is
expecting a child. Mrs.Rainey, who looks up at Snowdie is struck at the transformation she
beholds.
It was like a shower of something had struck her, she‟d been caught out in
something bright. It was more than the day. There with her eyes all crinkled up
with always fighting the light, yet she was looking out bold as a lion that day
under her brim, and gazing into my bucket and into my stall like a visiting
somebody. (CS 266)
These lines make it quite obvious that Snowdie of „Shower of Gold‟ is none other than
Danae of Greek mythology. Perseus was the child born of Zeus‟ visit. Snowdie‟s twins are
Castor and Pollux, destined to disturb their father‟s peace, as Perseus did to his grandfather‟s,
though not as seriously. Welty‟s skill in weaving the mythical strands into her stories is evident
by the richness of the representation. Snowdie is not just Danae, if King MacLain is Zeus, a
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comparison made stronger by the prefix „king‟, then Snowdie could be Hera or Juno, Zeus‟s
consort. Just as Hera is aware of Zeus‟s weakness, and in spite of being divine is incapable of
doing anything about it, so too Snowdie is incapable of tying her husband down.
The reference to the oak tree in the woods, against which king MacLain was fond of
reclining, further substantiates the king-Zeus‟ comparison, as the oak was sacred to Zeus. It was
believed that Zeus‟s will was revealed by the rustling of the oak leaves, which was interpreted by
his priests. Katie Rainey describing the day king MacLain visited his home and was frightened
away by his twins, refers to “the oak leaves scuttling and scattering, blowing against Old Plez
and brushing on him” (CS 273). Further just like Zeus, king MacLain also irresponsibly
populates the countryside. Speaking of MacLain‟s sudden disappearance at the close of „Shower
of Gold‟, Mrs.Rainey says, “But I bet my little Jersey calf King tarried long enough to get him a
child somewhere” (274).
Welty wrote „Shower of Gold‟ in October 1947 in one day. She could experience the link
of the story to „The Whole World Knows‟, „The Golden Apples‟, „Music from Spain‟ and „Moon
Lake‟. Although it was the fifth story which Welty composed in a cycle, Welty designed Shower
of Gold to be the opening story in the short story collection The Golden Apples. Welty associates
King MacLain to the historical James Kimble Vardaman, the governor of Mississippi from 19041908 to King MacLain. Vardaman was an ardent racist who was titled as “Great White Chief”
(Loewen 192). Michael Kreyling fixes King MacLain as a sort of double for Vardaman wherein
he states, “If King‟s associations intersect with those of Zeus on the putatively positive range of
cultural acceptability, they also delve into the repugnant as they cross Vardaman‟s”
(Understanding 117).
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Echoes of Robinson‟s need for independence, appears in King MacLain who fixes
himself as a womanising wanderer. For Robinson too appeared to Welty only during holidays.
Echoes of the legendary Zeus, Vardaman, and John Robinson are reflected in the character of
King MacLain.
„Sir Rabbit‟, the third story in The Golden Apples is a story of seduction, and like
„Shower of Gold‟, it is a story about King MacLain. Greek and Roman mythology incorporate
stories involving Zeus‟ love and possession of many beautiful women. The story of Europa, Io,
Danae and Lida are a few. King MacLain is the “Zeus or Jupiter of this pocket Olympus” (Mc
Haney 593). In this tale, “two events which occur years apart are narrated not through the voice
of a historian, but are seen through the eyes of Mattie Will, as she is raped first by the MacLain
twins and later by King MacLain himself” (Messerli 91). The first event is Mattie Will
Sojourner‟s memory of a day when she had allowed the MacLain twins pin her down and rape
her on the wet spring ground. In the second, Mattie is older, married and is with her husband
Junior Holifield and a Black, in the forbidden Stark Woods, firing off some old ammunition.
They meet King MacLain, who is out hunting. MacLain‟s gun, fired over Junior‟s head, causes
him to pass out, and King has his will, with Mattie who seems willing enough to oblige.
The rape is described in the language of Yeats‟ poem Leda and the Swan. Leda, in Greek
myth, is the daughter of Thestius and the wife of Tyndareus, King of Sparta. She was loved by
Zeus, who approached her in the form of a swan. Leda bore four children, the twins Castor and
Polydeuces, Clymnestra, and Helen of Troy, of whom the last at least was fathered by Zeus.
According to the usual story, Zeus visited Leda in the form of a swan, Leda laid an egg, and from
this Helen was hatched. Mattie is staggered by King‟s grandeur. He approaches her roughly, and
like Zeus to Leda he imparts to her his knowledge with his flesh.
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Mattie, by obliging the twins, and later king MacLain, participates in the myth. When
Mattie witnesses the twins, the spit image of their father, “She yawned – strangely, for she felt at
that moment as though somewhere a little boat was going out on a lake, never to come back” (CS
331). The rape makes Mattie feel, like all experience grounded in myth, as if something was
beginning anew. In Mattie‟s surrender, as well as in Miss Eckhart‟s music, one can see the old
made new. Even the twins behave in a ritualistic manner. They go in a circle round Mattie,
before raping her, and sit in a circle eating sticks of candy, till a crow caws, when they flee.
Years later, Mattie is all the more willing to participate in myth, to become “something she had
always heard of” (338). Mattie later sees King MacLain asleep in the wood and then he seems no
mythical being, but just an ordinary man.
The sunlight falls on the twins, through the leaves of the forest as they roll on Mattie. It is
a description that leads itself to mythical interpretation. “At moments the sun would take hold of
their arms with a bold dart of light” (332). These words bequeath life to the sun re-creating
Greek and Roman mythology. Apollo, the God of Light is the son of Zeus or Jupiter, the Lord of
the Sky, and it is MacLain‟s sons who are raping Mattie. A factor that supports theory is Welty
drawing the reader‟s attention to crows – “and now while one black crow after another beat his
wings across a turned-over field no distance at all beyond” (332). Welty could have been merely
drawing a realistic picture, but one, aware of Welty‟s boundless knowledge of myths and legends
and her ability to subtly weave them into her tales, tends to think twice before concluding its
“only this and nothing more” (The Raven) and Welty herself has stated, “if you hunted long
enough in a book‟s pages, you could find what you were looking for” (A Sweet Devouring 282).
Suddenly there came a tapping,
As of someone gently rapping, rapping
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At my chamber door.
“ „Tis some visitor,” I muttered,
“ tapping at my chamber door –
Only this and nothing more” (LI 3-6).
The scene is a chamber where a weary student who has lost his beloved is half dreaming
of his mistress on a stormy night. To alleviate his grief, he is reading a book. Disturbed by a
tapping sound, the young scholar opens the door thinking that someone has knocked it. As there
is no one standing outside, he closes the door and continues to read the book. When he hears the
knocking sound again, he locates the spot at the window lattice. He opens the window he is
surprised to see the raven there. He has let the raven in. the bird without showing any respect to
the grief- stricken scholar entres the room boldly and perches on the figure of Pallas Athene, the
Greek God of wisdom, made of marble. Tortured by grief over loss of his beloved, the weary
student contrives a series of queries and the bird answers his queries using single word
vocabulary, „nevermore‟.
Further, the crow, according to Greek mythology is sacred to Apollo. So this does
substantiate the idea of it being Apollo who is referred to. Later, thinking of this episode in the
forest with the twins, Mattie refers to them as “goody-goody” (CS 333). Apollo was also known
as the God of Truth. The idea of Zeus speaking in the rustling of the oak leaves is again repeated
when Mattie sees King MacLain in the wood and thinks, “He was Mr.King, all right. Up there
back of the leaves his voice laughed and made fun this minute” (333). Welty keeps the ZeusMacLain comparison vibrant throughout The Golden Apples.
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„Sir Rabbit‟ appeared in the Spring of 1949. This story plays an important part in the
evolution of The Golden Apples for it is the first time Welty portrays the legendary King
MacLain in action. Welty alludes to the oral folktale of „Brer Rabbit‟. There lies a resonance
between her stories and that of Zora Neale Hurston‟s Brer Rabbit Tales in Mules and Men. The
strongest link between Sir Rabbit and Brer Rabbit is the rhyme recollected by Mattie Will when
King MacLain attempts to chase her away:
In the night time,
At the right time,
So I‟ve understood,
„Tis the habit of Sir Rabbit
To dance in the wood (GA 111).
Welty provides more of an imagery to King MacLain to possess the rabbit-like
appearance. The King‟s trade-mark White suit suggests the rabbit‟s fur. His squire brown teeth
and his pinkish white patch of hair under his lip and the lapels on his white suit are alert as
rabbit‟s ears. Welty‟s use of the Southern oral culture in the context of Greek Irish and Celtic
myth cycles parallels the tradition of the Southern folk story telling with its origins in Africa with
the use of the Southern dialect, rhymes, behaviour and imagery Welty has constructed a world
with the patriarchal trickster hero-King MacLain who could not be fixed as one proto-type.
The career of the twin sons of MacLain, Randall and Eugene MacLain are portrayed in
„The Whole World Knows‟ and „Music from Spain‟. In the earlier section of The Golden Apples,
the twins are almost indistinguishable, mischievous and feebly disciplined. In „Sir Rabbit‟, they
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are seen as sprightly fifteen years old, who engage Mattie Will Sojourner in a spring-inspired
sexual romp. In the stories devoted to each of them, the brothers are clearly differentiated with
only one familiarity between the two – marital discord and failure in love. „The Whole World
Knows‟ is in the form of a soliloquy – half confession and half supplication. A pouring out of
woes of estrangement and a sense of guilt pour out in agonized words, seeking paternal
understanding and guidance – a search never to be gratified.
Ran is married to Jinny Love Stark. She has proved faithless to him, by having an affair
with Woody Spights and so Ran leaves her. He comes back to the MacLain house now run for
boarders by Miss Francine Murphy and may be, takes up the same room rented out earlier to
Miss Eckhart. Ran, who still loves his wife, cannot forgive her infidelity. Maideen Sumrall, a
farm girl completely devoid of imagination and working in the Seed and Feed store, is stupid
enough to hang on to Randall. Randall takes her to Vicksbury and eventually they land up at a
motel. Ran attempts to commit suicide, Maideen stops him and later gives herself to Ran, an act
she is unable to accept, and so kills herself with Ran‟s gun.
Unlike Ran, Maideen acts and her act has significance. Her mother‟s maiden
name is the same as Mattie Will‟s – Sojourner. Thus in a small way she too is
connected with myth. Her death which again permits a renewal. One discovers
later that Ran, after Maideen‟s death, is reunited with Jinny (Messerli 97).
Ran lying siege to the stark household and driving his car to and fro along the main street
of Morgana is reminiscent of the Greek Warriors charging and retreating before the walls of
Troy. Modern man lacks the courage to pursue his desires. Ran is no exception. He seeks an
indirect means of revenge and Maideen Sumrall is Ran‟s way of taking revenge on his wife. He
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takes her to the stark house. Maideen is the Trojan horse, but his plan does not work as Ran is no
hero.
Welty wrote the story „The Whole World Knows‟ in Mississippi in September 1946
when she, “longed for commitment and Robinson felt unable to give it”. The story and Welty‟s
personal life with John Robinson share parallels here.
The story describes a marriage on the rocks and a husband‟s longing for reunion
with his wife even as he feels suffocated in a Southern small town environment.
Eudora‟s sense of the constricted nature of Mississippi life and her fear that an
alternatingly warm and distant relationship with Robinson might never break from
that cycle are implicit in the narrative (Marrs 146).
Although King MacLain does not appear in the story, his legacy haunts the entire plot.
Welty created King MacLain to tie together „The Whole World Knows‟,‟ June Recital‟ and
„Music from Spain‟.
King MacLain‟s mythical role has been characterised to reinforce the father-god of
Morgana. The prayer like form of Ran‟s address as „Father‟ and „Dear God‟ suggest the
Christian myth and parallels King MacLain‟s perceived God-like status. King MacLain‟s legacy
in this story does not take an optimistic note but rather produces depression, probable incest, and
suicide – ultimately a chaotic isolation in Ran, the son who longs to escape for a temporary
fulfilment but later is forced to follow the legacy of his father as the Mayor of Morgana.
„Music from Spain‟ is narrated from the point of view of Eugene MacLain. Natural
simplicity and economy of structure are the outstanding qualities of this tale. Eugene MacLain‟s
odyssey occurs in San Francisco on a single day. Carefully related internal and external events
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lead slowly and gradually to the climax and the resolution. Eugene slaps his wife Emma one
morning at the breakfast table and then flings out of the house in a burst of fury. This act
unleashes in Eugene‟s pent up emotions. Eugene‟s wife is, in every aspect, a contrast to
Randall‟s. Emma is plump, over sensitive, busy-tongued. Jenny, on the other hand, is slim,
young, jolly and carefree. Emma is a professional sufferer. The loss of their child has made her
all the more self-crucifying. Eugene‟s needs and requirements as a man and husband are not
dead, though Emma behaves as if hers had died with her child.
The initial act of protest is followed by another. Eugene decides not to go to Bertsinger‟s
Jewellers, where he works. He begins his wanderings and a feeling of elation and longing fills
him. He spies the Spanish guitarist and saves him from being hit by a speeding automobile. The
language barrier prevents the communication between the two. On Eugene‟s pilgrimage to
freedom and rebirth, the Spaniard with his thick black hair and crude manners, but dignified and
noble in his bearing and actions, is an ideal companion. After a meal at a restaurant, when
Eugene acts the host, they go in a street car in the edge of the city.
They walk over hills, moving towards the sea. On a high peak the Spaniard turns around
with arms raised to survey the world through which they have just passed. They move on till they
reach the beach and cliffs of land‟s end. Eugene and the Spaniard struggle with each other,
Eugene is then held high in the air, as if the Spaniard intended to throw him down. They turn
back, and the Spaniard goes to an all night restaurant and Eugene goes home to Emma who
seems all the more narcissistic and uninterested in Eugene‟s wanderings or his bout with
Spaniard. Eugene returns to Morgana, where he dies of tuberculosis and is buried, like the other
dissatisfied wanderers and sojourners near Morgana.
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Eugene MacLain re-enacts the Perseus legend. His slapping his wife across the breakfast
table, like Miss Eckhart‟s action, is symbolic of Perseus cutting off Medusa‟s head. Eugene
carries a folded newspaper under his arm, symbolic of the sickle Hermes had given Perseus. The
hat and the raincoat worn by Eugene is symbolic of “Pluto‟s helmet, which rendered its wearer
invisible” (Warrington 395). Eugene, afraid to pass by Bertsinger‟s, lest he be summoned,
pauses, but the rain coat he is wearing seems to make him invisible. “Bertie Junior was up front
and on the look-out” but “Eugene got by” (CS 398). When Perseus slew Medussa , Pegasus, the
winged horse sprang from her trunk, this is clearly the allusion in the reference to Eugene
passing by his shop and seeing their own brand of “rhinestone Pegasus” in the window (397).
Eugene refers to his wife as if she had been to stone by her inconsolable grief on the death of
their daughter. He says, “her eye was quite marble-like” (399). Statements and sentences like
these make Eugene the wanderer appear like Perseus the wanderer, and Medusa‟s head that
Perseus carried, turned away who looked at it to stone.
After the slaughter of the Gorgon, Perseus flew to the western limit of the earth.
There he encountered king Atlas, who had gardens filled with fruit of gold.
Remembering an ancient prophecy that warned of a son of Jove who should one
day rob him of his golden apples, Atlas fought with Perseus. He was too strong
for the youth, but using the slain Gorgon‟s head, Perseus froze his adversary into
the mountain that supports the earth. Perseus further adventures took him to the
rescue of Andromeda, the daughter of Cassiopeia. Comparable feats were
performed by Hercules, whose most difficult task among the twelve labours was
getting the golden apples of the Hesperides… Like Perseus, Hercules also
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struggles with a giant, Antaeus, who was invincible as long as he remained in
contact with Mother Earth (McHaney 613).
The giant that Welty‟s Perseus, or Eugene grapples with is the Spaniard. The grappling is
on the top of a cliff, where it seems Eugene, referring to the manner in which he saved the
Spaniard from a horrible death, recalls the speed with which he ran recalling Perseus with the
winged shoes, shoes given by Mercury to Perseus enabling him to move quickly from one place
to another. Further, Eugene‟s nickname at Morgana, Mississippi was “old scooter MacLain” (CS
401). It is a name that links him again to Perseus. Perseus, in Greek myth, is the son of Zeus and
Danae. Danae is the daughter of Acrisius, King of Argos.
An Oracle foretold that Acrisius would be killed by his daughter‟s son, and he therefore
confined Danae in a bronze tower, so that no man might approach her. But Zeus descended on
her in a shower of gold, and she bore a son Perseus. Acrisius placed Danae and the child in a
chest and cast them adrift in the sea, but they landed on the island of Seriphos, where they were
sheltered by Dictys, brother of polydectes, the king of the island. Polydectas fell in love with
Danae, but his love was not returned by her. Perseus was now a young man, and polydectes,
finding him an obstacle to his designs on Danae, persuaded him to undertake the dangerous
venture of obtaining the head of Medusa, thinking that he would be destroyed. But the Gods
favoured him by giving him various gifts. Pluto lent him a helmet which would make him
invisible, Hermes wings for his feet, Athena a mirror (so that he need not look directly at
Medusa, whose gaze turned people to stone), and the nymphs a wallet to put the head in.
Directions for finding Medusa were given him by the Graiae. On his return, having killed
Medusa, Perseus rescued Andromeda from where she was chained to a rock, and married her.
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In the company of the Spaniard and out in the open, Eugene felt exhilarated and “he felt
fleet of foot, at the very heels of a secret in the day. Was it so strange, the way things are flung
out at us, like the apples of Atlanta” (403). Welty has in these lines, once again revealed her skill
in subtly weaving myth and legend into the fabric of her tale. This time it is the tale of Atlanta,
the fleet footed. Atlanta desired that anyone seeking her hand should participate in a race against
her. The winner would win her hand while the loser would forfeit his life.
She was eventually defeated by Meilanion. Aphrodite gave him three of the
Golden Apples of the Hesperides, which he dropped one after another during the
race and which Atlanta stopped to pick up. In the Boeotian version, Atlanta‟s
husband is Hippomenes (Warrington 80).
„The Land‟s End‟ to which Eugene and the Spaniard go symbolises the western limit
Perseus goes to after slaying Medusa. In one of the visions that Eugene has of the Spaniard, he
visualises him as “with horns on his head – waiting – or advancing” (CS 408). It is a visualising
that clearly points to the Minotaur.
Theseus slew the Minotaur in the maze, thus saving the Athenians who were sent to the
Minotaur to be devoured. The Minotaur was a monster, half bull and half human, it had the head
of a bull. It is an allusion that is strengthened by the words used by Welty to describe the manner
in which the Spaniard and Eugene groped to find their way. “They looked together for the thread
of the way back. They seized hands at perilous places and took mistaken hold of streaming thorn
bushes with a chorus of outcries. They retreated at points and tried the way again” (424).
The Athenians sent into the maze were never able to find their way out of the maze, like
Eugene and the Spaniard they were in the wrong direction, and would then move on again. “The
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thread of the way” that Eugene and the Spaniard looked for recalls the thread that Aridane, the
daughter of Minos, gave Perseus. She was in love with him and wanted to save him. Perseus was
able to find his way out of the labyrinth after slaying the Minotaur, by the thread which he had
unwound as he entered the maze. These are not the only instances that clearly point out to
Welty‟s great skill and artistry in using Greek and Roman myths and legends in her work. The
Golden Apples, as has been clearly indicated so far, teems with such allusions. These are so
subtly woven into the story, that they do not seem alien, or out of place. There are no edges that
stick out needing a finishing touch. The Golden Apples is in fact, a beautiful and perfect piece of
art that Welty has presented to the literary world.
Michael Kreyling equates „Music from Spain‟ as an „oblique diary‟ (Author 125) as it
expresses an autobiographical note of Welty‟s stay in San Francisco. It expresses Welty‟s
disappointment with futile hope for more of a bond with John Robinson. While „The Whole
World Knows‟ represents Ran MacLain‟s life in Morgana; „Music from Spain‟ presents Eugene
MacLain‟s life in San Francisco. The impact of the Oedipus complex could be felt in both the
stories „The Whole World Knows‟ and „Music from Spain‟ which Peter Schmidt states as,
Both The Whole World Knows and Music from Spain reveal that underneath
Ran‟s and Eugene‟s idealization of their father is volatile mixture of repressed
emotions toward him – guilt for not measuring up to his standards of masculinity
and deep anger toward him for abandoning them and making their relations with
women so troubled. Together, the stories give us a twinned portrait of a boy‟s
Oedipus complex and its causes (66).
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The last story of „The Golden Apples‟ was originally titled „The Humming Birds‟. It was
retitled as „The Wanderers‟ as it narrates how Virgie Rainey has tried repeatedly to break with
Morgana, returns and watches over her mother during the last few days of her life, buries her
when she dies. In short, this story acts as an epilogue proceeding to the denoument of several
characters. „The Wanderers‟ also provides a perspective into the meaning and interrelations of
the characters. A sense of mutability is also provided by this final tale. The reader is given a
detailed portrait of the Morgana community, by picturing them as engaged in a ritual – the burial
ritual. The Morgana of the „The Wanderers‟ is completely different from the Morgana of
„Shower of Gold‟, „June Recital‟ and „Sir Rabbit‟. Modernity is sweeping over it, destroying
vitality in its wake, and paving the way for machinery and the dollar. The engines of depletion
roar along the same road on which Katie Rainey is seen seated, looking out for some passer-by
with whom she could gossip. It is not just Morgana that has changed; its inhabitants too have
changed.
Some individuals resemble Eugene MacLain, living two lives, lives that have lost their
spice. Nina and Jinny Love lack the joy and vitality of their youth. Nina Carmichoel, now
Mrs.Nesbitt, seem unconcerned and indifferent to life. Jinny, shallow as always, vain and
untouched by life, is still determined to win the recognition from everyone. Jinny is unaware of
life, she is incapable of feeling and enjoying life. As a child she seemed more knowing, but now
as a woman in her thirties, she appears strangely child-like. Ran has become a successful
politician. Cassie Morrison is armoured against contact with the world. She lives in a world of
loneliness. King MacLain, still mysterious, with a voracious appetite, is feeble, and tended by
Snowdie as if he were a child. It is Virgie alone, who preserves in her demands upon life. She
turns her mourning into her re-birth.
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„The Wanderers‟ is a story that concerns Virgie chiefly. She is back in Morgana after a
brief sojourn in Memphis. Virgie is forty, a spinster, and one who has had numerous lovers. Mrs.
Katie Rainey‟s funeral brings the wanderers together. Virgie displays none of the anticipated
signs of hysteria or grief. Later when she takes a dip in the Big Black River, she seems to come
to terms with life. Returning from the cemetery, Virgie recalls her return to Morgana at the age
of seventeen, when she seemed to sense then, as now, a kind of link between herself and the
golden earth.
Virgie senses a kinship with Ran, King MacLain, and his grand children – “all have the
„pure wish‟ to live, to be individuals. They refuse to be crushed or defeated by life or death, or by
the stultifying effects of sentimental conformity or piety” (VandeKieft 141). Virgie leaves
Morgana giving away or storing away all her mother‟s belongings, and sets out in her car. She
stops at the MacLain town for her final reflection. Sitting on the stile in front of the courthouse
Virgie recalls the picture that hung in Miss Eckhart‟sstudio , which her teacher had explained
was similar to Siegfried and the dragon. Siegfried is a mythical German God, akin to Zeus, and
like Zeus he also possessed a cap that made the wearer invisible.The picture of Perseus seems to
make sense to her. Virgie‟s limited vision and what she comprehends
…is that every hero, as well as every heroic act , implies a victim, a staying, and
hence a source of horror and terror to the onlooker… whoever conquers does so to
the cost of someone or something else, producing in the moment of destruction
physical and meta physical horror… (VandeKieft 142).
Myth, like the Gorgans, or the Perseus myth, keeps roaring its head throughout The
Golden Apples and „The Wanderers‟ is no exception. The Negro woman sent to help Virgie is
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named Minerva. The Minerva referred to here is none other than Minerva, the Greek Goddess of
Wisdom. It does seem fitting that Minerva should be Virgie‟s companion now, for it is with
wisdom that clarity comes, and with clarity, peace. Virgie is now at peace, with herself and with
the world. J.A. Bryant finds Virgie, on her perch in front of the court house, as reminiscent of
Yeats‟ Golden Nightingale, “reluctantly faithful to time and metamorphosed into something
transcending time, coisant of what is past, passing and to come” (Bryant 32).
An abundance of Greek myth comes into play in the names of flowers that Cassie
Morrison uses to spell out her mother‟s name. There are hyacinths and narcissus and violets.
Hyacinths in Greek mythology “...was a beautiful youth, beloved of Apollo and Zephyrus, out of
jealousy, caused the quoit of Apollo to strike the head of the youth and kill him on the spot.
From the blood of Hyacinthus there sprang the flower hyacinth” (Warrington 284).
Narcissus, unlike the hyacinth, did not spring from the blood of a youth, but rather, was
the flower to which a youth, was changed. Narcissus was
the son of the river God Cephissus and Liriope. Having rejected the love of Echo,
he was caused by Nemesis to become enarmoured of his own image reflected in
the waters of a spring. He pined away (or threw himself in) and was changed into
the flower that bears his name (Ibid 358).
Welty revised the story „The Humming Birds‟ published in March 1949 which she later
retitled as „The Wanderers‟. The treatment of the mythical Perseus-Medusa episode parallels
Welty‟s relationship with John Robinson. Welty‟s use of the imagery of Perseus and Medusa to
describe her relationship with Robinson gets reflected through a letter which she wrote to him
dated September 2, 1948.
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In the letter, Eudora depicted herself as the Medusa in Robinson‟s eyes, as one
whose love and assistance had at times, or so it seemed to him, threatened to set
his course in stone and deny his need for independence and solitude. But in the
same letter Eudora also recognized the Medusa as a victim of Perseus, as a living
being who had been mortally wounded by the legendary hero. She suggested that
that the hero and the monster, the murderer and the victim, were part of “us all.”
That is the very realization that comes to Virgie Rainey as „The Wanderers‟
comes to a close. (Marrs 165).
The portrayal of King MacLain has been depicted to perform two interconnected roles in
The Golden Apples. He functions both as a mythic wanderer and also acts a unifying device for
Morgana‟s inhabitants and also to the collection of stories. Welty has projected King MacLain as
Zeus, the god of gods, the Lead of mythic pantheon and also as a biological and spiritual father.
Welty has woven a coherent cycle out of, “what might have been a diverse collection of very
good short stories about separate, unrelated moments” (Marrs 136).
The germ of the story „Death of a Traveling Salesman‟ occurred to Welty when an
anecdote about a farmer was narrated to her by a friend, “in which occurred the words „he‟s gone
to „borry‟ some fire‟. Prometheus was in my mind almost at the instant” (Dessner 147). The story
centres round R.J. Bowman, a salesman, who travels through Mississippi selling shoes. He is
back on the road after a serious attack of flu, loses his way and drives his car, but dies before he
reaches his car.
The first indication of the presence of something is the name of the chief actor –Bowman.
Homer was the first to have given to Hercules the name Bowman, for his renowned skill in
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archery. Welty makes use of veiled hints that make it obvious that her Bowman is the legendary
Hercules. Bowman‟s flu could be a veiled hint at Hercules‟ illness at Thebes towards the end of
his life. Further,
Bowman did not like the name Redmond; Hercules had trouble in the red sunset
country Erythera. Bowman‟s host Sonny had two hounds; Hercules‟ host Geryon
had a two headed dog. Bowman‟s hostess moving iron pots and dropping „hot
coals on top of the iron lids‟, „made a set of soft vibrations like the sound of a bell
far away‟. Hercules rang a bell to frighten away the Stymphalian birds, birds with
iron talons that dropped their sharp feathers (Jones 20).
Bowman, at the beginning of the story, recalls his grandmother and wishes, “he could fall
into the big feather bed that had been in her room” (CS 119). Here Welty is probably referring to
Hercules‟ grandmother, Rhea, the mother of Zeus and Hera. Later in the cabin, when Bowman
spies the bed in the next room his eye is caught by the quilt on the bed, and his thoughts fly back
to his grandmother. “the bed had been made up with a red-and-yellow pieced quilt that looked
like a map or a picture, a little like his grandmother‟s girlhood painting of Rome burning”(122123). This is symbolic of Rhea‟s worship. The main feature of the worship is the waving of
burning torches. Sonny, the young rustic is also a mythic figure. He represents Prometheus, who,
according to Greek mythology, stole fire from heaven and gave it to man. As a punishment he
“was taken away among the Caucasus mountains, there nailed alive to a rock by Hephaestus, and
compelled to suffer every day, an eagle sent by Zeus, to gnaw his liver, which daily grew a
fresh” (Murray 88).
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Bowman can also be considered to be a representative of another archer – Cupid. This
reference appears particularly apt because Bowman‟s troubles are both metaphorically and
physically of the heart. To strain an allusion one might say that this heart veritably quivers like a
bow (it leaps and expands like a rocket and a colt, falls gently and scatters like an acrobat into
nets) out of its lonely need to achieve a communion with his host and humanity.
The bow imagery is re-inforced by the tableau of the mule turning its target like
eyes into him. But Bowman averts his eyes and at the conclusion becomes the
hunted, slain by his own self-destructive heart… the woman before whom
Bowman awkwardly bows is also a complex and ambiguous symbol, she is both
ancient and youthful to evoke simultaneously the Uroborous or Archetypal Great
Mother (Sederberg 53).
Bowman cannot be equated with Hercules. The main point of divergence is Hercules‟
proverbial strength. Even as a baby in the cradle he had strangled snakes. The twelve labours
performed by him are labours no other man could have carried out. According to The
Concise Oxford Companion to Classical Literature the twelve labours of Hercules are:
i) The Nemean Lion, an invulnerable monster, the offspring of Echidna and Typhon, sent to
Nemean in Argos by Hera, to destroy Hercules. Hercules choked the monster in his arms,
and clothed himself with its skin, using the beast‟s own claws, by which alone the skin
was penetrable, to separate it from the body.
ii) The Hydra, the offspring of Echidna and Typhon. It was a poisonous water snake which
lived in the marshes of Lerna near Argos. It had numerous heads; when one was cut off
another grew in its place. Moreover, Hera sent a huge crab to help it, hence the proverb
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„Not even Hercules can fight two‟. The latter, as Hercules cut off the heads, seared the
stumps with burning brands. Hercules then dipped his arrows in the Hydra‟s blood, which
made their wounds incurable. The Hydra had one immortal head, which Hercules buried
under a rock. The crab, which Hercules killed by crushing it under foot, became the
constellation cancer.
iii) The Erymanthian Boar. Hercules‟ labour in this case was to catch alive the boar that lived
on Mount Erymanthus in Arcadia. He drove it into a snowfield, tired it out, and caught it
in a net. It was while searching for the boar that he was entertained by Pholus the centaur,
to whom he gave wine. The other centaurs lured to the cave by the smell of wine, got
drunk and attacked Hercules; in defending himself he killed many of them with his
poisoned arrows.
iv) The Cerynitian Hind. Hercules captured the hind alive after a year-long chase which
takes him to the land of the Hyperboreans. Though female and therefore by nature
hornless, this creature was said to have gilded horns and to be sacred to Artemis.
v) The Stymphalian Birds, which infested the woods round lake stymphatus in Arcadia.
Various reasons are given about the need for their destruction, e.g. they used their bronze
– tipped feathers as arrows and killed and ate men and beasts. Hercules scared them by
means of a bronze rattle, then shot some with his arrows and drove the rest away.
vi) The Augean Stables, Augeas, king of Elis, had enormous herds of cattle, like his father
Helios, and Hercules was required to clean in one day their stables which had never been
cleaned before. This he did by diverting the river Alpheus so that it flowed through the
yard.
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vii) The Cretan Bull. The Minotaur, which had the body of a man with a bull‟s head.
Hercules caught it alive, brought it back to show Eurystheus, and let it go. It wandered
throughout Greece and finally settled down near Marathon.
viii)
The Horses of Diomedes. Diomedes was the son of Ares and a nymph Cyrene,
and king of the Bistones in Thrace. His horses were fed on human flesh. Hercules killed
Diamedes and fed his body to the horses, where upon they became tame and Hercules
brought them to Argos.
ix) The Girdle of the Amazon. The girdle given to Hippolyte, queen of the Amazons, by her
father Ares, was desired by the daughter of Eurystheus, and Hercules was sent to procure
it. Hippolyte would have handed it over, but Hera stirred up war; in the ensuing battle
Heracles killed Hippolyte and removed the girdle from her dead body.
x) The cattle of Geryon. In order to obtain the cattle Hercules had to travel to the extreme
west where they were pastured on the mythical island of Erytheia (red island). Helios
(sun) so much admired Hercules‟ boldness in drawing his bow on him
when annoyed
by the heat that he gave him his golden cup in which to sail to Erytheia. Having reached
the island Hercules killed the dog Orthrus, the herdsman Eurytion, and lastly Geryon
himself, who was a three-headed Ogre, and brought away his cattle then he reached home
safely.
xi) The Golden Apples of the Hesperides (daughters of Night). These were the apples given
by Gaia to Hera as a wedding present, and kept in a garden at the edge of the world.
Hercules, who had to bring back the apples, had much difficulty in finding the way and
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forced Nereus to give him directions to the garden. Having killed Ladon, the dragon that
guarded it, he carried off the apples.
xii) The Descent to the underworld for Cerberus. Hercules, after preliminary imitation into
the Eleusinian mysteries, and with the help of Gods Hermes and Athena, descended to the
underworld near Cape Taenarum in Laconia. Hercules captured and bound the dog
Cerberus brought him to Eurystheus, and then returned him to the underworld. This myth
suggests that by conquering death Hercules earns his final immortality. (260 – 261)
Bowman‟s outstanding trait is his weakness… Bowman has finally rejected the way offered
him by the mythic symbols and now he is completely alone, forever cut off from past patterns.
His own myth had been the Hercules myth. In a timeless world he had for a time, the same
grandmother, the same possibilities for strength that Hercules had had. But Hercules responded
with strength, Bowman with weakness (Jones 20-21).
Bowman denies his link with mankind and runs out to die alone on the road, where there is
no one to hear his final heart beats. Bowman represents a type of man – one who has the chances
and the possibilities but lacks the will, strength and determination to pursue them. The end result
being that, like Bowman, they fade from the earth leaving no sign of their sojourn in this world
and die alone uncared for and unsung.
The „Death of a Traveling Salesman‟ proves to be an inversion of „A Worn Path‟ Bowman‟s
journey to the woods, though it resembles phoenix Jackson connects herself with the modern
world with almost all the people she encounters – the white hunter, the nurse, whereas, Bowman
does not represent as a member of hill country. He assumes that he is gliding past unknown
aliens and feels dejected to be lost in some sort of nether world.Welty picturizes Bowman as a
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representation of modernity which results only in illness and social isolation. The modern man‟s
illusion of equating mobility for modernity like Bowman in contrast to the primitives who fix
themselves to one topographical space as the hills project the ill conceived notions of the modern
American male ego.
Welty insists that the primitive life and it‟s people emerge as a resourceful survivors of hard
times wherein the modern man in the depression era has been lost with the chaotic identity. The
adherence to a traditional way of life which is a sign of adaptability and integrity amidst the
economic collapse is the only solution which Welty renders through „The Death of a Salesman‟.
Through the mythical name Bowman, Welty contrasts the mythical hero Hercules with the
sophisticated modern yet isolated representation of the American men.
„The Whistle‟ is a pathetic story of the plight of two share-croppers Jason and Sara Morton.
They had been having a spell of bad luck with their harvest. Their hopes were now laid on this
harvest being good. It was not to be so, as the gods had conspired against them. Sara briefly
snatches at the happiness, warmth, sunny days and a good harvest by conjuring up pictures of
summer and a harvest of plenty. “She began to imagine and remember the town of Dexter in the
shipping season. There in her mind, dusty little Dexter became a theatre for almost legendary
festivity, a place of pleasure” (CS 58). These are only brief snatches, for the cold is too intense to
enable Sara to forget reality. Then the Perkins‟ Whistle blows. Perkins blows his whistle when a
freeze threatens. Sara and Jason sacrifice their quilts and garments to save the tomato plants.
They turn back freezing, to a house that has become colder. Jason attempts to keep the burning
by throwing in, first some kindling, then the big cherry log, and then the split bottomed chair and
finally it was the table that was consigned to the flames, but the golden flames that Jason sought
were not to be his.
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The allusion to the legendary Jason – Jason of the Golden Fleece is quite obvious. One does
not have to go delving into or searching between the lines to discover the obvious connection.
The hardships Jason had to face – the encounter with the Harpies, the clashing rocks, the
symplezades that perpetually rolled against one another, were easily overcome as Hera, Zeus‟
wife had decided to help Jason.
Jason was the son of Aeson (son of Cretheus and Tyro), who was the rightful king of Iolcus
in Thessaly, but the throne had been usurped by Aeson‟s half-brother Pelias (son of the God
Poseidon and of Tyro). Jason has been sent for safety and education to the centaur Chiron. Pelias
had been warned that he would be killed by a descendant of Aeolus who would come to him
wearing only one sandal. This prophecy was fulfilled when Jason, grown up, returned to Iolcus
to claim his inheritance, having lost a sandal while carrying an old woman (the Goddess Hera in
disguise) across a river.
Pelias promised to restore the throne to him if he would first recover the Golden Fleece. This
was the fleece of the ram that had carried away Phrixus and Helle and had been hung in the
grove of Ares at Colchis, at the eastern end of the Black sea, guarded by a dragon that never
slept. Jason undertook the task, and embarked in the Argo at pagasae with some fifty of the chief
heroes of Greece. Heroes most generally said to have been on the expedition include Orpheus,
Peleus, Telamon, the Dioscuri, Idas and Lynceus, Argus, Admetus and others.
The expedition eventually reached Colchis, where the king Aeetes expressed willingness to
surrender the fleece if Jason would perform certain apparently impossible tasks. These included
yoking to a plough a pair of fire – breathing bulls with bronze hooves, and ploughing a field and
sowing it with teeth from Cadmus‟ dragon; from these armed men would arise whose fury would
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be turned against Jason. With the help of the magic arts of Medea, the king‟s daughter, who fell
in love with Jason, the tasks were successfully accomplished, and Jason and Medea and the other
Argonants returned to Iolcus with the fleece.
The Jason, of Welty‟s „The Whistle‟ did not have to go to Clochis to obtain the Golden
Fleece. It was within his reaching and yet beyond his reach. The gods were blind to this Jason‟s
plight and hence that which was so near, was still so far off. Jason sought the warmth of the
golden flames, this was his fleece. His attempts with the kindling, the cherry log, the split
bottomed chair and the kitchen table were ineffectual. The fire seemed determined to outwit him.
The legendary Jason‟s quest was more difficult, many hardships and dangers which he
would never have been able to overcome of his own accord were overcome, with the help of
gods. Jason Morton‟s plight is the plight of many a poor human being, not blessed with the basic
necessities of life, a plight made worse by nature also working against them – a poor harvest and
the freezing cold. Jason Morton‟s plight is underscored by the numerous references to the golden
sun and the warmth that is beyond his reach. The bleakness of their home and their surroundings
is a reflection of the bleakness of this couple‟s life. A bleakness that seems to pervade „The
Whistle‟ which is a simple but realistic story, made multi-dimensional by the choice of a name
and Welty‟s choice of words. In an interview that Welty gave to Ward, she clearly states that
I will use anything you know whatever is about that I think truly expresses what I
see in life around me. I have used not only Mississippi folklore but Greek and
Roman myth or anything else, Irish stories, anything else that happens to come in
handy that I think is an expression of something that I see around me in life. I do
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not start out just to write something and use folklore, it is just there to be plucked
(Ward 501).
„The Golden Apples‟, „Circe‟ and „The Whistle‟ are clear indications that Welty has not only
plucked all that was within her reach but has also artistically woven them into the fabric of her
stories.
The apollonian and Dionysian conflict evident in „Asphodel‟ is also the conflict round
which the story „Livvie‟ revolves. „Livvie‟ originally appeared under the title „Livvie is Back‟
and won the O‟Henry award for Welty. The title is suggestive of the people who benefited
because Livvie was back, reinforcing the Persephone comparison, Persephone‟s captivity
impoverished the world. Her return enriches the world and the people in it. Solomon, like
Sabina, represents orderliness. He has made himself a little spot in the middle of the teeming
natural world, but he cannot prevent the eventual victory of the forces of Dionysus, nor can he
keep the world from changing in its natural way.
Livvie‟s natural impulses are first aroused by Miss Baby Marie, an itinerant
cosmetics peddler, whose lipstick smells to Livvie like chinaberry flowers.
Livvie‟s waning allegiance to Solomon holds her back from Miss Baby Marie‟s
wares, but her natural instincts pull her away at the same time. Aided by the turn
of the year into spring, Livvie finally turns away from Solomon and towards
Cash, the black Dionysus of this story. Cash is part of the field, linked with the
irresistible germination and growth in the soil; he is the opposite of the
geometrical order of Solomon and his rooms. (Kreyling 24).
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Solomon tries with great care and determination to manage the physical world. His
attempts prove futile, as futile as man‟s attempt to discover the elixir of life. Solomon‟s attempt
to curb the natural forces is clearly discernible in his marrying Livvie, a sixteen year old girl, and
he an old man. He cuts her off from the rest of the world and from everything in it. “Solomon
carried Livvie twenty-one miles away from her home when he married her. He carried her away
upon the old Natchez Trace into the deep country to live in his house” (CS 228).
At Natchez there was nobody, not even a white man and if there had been anybody,
“Solomon would not have let Livvie look at them, just as he would not let her look at a field
hand, or a field hand look at her” (230). Baby Marie, a seller of cosmetics, is the first to break
down the barriers built around Livvie, by Solomon. She is soon followed by Dionysus himself in
the form of Cash. Cash‟s “I taken a trip, I ready for Easter” (236), is a clear indication that the
Apollonian order cannot survive for long. The old must give way to the new, just as winter paves
the way for spring. Solomon bears no grudge. Unlike Sabina, he understands and is prepared to
allow the natural process to go on unhindered. “So here come the young man Livvie wait for.
Was no prevention. No prevention” (238). These words of Solomon clearly indicate that he will
not stand in the way of the natural forces, and hence, unlike „Asphodel‟, things end on a happy
and peaceful note, with Cash and Livvie walking out into a spring that welcomes them.
The Persephone myth that Livvie symbolises, is further strengthened by the reference to
the pomegranate trees on Solomon‟s land. It was the fruit that prevented Persephone from
gaining complete freedom. Solomon carrying away Livvie to Old Natchez is symbolic of Pluto
carrying away Persephone to the underworld. Demeter succeeds in getting her daughter back. In
„Livvie‟ it is Cash, who frees the captured girl. Demeter withheld her gifts from the world when
Persephone was taken from her. She gave back to the earth its fruits and rich field and bright
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flowers when she got back her daughter. This aspect of the Persephone myth – the earth wearing
her cloak of plenty, of bright flowers and colours is apparent in the concluding line of the story,
“outside the redbirds were flying and criss-crossing, the sun was in all the bottles on the prisoned
trees, and the young peach was shining in the middle of them with the bursting light of spring”
(239).
In „Circe‟ a short story that occurs in the collection The Bride of the Innisfallen, the
reader is taken to a mythical island in the Mediterranean, where the sorceress gives her own
version of Odysseus visit. Circe the mythical sorceress “dwelt in the island of Aeaea upon which
Odysseus was cast! His companions drank a magic potion which Circe offered them and were
changed into swine, all except, Eurylochus” (Warrington 146). Odysseus was saved because of
the root Hermes had given to him and Circe is compelled to restore his men to him. Odysseus,
according to the legend, feared Circe‟s welcome, and Eurylochus informs him of the
transformation. In Welty‟s „Circe‟ Odysseus arrives with his men, Odysseus, as in the legend, is
able to overcome the effort of the broth. Circe was filled with contempt when she transformed
the men to swine. “That moment of transformation – only the Gods really like it! Men and beasts
almost never take in enough of the wonder to justify the trouble…. What tusks I had given
them!” She is now overcome with surprise to see Odysseus unaffected. She cries out, “What
makes you think you‟re different from anyone else?”(CS 531).
Troubled by this apparent failure of her power, Circe runs back to the broth she has
prepared while giving rent to her troubled thoughts. She then goes about the task of enticing and
trapping the handsome stranger who had proved stronger than her potion. Odysseus was not the
man to reject such an offer, nor was he a slave to Circe‟s charms. It was Circe who fell a victim
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to Odysseus powerful charm, and had no other option but to give back the men to Odysseus.
Circe‟s plan of retaining some of them proves futile.
Odysseus decides to leave the following morning. Circe is reluctant to let him go.
Odysseus and his men depart leaving Circe incapable of finding solace or an outlet for her grief.
The Greek and Roman Gods, as clearly portrayed in The Golden Apples are immortal beings, but
beings who are slaves to the same passions that mortal men are slave to – love, anger, jealousy,
envy, hatred, etc. the joy that humans experience in a reunion, as for example, the reunion of
Odysseus and his men, is an experience that Circe and the Olympian Gods are incapable of
participating in. So, Welty portrays Circe as resorting to contempt.
Initially, Circe had looked upon the Archaeans as playthings, and so eagerly welcomed
them. She eagerly waited for the moment of their transformation. Her thrill and satisfaction at the
transformation was short lived, as Odysseus with Hermes‟ help thwarted the enchantment and
forced its undoing. Circe could not welcome them back into humanity, as the pain at parting, and
the thrill and joy at a reunion, are human emotions, emotions she could never experience. Circe,
by welcoming Odysseus and his men, has allowed beings, she cannot understand, enter her life.
Odysseus is able, may be with help, not to fall a victim to Circe‟s charm. Circe, in spite of being
a Goddess lacks the ability to safeguard herself from the harm that Odysseus can inflict on her.
Circe‟s thoughts carry her to her father, the Sun,
who went on his divine way untroubled, ambitionless – unconsumed; suffering no
loss, no heroic fear of corruption through his constant shedding of light, needing
no story, no retinue to vouch for where he has been – even heroes could learn of
the Gods! (533).
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Heroes could and do learn of the Gods. Circe‟s anger and despair seem to be the slow
dawning of the suspicion that Gods are incapable of learning from heroes. To learn the God, one
must descend to the level of a mortal, something the Gods are incapable of doing. The Gods can
help mortals become like them. Greek mythology is full of instances of heroes being raised to
immortal ranks. Heroes, on the contrary, are powerless to help gods become mortal.
A goddess falling in love with a mortal, as Circe did is not uncommon. Aphrodite was in
love with Hippolytus, who scorned her. Welty‟s Circe possesses foreknowledge but “her
knowledge is vast, fixed and timeless – expansive but unexpandable. She knows nothing of
urgency and suffers the consequence of her ignorance” (Andrea Goudie 485). Circe is ignorant
of the meaning of time for humanity. Time is limited for man. In order to expand, share and
savour his knowledge of himself and the world, he resorts to story-telling. Circe is incapable of
appreciating and reliving a story, so she is bored with the story Odysseus narrates. What she is
interested in, is his secret. “I didn‟t want his story, I wanted his secret” (CS 533). Circe doesn‟t
realise that the secret she so craves for could be man‟s insatiable desire for stories. She does not
comprehend that stories are more vital than foresight. Stories free man from being enclosed
within his own experience; and enable him to participate, unconditionally in a limitless range of
human possibilities and experience. Circe is incapable of comprehending the frailty in man; her
only way of coping with this elusive mystery is to resort to contempt and so dismisses them as
swine.
Odysseus‟ men plan to leave. Circe is not able to comprehend her feelings at the intended
parting and so once again resorts to contempt by consoling herself that the condition of a swine
was better than that of humanity. It is a thought that gives her no contempt. The grief she longs
for is beyond her grasp.
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Odysseus and his men depart from the island richer in experience, knowledge and
awareness, where as Circe is no richer. “Circe is as irrevocably tied to her insular divinity as she
is literally confined to her island” (Andrea Goudie 489). Though mortal, man‟s life is fuller,
richer and more meaningful than the lives of the immortal gods of Greece and Rome. Man is able
to understand and identify with each other, thereby sharing in and knitting a bond between one
human being and another. The gods and goddesses of Greek mythology, as clearly indicated in
Welty‟s „Circe‟, lack the happiness of the mortals, as there is no sharing, no bond that unites
them. They rule over man‟s life, they govern his fate, but like strangers they cannot comprehend
the bond, the compulsion that makes one man lay down his life for another.
Welty apparently seems to imply that to be human is far better than being a God or a
Goddess. The latter has power, foresight, but is lonely and isolated. The former, though fickle,
mortal, and lacking in foresight, yet has power over a world that is his, where he is not alone, but
surrounded by those who care and love him, those who will willingly share their all with him.
Thus man, though mortal, is a happier being.
A fine blend of realism, mythology, fantasy and allegory is apparent in „Asphodel‟ a
story in the collection The Wide Net and Other Stories published in 1943. Three old maids out on
a picnic are the narrators of this story. “They move in a pattern remindful of the Greek
chorus…Like the Greek chorus, the three old maids are caught in a chorus of events which,
because they do not comprehend it, sweeps them to their own destruction” (Hodgins 218). The
story focuses on Miss Sabina and Don McInnis, former owners of Asphodel. Miss Sabina was
forced to marry Don McInnis, a man in every aspect her opposite. Unable to tame and
domesticate her wild and unruly husband, Sabina chases Don MacInnis out of Asphodel and
burns down the place.
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Sabina‟s attention is now turned towards ruling the town, as she looks after all its affairs,
names the children, and predicts the events. In short, she acts as the Oracle itself. The only place
not under Miss Sabina‟s control is the post office. Her final assault is on the post office, which
she enters in frenzy, and like a possessed demented being, began to destroy everything there.
“Miss Sabina‟s arms moved like a harvester‟s in the field, to destroy all that was in the little
room. In her frenzy she tore all the letters to pieces, and even put bits in her mouth and appeared
to eat them” (CS 206). Her destruction complete, Sabina stood still for a moment and then
toppled to the floor dead.
„Asphodel‟ is a skilfully crafted and ironic vision of the classic strife between
Dionysian and Apollonian visions of life. Sabina is Apollonian in allegiance. The
three spinsters who narrate her story perform the role of the chorus…At the centre
of the old story are two houses – Apollonian house of Sabina, who loves order
and restraint in human affairs, and the Dionysian house of Don McInnis, a satyr in
appearance and deportment, for whom appetite is both moral and civil tutor
(Kreyling 23).
Dionysus or Bacchus, the Greek God of Wine, was known to change into a lion to
destroy those who opposed him. When the spinsters spy Don McInnis in the ruins of Asphodel,
he seemed “as rude and golden like a lion” (CS 207), a clear indication that McInnis is
representative of Dionysus or Bacchus. Welty‟s description of McInnis of his wedding day and
the wedding celebrations are reminiscent of Bacchus and his revelry. “He was dangerous that
first night, swaying with drink, trampling the scattered flowers, led up to a ceremony there before
all our eyes” (202). The ceremony referred to is the worship of Dionysus in which drinking and
revelling form part of the worship.
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The spinsters, who spy on McInnis in the ruins of Asphodel, are not able to believe their
eyes. Cora concluded that it was Mr. McInnis, where as Irene felt it was just “a vine in the wind”
(207). Cora is certain of the man‟s identity and claims “He was buck-naked. He was as naked as
an old goat. He must be as old as the hills” (207). The spinsters take fright and flee from the
ruins of Asphodel. They are chased by a number of goats, goats of all kinds. “There were billygoats and nanny-goats, old goats and young, a whole thriving herd” (208). The goats and Cora‟s
description of Don McInnis immediately evoke the picture of Pan – the god of pastures, herds
and herdsmen.
By the use of myth, Miss Welty succeeds in coalescing all time into present of the
story so as to symbolically unite disparate chronological periods; and by
rendering symbolic character in myth-related backgrounds, she is able to make
them timeless… „Asphodel‟ can become the fall of Rome, the decline of Greece,
the death of South – any period of man‟s history that placed convention above
individual freedom (Neault 45).
An examination of „A Visit of Charity‟, one of the most effective of Welty‟s earlier
works “provides a significant index to the way in which the artist, employing her great gift for
details and framework drawn unerringly from life, works within a larger pattern absorbed
naturally and unconsciously from her sensitive assimilation of literature and tradition” (Hartley
350). „A Visit of Charity‟ is one of the simplest and yet most complex of Welty‟s works. Its
simplicity lies in the story which is about Marian‟s (a camp girl‟s) visit to an Old Ladies‟ Home.
Its complexity lies in the implied link between the living and the living dead. It is this link that
provides the story with its rich overtones and links it to the off quoted and well known myths of
the descent of mythical beings as Aeneas, Hercules and Proserpina, to Hades. Marian‟s visit to
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the Old Ladies‟ Home could be regarded as a descent into Hades and like Aeneas who carried
the Golden Bough, to protect him from dangers, he knew, he could have to face there, Marian
carried a potted plant to be given to one of the inmates as a gift. The potted plant could be a
symbolic representation of the Golden Bough, though the motive for carrying it differs.
When Marian entered the home, she was stopped by a nurse who in her white starched
uniform and cold aloofness resembles the boat man Charon of Greek mythology, who ferried the
souls to the underworld. Welty‟s description of Marian walking on the linoleum floor supports
this allusion, “There was loose, bulging linoleum on the floor. Marian felt as if she were walking
on the waves, but the nurse paid no attention to it” (CS 113). The sounds that emerge from the
home are symbolic of the dead souls in the underworld. Marian, horrified and terrified by the Old
Ladies, decides it was time she made a quit. She has to snatch herself from the grip of the first
old lady who cried and begged for a penny. She once again encounters the nurse who asks her if
she will not stay for dinner, Marian declines the offer, with one thought in her mind to get away
as quickly and as possible from the Old Ladies‟ home.
Lodwick Hartley sees Marian as “symbolic of Proserpina” (Hartley 353) the daughter of
Demeter, who was carried off by Pluto, Lord of the underworld, to his domain. Hermes goes
down to the underworld at Zeus‟ command to get Proserpina back. As Proserpina had consumed
some pomegranate seeds offered by Pluto, she was forced to spend one-third of a year with Pluto
or Aidoneus as he was known. Proserpina in the underworld represents corn sown – which
remains connected in the ground for part of the year. Proserpina back from the underworld is the
corn that shoots out from the soil. To strengthen this comparison, Welty gives Marian “Straight
yellow hair” (CS 115) the colour of ripe corn, and the apple that Marian bites into as she leaves
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the home is symbolic of the pomegranate seeds Proserpina ate before leaving the underworld.
Marian, by refusing to dine at the Old Ladies‟ Home, makes no commitment to the underworld.
She, therefore, bites the apple in an eager and even a desperate affirmation of her
belonging to the upper world. And the rocketing bus reinforces the symbol of the
life-force after the flight from the horrors of the land of the living dead…perhaps
better than any other of Miss Welty‟s stories, „A Visit of Charity‟ reveals the
informing influence of myth subconsciously at work in the artist (Hartley 534).
Mythical parallels through characters and incidents could be found in „A Visit of
Charity‟. Marian‟s story of initiation parallels Proserpina, the vegetation goddess of Greek myth,
whose yellow hair symbolizes grain. The potted plant becomes a passport for Marian in her
voyage across the Acheron: “There was loose, bulging linoleum on the floor. Marian felt as if
she was walking on the waves, but the nurse paid no attention to it”. Marian parallels the
„passenger‟ wherein the indifferent „boatman‟ parallels the nurse. Marian could be compared to
the mythical Eve for she develops an awareness of her own separateness in biting into the apple
at the end of the story. As May remarks, in Marian “nothing is solved” and she “has learnt
nothing” for her act as an “initiation of the tentative type” (341).
The incident of the attendant pleading Marian as, “why won‟t you stay and have dinner
with us?” parallels an important incident in Proserpina story: that eating in the underworld
subjected the visitor to retention there. So,“Marian‟s recognition of the fact and her rejection of it
are instinctive and immediate” (Hartley 353).
Welty at times suggests or hints at a mythical being and leaves it to the reader‟s ability to
discern the picture behind the hazy outline. „Lily Daw and The Three Ladies‟ is an example to
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this concept. The role the three ladies (Mrs. Watts, Mrs. Carson and Aimee Slocum) enact is that
of the Fates. It is these three ladies, who plan and decide Lily Daw‟s future – typical of the Fates
who decide man‟s fate, unconcerned about what his pleasures or desires are. This comparison
becomes clear if we take into account Welty‟s description of Mrs. Carson. She has a measuring
tape over her shoulder, typical of Lachesis who decides how long man‟s life is to be. According
to Greek mythology the Fates were “three goddesses who controlled human life… they were
Clotho, who spun the web of life, Lachesis, who measured its length and Attropos, who cut it”
(Levey 224).
The three old ladies decide to send Lily Daw to “the Ellisville Institute for the Feeble –
Minded of Mississippi” (CS 3). Unknown to them Lily has taken her future into her own hands.
She decides to marry the Xylophone player. The three old ladies, horrified to find their plans
going awry, make numerous promises to Lily if she will go to Elisville.“We‟ll give you lots of
gorgeous things” (7). The gorgeous thing are hemstitched pillow cases, caramel cake, a souvenir,
a pretty little Bible with Lily‟s name on it in real gold, and even a “pink crepe de chine brassiere
with adjustable shoulder straps” (8). Lily Daw falls into the trap and is accompanied to the
railway station, and put on the train to Ellisville. She does not make it as Aimee Slocum comes
with information that the Xylophone player was at the station seeking direction to Lily Daw‟s
place. Lily Daw is dragged out against her will. The train leaves with her box, arrangements are
made to see her wedded to the player. Mrs. Watts performs the role of Clotho, the one who spins
the thread of life, as is clearly indicated in her asking Mrs. Carson to pack up as Lily Daw was
leaving for Ellisville “on Number one” (9).
Aimee Slocum is Atropos, the one who puts an end to the plan of sending Lily Daw to
Ellisville. The Fates have always been regarded as a power that rules and plans out man‟s life.
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Man is picturized as a puppet in the hands of Fate. Welty‟s „Lily Daw and the Three Ladies‟
underscores this blind faith and fear that people have regarding the Fates- a groundless faith. If
man is determined and firm enough, he will attain his goal, irrespective of the odds against him.
Thus, „Lily Daw and the Three Ladies‟ is Welty‟s way of making man realize this fact. Man is
his own destiny and not any other power of Fate.
Myth is clearly evident in „A Worn Path‟ a story that occurs in the collection A Curtain of
Green. Unlike „Circe‟, the character portrayed in „A Worn Path‟ is not a mythical being, but a
human named Phoenix Jackson, an old woman, whose memory plays tricks on her. Phoenix
Jackson‟s struggles to achieve her goal are struggles that everyman goes through in his journey
through life. „A Worn Path‟ is symbolic of the path of life, a path worn out, by the number of
people who have traversed it. This story has also been considered as “suggestive of a religious
pilgrimage while the conclusion implies that the return trip will be like the Journey of the Magi”
(Issacs 77).
The name Phoenix links the old woman to the Egyptian bird that periodically renews
itself from its ashes and equally apparent is “her quest motif associated with her annual journey
to Natchez” (Bartel 288). Phoenix‟s journey is also symbolic of Odysseus‟ journey. Merilyn
Keys sees „A Worn Path‟ as a “symbol for the resurrection of Christ” (354).
The story of „A Worn Path‟ is set in December – “a bright frozen day in the early morning”
(CS 142). Phoenix Jackson, an old Negro woman, her head tied in a red rag, is seen walking
through the pine woods.
Phoenix is a legendary bird from Egypt, it was similar to a big eagle with red, blue and gold
plumage. The bird always had a transformation. It resurrects from its own ashes and transforms
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into a new phoenix. In this way Eudora Welty‟s character Phoenix Jackson has a name which as
the bird symbolizes her physical appearance and her journey. In association with her physical
appearance Welty confirms that the name Phoenix refers to the bird, because one can see Welty‟s
mention of the three colour of the bird Phoenix in the old woman Phoenix Jackson :
i) “An old Negro woman with her head tied in a red rag coming along a path through
pinewoods” (CS 142). – the reference to the red colour;
ii) “Her eyes were blue with age” (142) – the blue colour;
iii) “Her skin had a pattern all its own numberless branching wrinkles and as though a whole
little tree stood in the middle of her forehead, but a golden colour ran underneath …”
(142) – the gold colour;
Related to her journey, Phoenix as the bird symbolizes life and death. It means that her life is
always renewed, because in each difficulty she passes, she dies a bit and then she is born again to
obtain the medicine for her grandson and with this she gives him life.
She is on her way to Natchez, an annual journey undertaken by her to obtain medicine for her
grandson who has swallowed lye and thereby permanently damaged his throat. She carries a thin
small cane with her with which she taps the ground as she walks recalling the old man, who
symbolizes death in Chaucer‟s „The Pardoner‟s Tale‟,
And on the ground, which is my moodres gate;
I knokke‟ with my staff, botheerly and late,
And saye, “Leevemooder, let me in!
Lo, how I vannysshe, flesh, and blood, and skyn!” (Ll 441-444)
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Phoenix finds her journey difficult, as it is not a smooth, straight path she is travelling on
“seems like there is chains about my feet, time I get this far”, and then “up through pines” and
“Now down through oaks” (CS 143). There are bushes to be wary of, creeks to be crossed,
barbed wire fences to go through, snakes to look out for and fears to be overcome. In short,
figuratively and literally it was a journey that took her over the hills and down dales. Phoenix
reaches Natchez late in the evening. She reaches the dispensary and quite forgets the reason for
her journey, until one of the nurses recognises her. The nurse‟s repeated questioning clears
Phoenix‟s mind. But it is only the top haze that is cleared. Phoenix‟s grandson is apparently dead
but Phoenix does not seem to comprehend this. She has been making her annual trips to Natchez
every year, for the past four years, to get medicine to soothe her grandson‟s throat.
Besides the obvious allusion to the Egyptian and Christian myth, Frank Ardolino has
discovered that “Phoenix re-enacts the death and re-birth of the pagan vegetation gods Osiris,
Attis and Adonis. She is identified with these ancient gods by her physical description and the
vegetation about her” (Ardolino 2-3). Old phoenix Jackson‟s
Skin had a pattern all its own numberless branching wrinkles and as though a
whole little tree stood in the middle of the forehead…. Under the red rag her hair
came down on her neck in the frailest of ringlets, still black, and with an odour
like copper (CS 142).
The pine and oak trees through which Phoenix Jackson passes are trees considered to be
sacred to Attis and Adonis. The red rag worn by her is symbolic of the anemone, “a flower that is
believed to have sprung from the blood of Adonais, or to have been stained by it” (Frazer 336).
While on her way Phoenix keeps muttering to herself, “Keep the big wild hogs out of my path.
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Don‟t let none of those come running in my direction” (CS 142). Adonais is believed to have
been killed by a wild boar, and Phoenix‟s reference to the wild boar reinforces the phoenix –
Adonais symbolism.
Osiris is the Egyptian corn god whose body Set, his brother, had cut into pieces and cast
into the Nile. Isis, the royal consort of Osiris, picked up the fragments and buried them. The
Egyptians regarded sowing as the burial of the fragments of Osiris‟ body and reaping, done with
lamentation, was regarded by them as Osiris being slain once again. It is this annual re-birth and
slaying that Phoenix Jackson re-enacts in her annual trip to Natchez. Phoenix Jackson‟s journey
for the soothing medicine for her grandson is symbolic of Aeneas‟ quest for the Golden Bough,
which would enable him to reach underworld and meet his father Anchises, whose advice he
sought. There is also an obvious reference to the legend of Daedalus, the architect of the
labyrinth for the Minotaur in Crete, in Phoenix Jackson‟s words as she goes into a field of old
cotton and dead corn, “Through the maze now”, she said, for there was no path (144).
„A Worn Path‟ is a story that strives “to probe the meaning of life in its simplest and most
elementary terms” (Isaacs 81). A probing that does not come up with anything new for the path
that is trod is a worn path, one through which not only Phoenix Jackson has passed but countless
people have passed and are passing. It is a path that is dark and lonely as hazardous as Aeneas‟
descent into Hades. Just as Aeneas was able to overcome all dangers and fears because of the
mistletoe or the Golden Bough he carried, so too Phoenix‟s difficulties seem light because her
goal is uppermost in her mind. The thorns that catch her skirt are symbolic of the loneliness, the
illusions, and the difficulties of her journey, and they seem of no consequence to her. Uppermost
in her mind is the medicine she must get for her grandson. Man‟s journey through life, like
phoenix‟s and Aeneas‟ is fraught with dangers and difficulties at every turn. Instead of losing
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hope, if he carries the Golden Bough with him – a goal, a desire to make something of his life
and not to be narcissistic, then, he, like Phoenix, will find no difficulty in overcoming those
hazards strewn on his path through life.
In portraying Phoenix Jackson, Eudora Welty carves a confluence of mythical, virtuous
traits of good Christian, a good Buddhist and loving matriarch. She parallels the symbol of
Buddha. Her conduct is ethical for Phoenix Jackson does not lie and is not unkind. She parallels
the eight fold path (1. Right View, 2. Right Intent, 3. Right Speech, 4. Right Focus, 5. Right
Alertness, 6. Right Purpose, 7. Right Effort and 8. Right Motivation) enunciated by Buddha.
The Eightfold Path
Fig.5 The Wheel of Dharma
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Phoenix Jackson‟s livelihood does not harm anyone and resembles the tradition of
Buddhism. As Buddha used his own two feet, his own voice to inspire religion that would
continue for generations, Phoenix Jackson also journeys to revive her generation. Her sacrificial
life resembles the mythical phoenix bird. She parallels the sacrificial Buddhist monk and also
the mythical bird in her traits of single minded determination and selflessness.