#scholarly source

[crazycatsiren]

Fire is one of the foundations of civilized life. It is the most primitive protection from beasts of prey, and so also from evil spirits. It gives warmth and light, and yet is always grievous and dangerous, the very epitome of destruction: things great, fixed, and solid dissolve in smoke and ashes. Fire with its multiple fascinations is present in almost every cult act of the Greeks.

- Walter Burkert, Greek Religion.

[annespencerpoet]

Scholarly Source: Lady Writes the Blues, Call and Response in the Poetry of Afro-American Women

Hopewell, K. (2000). Lady writes the blues. call and response in the poetry of afro-american women. Equal Opportunities International, 19(2-4), 93-102. Retrieved from https://login.intra.mills.edu:2443/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.intra.mills.edu:2443/docview/199661929?accountid=25251

This source links the poetry of Black women to the Blues tradition, as well as emphasizing the importance of the poet’s relationship to her audience. Valuable to anyone interested in poetry and/or African American literature, Hopewell’s text includes analysis of Anne Spencer, Ma Rainey, Nikki Giovanni, Ntozake Shange, and more. Hopewell argues that Spencer was of a group of poet who wrote firmly within the white male tradition, and that this was due to the influence of W.E.B. Du Bois. 

“Anne Spencer (1882-1975) wrote in a spirit of resistance but still locked into a white male literary tradition. "Lady Lady" was printed in The New Negro, an anthology that was a central document of the Harlem Renaissance, edited by Alain Locke in 1925. In this poem, Spencer draws on the long established image of the elevated and worshipped lady of courtly love surviving into the nineteenth century in the poetry of Alfred Tennyson. She bemoans the fact that the black woman whose face is "dark as night" cannot aspire to this perfect image; her hands are "bleached poor white in a sudsy tub" by constant toil. The black woman's innate spirituality, of pagan and African origin is cruelly supplanted by Christian dogma.”

[eurydicedramaturg-blog]

Research Notes

Casting as Queer Dramaturgy by Meghan Brodie

This article discusses a case study of a production of Sarah Ruhl’s Orlando. The director discusses her casting choices and how those choices furthered the examination (and rejection) of cisheteronormativity already strongly apparent in the play. This will be useful in making casting decisions for our production of Eurydice.

-          Considering positions of power in gendered casting

-          A woman playing a man is subversive, a man playing a woman is funny

-          Questioning and denying heteronormativity through casting of romantic pairs

-          Avoiding stereotypes when having characters portray a gender they do not identify as

-          Examining performative nature of gender

[eurydicedramaturg-blog]

Research Notes

Classics in the Modern World: A Democratic Turn? edited by Lorna Hardwick and Stephen Harrison

This book features a series of essays on ways that the ancient Greek and Roman cultures continue to have an impact in this day and age. I will be using two essays from it. One essay is on modern stagings of ancient dramas, which (although Eurydice is not in itself an ancient play) will provide perspective on bringing ancient stories into the modern world through theatre. The second essay focuses on feminist reinterpretations and will prove useful for examining modern portrayals of the character Eurydice.

-          Modern Stagings

o   Different types of authenticity

§  Nominal/Historical Authenticity – tries to be as faithful as possible to ancient performance traditions

§  Expressive Authenticity – tries to express the original author’s intent in whichever way best communicates that to a modern audience

§  Processual Authenticity – brings in the experiences and values of the artists creating the performance

§  Structural Authenticity – tries to match the structure of the original

§  Inductive Authenticity – seeks to affect the audience

§  Critical authenticity – Includes understanding of process and goals

-          Women’s Writing

o   Recovering women’s voices

o   Opening up stories closed off by a constant stream of male interpretations

o   Restoring life to “idols”

[eurydicedramaturg-blog]

Research Notes

Orpheus: The Metamorphoses of a Myth edited by John Warden

This book examines the cultural context of various adaptations of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth, both discussing the presiding interpretation(s) of each historical period and delving into the specific details of period-appropriate works focusing on the character. While this book has a heavy focus on Orpheus, examining Eurydice mainly as a side note, it does provide a comprehensive and relatively compact history of representations of the myth from our earliest knowledge to the Renaissance, as well as the historical context that influences each interpretation.

-          The original Greek myth is unavailable

-          Orpheus was likely based on a real person

-          There was most likely an early version of the descent myth where Orpheus was successful at bringing back Eurydice

-          Virgil and Ovid expected their readers to know the tale well and presented what were probably unique twists at the time.

-          Virgil is believed to be the one who introduced failure into the myth.

-          Virgil’s story is intended to criticize the poet’s wallowing in grief rather than accepting events as they are.

-          Ovid deliberately subverts the idea of Orpheus as the ideal poet, making him something akin to Romeo pre-masquerade. In this way he mocks the figure of the tortured artist.

-          Early Christian traditions used Orpheus as a Christ figure, venturing into Hades/Hell to rescue the lost soul of Eurydice/Humanity

-          The figures of Christ, David, and Orpheus were closely connected and somewhat interchangeable as musicians bringing God’s Word to the people

-          Medieval writers interpreted myths in three ways: Historic, Metaphor for Christian figures, Rhetorical morality teaching device

-          Orpheus became a prototype of the medieval courtly lover

-          In religious metaphor, Eurydice ironically represented both spiritual enlightenment (Orpheus’ search for her) and materialistic vice (looking back)

-          The inevitable Eurydice as Eve comparison (the snake is the devil)

-          Orpheus as a magician

-          Celtic adaptations drew heavily from Celtic tradition, with Orpheus in several adaptations having to rescue Eurydice from the fairy realm rather than the underworld

-          *Early renaissance artists took the myth less seriously, while also beginning the task of bringing it back to its roots.

-          Orpheus became part of a chain of theologic poets representing an unbroken lineage back to the early days of Greece.

-          Orpheus at time became associated as a symbol of “divine music”, which referred not to actual music, but to the idea of a supreme perfect order to the universe.

-          Orpheus as the self-conscious artist

-          Two phases – Euphemeristic (Orpheus as prophet-philosopher) and Platonic (Orpheus as historical character)

-          Orpheus started to be seen as a champion of unhappy love

-          Association with Apollo

-          Late renaissance painted him as a hero figure and focused more heavily on the Eurydice story

-          Eurydice represents the emotions and suffering of the story, Orpheus is the divine idealization.

-          Eurydice as an “intangible reality which cannot be grasped”

-          Several of the earliest operas were centered around the Orphic descent myth

-          The ending was commonly changed to be happier, as operas were commonly performed at weddings.

o   The condition for Eurydice’s return was left out, allowing Orpheus to easily bring her back.

o   Apollo intervenes, bringing Orpheus to heaven to be with her.

-          Views shifted to focus more on the importance of Love.

-          Immortality through art

-          Orpheus and Eurydice as part of the “courtly love” tradition

[eurydicedramaturg-blog]

Research Notes

Eurydice’s Body: Feminist Reflections of the Orphic Descent Myth in Philosophy and Film by Liz Locke This dissertation examines the myth through a feminist lens, as well as examining how several different adaptations reflect (or don’t reflect) feminist values. Locke argues that Eurydice is a “negative space” whose existence is only defined in relation to Orpheus and that defining her personhood is a responsibility of adaptors of the myth.

- Mythology as intertextual - Eurydice does not exist in any mythology that is not the story of her (twice-over) death - Did Eurydice die a virgin and does that matter? - Bodiless in the underworld, Eurydice is unavailable for sexual fulfillment - Orpheus as the archetypal tortured male artist and Eurydice as the artistic muse o The effect of her loss on his art o Eurydice also embodies the “Lost Bride” archetype - Orpheus as a Christ figure, Eurydice as Humanity - (Further notes on adaptation analysis forthcoming)

[sometypeof-feminism-blog]

This article does a great job talking about how women celebrities are viewed in the media, and some of the lies told about them and the business, check it out!

[fearlessfeministsladies]

Post 3: scholarly source

This source discusses a case study of the experiences of women in the STEM educational and professional system in Switzerland. It brings to light the fact that most women who graduate with a STEM degree will not continue to pursue a STEM career, but would rather go into the field of teaching simply because it may be less of a hassle for women to succeed in. This issue is known as the leaking pipeline (Makarova, Aeschlimann, Herzog, pg.2). The study calls into question the social role theory. According to this theory, society has its own shared opinion of what men and women are meant to do with their lives and careers. These views of what men and women are supposed to do have been engraved in the minds of most individuals of society. Since so many people share this view of gender roles, for one to abide such roles is viewed as something natural and normal (Makarova, Aeschlimann, Herzog, pg.3). The social role theory helps to explain why both men and women face difficulty when transitioning into fields of study and work that weren’t “meant” for them to be in. These people aren’t doing their gender. They aren’t acting in ways that correspond to their assigned gender which creates conflict within gendered organizations. Gendered organizations are “tactics of divisions of labor that keep the technology in men’s control and maintain ‘the definition of skilled work as men’s work and unskilled work as women’s work’ (Makarova, Aeschlimann, Herzog, pg. 4).

During the study, conductors initially analyze the treatment women in STEM education and professions then analyze the way in which women respond to their treatment. From the data provided, eight categories were created; Four to generalize the treatment women faced, and another four to summarize the women’s reaction to their treatment. The four treatment categories were described as wrong sex in which men make women feel that they don’t belong, exotic sex in which women are being treated as a minority by the men, and archetypal sex in which the men point out the differences between men and women based on stereotypes concerning the natural careers for the sexes. There is also the weak sex in which women are discriminated against through comparison of men making them look like inferior beings. The four response categories were named resilience in which women become tough to deal with the behaviors of men, and assimilation in which women become more masculine to fit in with the male dominant career., Women also respond with excellence by excelling in their field of work, and avoidance in which women try to go unnoticed. Most women in STEM training respond with resilience, while most women in STEM education respond by assimilating (Makarova, Aeschlimann, Herzog, pg.12)

Generally, I agree with the way in which the women response to the oppression of the men in STEM education and profession. I don’t think that women should allow men to deter them into different fields of study because running away from the problem will do nothing except pass it on to the next generation of STEM women. Women must struggle with their oppressions and discriminations in order to overcome them so taking the easy way out is unacceptable. The best two tactics that women can use to respond to their discrimination are resilience and excellence. I choose these two because by women excelling in STEM, they are giving men a slap in the face saying “Hey, I did all of this on my own and I didn’t even need a penis.” I also choose resilience because this tactic allows women to take a stand against their discrimination while still maintaining their feminine selves just with more confidence and authority. I disagree with the tactic of women assimilating into the ways of the masculine culture of STEM because even though it takes the pressure off women, it causes them to separate themselves from their natural femininity. The goal is to reshape the culture of STEM education and professions so that it accommodates both men and women entering the field. Assimilation supports the masculinity so one must ask themselves is it truly progressive to women of STEM?