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The Medusa Myth



Since I decided to go as Medusa this year for Halloween, I thought I should brush up on my Greek myths and not just rely on my memories of the 1981, stop-motion-tastic film Clash of the Titans.  In Ovid's rendition, this symbol of female power was once a beautiful, virginal priestess, "the jealous aspiration of many suitors," in the temple of Athena.  When Poseidon decides he will have her, he "ravishes" (i.e. rapes) her as she prays in temple in front of the altar of Athena.  The goddess Athena punishes Medusa's transgression by causing snakes to grow out of her head, tearing their way through her scalp to take the place of her much admired hair.  Athena gives Medusa boar's tusks and turns her skin to scales.  (The myth doesn't mention how Athena takes vengeance on Poseidon.)  After this torturous transformation Medusa is banished to the island of Cristhene, off the coast of Ethiopia in the Red Sea.  In exile she is pursued as she was in the temple, however, instead of coming to violate her men come to decapitate her, stealing her head for its ability to petrify any living creature.  So she waits on her island, turning everyone and everything who tries to come near her to stone, with only the company of her mane of slithering snakes to break her solitude.


The myth of Medusa is a tragedy.  I don't know which is worse: being so beautiful that you lose your job and are blamed for your own rape or destroying everyone who comes near with the mere sight of you.


What I love about the Medusa myth is the symbolism around female power.  Medusa engenders that power even once she is stripped of her beauty.  Even after she is beheaded she remains an unstoppable, undeniable force-- slayer of monsters, demons, and men.


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