Orpheus and Eurydice: Some Modern Versions Author(s): M. Owen Lee Reviewed work(s): Source: The Classical Journal, Vol. 56, No. 7 (Apr., 1961), pp. 307-313 Published by: The Classical Association of the Middle West and South Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3294869 . Accessed: 27/02/2013 22:23 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. The Classical Association of the Middle West and South is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Classical Journal. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded on Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:23:15 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE: SOME MODERN VERSIONS M. OWEN LEE THE MYTH Of Orpheus and Eurydice cult, however, to categorize Greek has always been one of the most myths along these lines, as many of popular of the classic myths. Virgil's them partake of the nature of myth, fourth Georgic first immortalized it.1 legend and folklore at one and the In later ages it became a moral lesson, same time. The story of Orpheus and in Boethius, and a romance, in the Eurydice is certainly one of these. Middle English poem Sir Orfeo.2 In It has been assigned a number of the Renaissance it provided the sub- mythical origins because of its possible ject for the first secular drama in connection with the Orphic mysteries, a modern language, Politian's Orfeo.3 and because it fits well into the general Later it became a sort of blueprint for class of underworld descent-myths operatic composition, in the experi- which express the conflict of day and ments of the Florentine Camerata and night, of summer and winter, of life the monumental operas of Monteverdi and death. It was treated, even in and Gluck.4 Among the German Ro- ancient times, as legend because its manticists the myth symbolized the hero was one of the legendary found- poet's attempt to penetrate the mys- ers of Greek civilization. It can safely teries of death5 - a tradition which be classed as folklore because the cli- was inherited by Rainer Maria Rilke max of its action - the backward look - and many modern symbolist poets in is a part of the folklore of the world. France, England and America.6 Thus the myth of Orpheus and Eury- The meaning Orpheus and Eurydice dice meant at least three things to the have for the men of any age is largely ancient world: it symbolized the eter- conditioned by the way in which that nal struggle of elemental forces; it age uses myth. The myths of primitive recounted the legendary power of a peoples are often re-classified as myth great civilizer; it told a tragic love proper (an explanation of natural phe- story. Each level of myth had some- nomena), legend (the forerunner of thing to contribute to the richness of history) and folklore (a purely imagi- the resulting whole. And as the story native narration). It is extremely diffi- continued to appear in literature, part This content downloaded on Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:23:15 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 308 M. OWEN LEE myth, part legend, part folklore, it ates the conventional Eurydice, but to came to grips with three subjects: the Orphee "la moindre de ces phrases est mystery of life and death and rebirth; plus etonnante que tous les poemes."7 the all-compelling power of poetry and He seems to be discovering the very song; the tragic destruction of love and meaning of poetry in these messages, beauty when human emotion is not and one of them, "Madame Eurydice properly controlled. reviendra des enfers," he enters in the The classic treatments of the story annual poetry competition sponsored by in every age have dealt with these a local women's club called the Bac- themes, balancing and interlaying and chantes. undercutting them, as the myth be- As the play proceeds, the symbols came, in turn, allegory, romance, clas- become even more startling. Death sic drama, opera, romantic and symbo- comes to claim Eurydice; she is a beau- list poetry. Recently, Orpheus has tiful young woman who issues orders invaded the liveliest arts. He has to two surgeon-like assistants and a found his way to the Broadway stage set of "infernal machines" obviously and the motion picture and television meant to suggest the operating room. screens, appearing in contemporary She accidentally leaves her gloves be- guise. Jean Cocteau's Orpheus walks hind, however, and an angel named the boulevards of Paris; Jean Anouilh's Huertebise tells Orph&e he can follow fiddles in a provincial railway station; Eurydice into the next world by don- Tennessee Williams' haunts the juke ning the gloves and passing through joints of Mississippi, and Marcel the mirror: "Je vous livre le secret Camus' drives a streetcar in Rio de des secrets. Les miroirs sont les portes Janeiro. How valid, one may ask, are par lesquelles la Mort va et vient." 8 In Are of these new Orpheus-figures? any the split second it takes the postman to them really related Virgil's tragic to drop a letter in the mail box, Orph~e hero? Will any of them, we wonder, returns with Eurydice. But he must stand with the Orpheus-figures of Poli- never look on her again. When, in a index to the tian and Gluck as an spirit quarrel, he accidentally does so, she of an age? disappears. Orphee opens the letter and discov- CERTAINLY Cocteau's Orph&e will give ers that his poem "Madame Eurydice pause to many a future student of liter- reviendra des enfers" has aroused the ature. He seems to owe something to fury of the Bacchantes because its in- the Orph&e of the French symbolists: itial letters spell out "un mot in- the poet who is master of the secrets jurieux." "Le cheval m'a joue'!",9 he of life and death. But Cocteau has cries, but by joyfully accepting his complicated the figure by identifying martyrdom, he breaks the horse's spell it with himself. And in retelling Or- forever. In the closing scenes of the pheus' story (on the stage in 1926 and play, Orphee's severed head announces on the screen in 1951) he has overlaid that his name is really Jean Cocteau, the myth with his own set of symbols. and with his wife and guardian angel Thus, in the opening scene of the Huertebise he mounts to heaven. play, Orphee is shown detecting poetic This outline omits hundreds of details messages from the world beyond via which are undoubtedly significant to the hoofbeats of an oracular horse Cocteau and his following, but it should which he keeps in his house. This infuri- at least indicate some of the serious, This content downloaded on Wed, 27 Feb 2013 22:23:15 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions ORPHEUS AND EURYDICE: SOME MODERN VERSIONS 309 comic, analogous and scandalous levels dice once more, provided he never look in this modern treatment of the Or- on her again. pheus myth. As the film ends, Eurydice dies a In the film the horse, the poetry con- second time when Orphee accidentally test and the severed head are gone. glances at her image in a mirror, and The tone is almost unrelievedly serious. Orph'e is shot down by a mob of young The scope of the motion picture camera poets, who think he is responsible for enables us to enter the world beyond the death of Cegeste. Then, strangely the mirror, and the central character enough, both of them are restored to seems to be less Orph6e than the death- life again: the Princess and Huertebise bringing young woman, who is now a appear to say they are ready to die in Princess escorted by two motorcyclists. the place of the poet and his wife. Poe- Huertebise is now her chauffeur, and try has wrung the heart of death it- the poetic messages from the other world self. come over the short-wave radio in her In both the play and the film, logic Rolls-Royce. and convention are scorned in an at- The Orphee of the film is a cele- tempt to surround the story with an brated Parisian poet who has lost his atmosphere of unreality - ironically inspiration and is seeking a fresh ap- achieved by the introduction of the proach to poetry. In the opening scene, most realistic, even mechanical de- he is drinking at a sidewalk cafe when vices. But the deliberate shock element a popular young writer named Cegeste of the play has been replaced, after is run down and killed by the Princess twenty-five years, by the marvelous and her cyclists. Both Orphee and and the picturesque in the film. The Cegeste are carried off in the car, and theater audience is startled into ac- Orphee learns that the young man's cepting the story; the cinema audience poetry has actually come to him is drawn to do so by curious, evocative through the Princess, from the world of images.