Iphigenia
Classical Lit Rock Spring Break
Friday, April 10, 2009
Curiosity and Advice
What's with these people and not taking advice? Everytime a god tells a mortal not to do something, they do it anyway, regardless of the fact that the god actually cares for them and the other people who pressure them do not. Take Cupid and Psyche. He was supposed to make her life miserable but instead, he risks his mom's anger and makes Psyche his wife. He absolutely adores her, but although he tells her what will happen if she asks her sisters for a visit and although he tells her what will happen if she sees his true form, she does it anyway. It just kills me on the inside! Looking at it over and over again though, I think Apuleius points out a pretty valid point about human nature. Maybe deep down, everybody would have trouble living in a mystery. People are naturally curious, and the sisters only brought Psyche's doubt to the surface. Undoubtedly, if left alone, she would eventually have done the same thing by herself. Humans aren't meant to live in the unknowing and whenever someone tells us we will never understand something, we rebel because we're so full of our own intelligence and curiosity that we just can't believe that. It's like when we're kids and our parents tell us not to do something and we do it anyway and then find out why we were forbidden to do it in the first place. But maybe that's something we had to do for ourselves to experience first hand the bad consequences to knowing something. I don't think we should be afraid to do that, but I suppose we should be smart about it? We'll see.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment