Hello! So, I am hoping to write a 4000-word paper about historical versions of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth and how they reflect the world and context in which they were written. I have Hadestown for the modern retelling and Ovid. Are there any written versions that date farther back than Ovid and were written by an ancient Greek or Mycenean? Or even a notable retelling from the last millennia (so centuries after 1 BCE)?
by IcecreamCat_23
3 Comments
Let me clarify: the older version is to compare. Ovid was Roman, and they were infamous for changing Greek myths
Try Robert Henryson’s one, which was written around 1500 in Scots and built round the Orphic metaphysics of Marsilio Ficino. This is very, very complicated and you will not fit it into that space easily.
A couple more modern retellings would be the ”Sandman” comic and (in a roundabout way) the movie Portrait Of A Lady On Fire.
You probably want to look at opera—I don’t know much about opera but I know that Orpheus was a very common subject for opera in the 17 – 18th centuries. Paintings, too.