ATDTDA (18): 493-494 "captivated by eyes"

[Heikki Raudaskoski]

Dead-on. The Venerean Cyps, later in Venice/Venus (both rising
from the sea) makes something of a mirror image of another
character that has been referred to her: Tadzio in "Death in
Venice", feverishly gazed at by Aschenbach, who does not fail
to compare him to the Goddess:
"He [Tadzio] returned through the waves, he ran, his head flung
back, his legs churning the resistant water into foam; the living
figure with dripping curls, the sweet and acrid adolescent on the
verge of masculinity, as beautiful as a tender deity, rising from
the depths of sky and sea, emerging from the liquid element,
absconding from it: this vision aroused mythical associations;
it was like a poetic legend about primordial times, about the
origins of form and the births of the gods."
Thomas Mann, "Death in Venice and Other Tales", pp. 318-319.
Tr. Joachim Neugroschel. Penguin USA 1999.


Heikki

On Wed, 26 Sep 2007, Clément Lévy wrote:

> Did someone already mentioned that "Cyprian" is also a traditional
> epithet for Venus (Aphrodite)? Her island is Cyprus, it's where she
> landed after her creation from the semen of Ouranos that was thrown
> into the sea (with testicles and all) after he was castrated by his
> son Kronos.
> One of the first text to mention it must be Hesiod's Theogony, v.
> 176-206 (and the text gives the goddess another surname, Cytherea,
> because she went to Cythere before Cyprus).
> And look there at the first lines of an homeric hymn to Aphrodite:
> http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin/ptext?doc=Perseus%3Atext%
> 3A1999.01.0138%3Ahymn%3D5
> and there for general information on the goddess!
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aphrodite
> Could Cyprian be a devotee of Venus?
> Enjoy! (and thanks to Bob, Kevin and John for the links about the
> Klaxons, never heard of them before! sounds good)
> Clément
>
> Le 26 sept. 07 à 02:30, John BAILEY a écrit :
>
> > Cyprian finds romantic ? and erotic ? pleasure in gazes which
> > refuse to return his own interest. Obviously schooled in classical
> > art and the averted, cold gaze of antique statues and paintings,
> > this makes a certain amount of sense. One of Pavlov?s (or
> > Pointsman?s) dogs, learning to love the object regardless of its
> > emotional return.
> >
> > Worth visiting Sacher-Masoch?s Venus in Furs, here, though, and
> > Deleuze?s intro as well (the equal of its subject). Masochism is a
> > key to Cyprian?s metamorphosis, as he moves through various states
> > of submission not to find a final, triumphant will to power but to
> > find the right power to submit to. In these early stages of his
> > narrative he?s clearly conflicted, aroused by Yashmeen?s voice
> > alone but ?left with an inelastic embarrassment? which prevents him
> > from following the object of his desire.
> >
> > He conjugates Greek "in obscure gnomic tenses" to mentally distract
> > himself, but it doesn't work. A gnomic tense is one used to state
> > an apparently universal truth, I think - in Greek, usually worded
> > in a present or future tense form. He's looking for universal
> > platitudes to calm himself, but obviously his situation is far from
> > a universal one.
> >
> > There's also hints of the spiritual coming in here - important in
> > this chapter - when Yashmeen warns Cyps that he "burns incense at
> > the wrong altar." His devotional, perhaps even sacrificial
> > offerings won't be rewarded, in other words. Knowing as she says
> > this that, paradoxically, the voice that utters these words is
> > offering excitement (a reward?) at the same time.
> >
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