Pygmalion (mythology)

For other uses, see Pygmalion.
Étienne Maurice Falconet: Pygmalion et Galatée (1763)

Pygmalion is a legendary figure of Cyprus. Though Pygmalion is the Greek version of the Phoenician royal name Pumayyaton,1 he is most familiar from Ovid's Metamorphoses, X, in which Pygmalion is a sculptor who falls in love with a statue he has made.

In Ovid's narrative, Pygmalion was a Cypriot sculptor who carved a woman out of ivory. According to Ovid, after seeing the Propoetides prostituting themselves, he is 'not interested in women', but his statue is so realistic that he falls in love with it. He offers the statue presents and eventually prays to Venus (Aphrodite). She takes pity on him and brings the statue to life. They marry and have a son, Paphos:

"...a lovely boy was born;

Paphos his name, who grown to manhood, wall'd
The city Paphos, from the founder call'd."

2 and in some versions also a daughter.3 Ovid's mention of Paphos suggests that he was drawing on the same sources as the brief account of Pygmalion and Galatea in Bibliotheke, a Hellenic mythography of the second-century CE that was formerly attributed to Apollodorus. Pygmalion is the Greek version of the Phoenician royal name Pumayyaton, and Galatea figures in the founding legend of Paphos in Cyprus.

Contents

Parallels in Greek myth

The story of the breath of life in a statue has parallels in the examples of Daedalus, who used quicksilver to install a voice in his statues; of Hephaestus, who created automata for his workshop; of Talos, an artificial man of bronze; and, according to Hesiod, Pandora, who was made from clay at the behest of Zeus.

The moral anecdote of the "Apega of Nabis", recounted by the historian Polybius, described a supposed mechanical simulacra of the tyrant's wife, that crushed victims in her embrace.

The discovery of the Antikythera mechanism suggests that such rumoured animated statues had some grounding in contemporary mechanical technology. The island of Rhodes was particularly known for its displays of mechanical engineering and automata - Pindar, one of the nine lyric poets of ancient Greece, said this of Rhodes in his seventh Olympic Ode:

"The animated figures stand
Adorning every public street
And seem to breathe in stone, or
move their marble feet."

The trope of a sculpture so lifelike it seemed about to move was a commonplace with writers on works of art in Antiquity that was inherited by writers on art after the Renaissance.

Sources

The Greek sources of Ovid's tale are fully discussed at Galatea.

Re-interpretations of Pygmalion

The basic Pygmalion story has been widely transmitted and re-presented in the arts through the centuries. At an unknown date, later authors give the name of the statue as the sea-nymph Galatea or Galathea. Goethe calls her Elise, based upon the variants in the story of Dido/Elissa.

In the Middle Ages Pygmalion was held up as an example of the excesses of idolatry, probably spurred by Clement of Alexandria's suggestion that Pygmalion had carved an image of Aphrodite herself. Although, by the 18th century it was a highly influential love-story, seen as such in Rousseau's musical play of the story. By the 19th century, the story often becomes one in which the awakened beloved rejects Pygmalion; although she comes alive, she is initially cold and unattainable.

A twist on this theme can also be seen in the story of Pinocchio where a wooden puppet is transformed into a real boy, though in this case the puppet possesses sentience prior to its transformation, and it is the puppet and not the woodcarver (sculptor) who beseeches the miracle.

William Shakespeare has a version of the legend in The Winter's Tale when Hermione is seen as a lifelike statue in the final scene.

Paintings

The story has been the subject of notable paintings by Jean-Léon Gérôme, Honoré Daumier, Edward Burne-Jones (four major works from 1868–1870, then again in larger versions from 1875-1878), Auguste Rodin, Ernest Normand, Paul Delvaux, Francisco Goya, Franz von Stuck, Francois Boucher, and Thomas Rowlandson, among others. There have also been numerous sculptures of the 'awakening'.

Literature

Ovid's Pygmalion has inspired several works of literature, including

Opera, ballet and music

The story of Pygmalion is the subject of Jean-Philippe Rameau's 1748 opera, Pigmalion. It was also the subject of Gaetano Donizetti's first opera, Il Pigmalione.

The English progressive rock group Yes composed "Turn Of The Century" (1977); it tells the story of the sculptor Roan who, in the grief of his wife's death, "molds his passion into clay." The sculpture of his wife comes to life and they fall in love.

The great choreographer Marius Petipa and the composer Prince Nikita Trubetskoi created a 4 act ballet on the subject called Pygmalion, ou La Statue de Chypre. The ballet was revived in 1895 with the great ballerina Pierina Legnani.

The song "Trial By Fire" by [darkwave/gothic band] ThouShaltNot creates the idea of a modern day Pygmalion with lyrics such as "I sculpt your nature within, I am your Pygmalion" and "I dust away the plaster from off your breathing body.. You'll never be the same."

Stage plays

W. S. Gilbert's stage version, 1871

There have also been successful stage-plays based upon the work, such as W. S. Gilbert's Pygmalion and Galatea (1871).

George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion (1912, staged 1914) owes something to both the Greek Pygmalion and the legend of "King Cophetua and the beggar maid"; in which a King lacks interest in women, but one day falls in love with a young beggar-girl, later educating her to be his Queen. Shaw's comedy of manners in turn was the basis for the Broadway musical My Fair Lady (1956).

Films

Notable 20th century feature films are My Fair Lady (1964, based on the stage play); Mighty Aphrodite by director Woody Allen; Weird Science directed by John Hughes; and the 1987 film Mannequin, a remake of the 1948 classic One Touch of Venus, as well as S1m0ne (featuring a computer-generated artificial intelligence as the love object); Many films have dealt collaterally with this theme.: Vertigo, and more recently Lars and the Real Girl, depicting an introverted man who falls in love with a plastic sex doll.

The popular horror genre in film has also had an interest in 'bringing to life' waxwork figures and show-room dummies (see: Waxworks: A Cultural Obsession by Michelle Bloom). Many horror films deviate considerably from the original story; for example, in The Stepford Wives (1975) the creators turn their living wives into inanimate (robotic, compliant) wives. Likewise, the legend serves as the inspiration for one of the Lineages, the Galatea, that appears in the White Wolf role-playing game Promethean: The Created.

Groundhog Day (1993), directed by Harold Ramis. Another Pygmalion story, but this time the material the sculptor works on is himself. Phil Connors (Bill Murray) is a jaded, dyspeptic, arrogant, cynical and obnoxious TV newsreader who on Feb. 2 finds himself covering the emergence of the groundhog in Puxatawney, Pa. When he wakes up the next morning, he finds that it is not the next morning, but Groundhog Day all over again and all over again and all over again. (His own spring will be late.) His responses to being trapped eternally in the same day include disbelief, despair, excess and hedonism before he settles down to make the best of the situation, which, it turns out, means making the best of himself — a self-help project that takes forever, but forever is what he has. (It is as if he were at once the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future and the object of their tutelary attention.). By bits and pieces, fits and starts, he makes himself into the most popular fellow in town and wins the love of his producer, the beautiful Rita (a perfectly cast Andie MacDowell). The miracle is that as the movie becomes more serious, it becomes funnier. The comedy and the philosophy (how shall one live?) do not sit side by side, but inhabit each other in a unity that is incredibly satisfying. This is a “feel-good” movie in at least two senses of the word “good.” (Stanly Fish, The New York Times, 2009-01-05)

Television

  • The American TV series My Living Doll portrayed a female robot whose creators attempted to transform her into a "perfect woman".
  • The Aerosmith music video for Hole in My Soul features a nerdy college student who tries to find the girl of his dreams by creating one in a lab only to have her leave him.
  • In Justice League Unlimited, Emile Hamilton creates a clone of Supergirl, that he names Galatea.
  • In Philippine TV series Love Spell presents: Barbie-cute features a teenage boy who falls in love with a mannequin who comes to life when lightning strikes it.
  • The Japanese anime series Chobits - there is a dispute as to how 'real' the robots are and deals with the morality or the issue
  • Dennis Potter's final works Karaoke & Cold Lazarus feature a character called Arthur "Pig" Maillion
  • In the music video for This Time by K-pop group Wonder Girls,a designer falls in love with his mannequin,and she comes to life.She runs away,leaving the designer to chase after her.
  • The American TV series Will and Grace (Season 5) aired a series of four episodes in which Will and Jack teach Karen's cousin Barry how to be a "gay" man; Will consequently develops feelings for Barry.

Notes

  1. ^ See Pygmalion of Tyre.
  2. ^ Ovid, Metamorphoses X.
  3. ^ Pseudo-Apollodorus, Bibliotheke, iii.14.3.

Further reading

  • Essaka Joshua. (2001). Pygmalion and Galatea: The History of a Narrative in English Literature. Ashgate.
  • Kenneth Gross. (1992). The Dream of the Moving Statue. Cornell University Press. (A wide-ranging survey of 'living statues' in literature and the arts).
  • Jack Burnham. Beyond Modern Sculpture (1982). Allan Lane. (A history of 'living statues' and the fascination with automata - see the introductory chapter: "Sculpture and Automata").
  • Ernst Buschor. Vom Sinn der griechischen Standbilder (1942). (Clear discussion of attitudes to sculptural images in classical times).
  • John J. Ciofalo. "The Art of Sex and Violence - The Sex and Violence of Art." The Self-Portraits of Francisco Goya. Cambridge University Press, 2001.
  • John J. Ciofalo. "Unveiling Goya's Rape of Galatea." Art History (December 1995), pp. 477-98.
  • Gail Marshall. (1998). Actresses on the Victorian Stage: Feminine Performance and the Galatea Myth. Cambridge University Press.
  • Alexandra K. Wettlaufer. (2001). Pen Vs. Paintbrush: Girodet, Balzac, and the Myth of Pygmalion in Post-Revolutionary France. Palgrave Macmillan.
  • Danahay, Martin A. (1994) "Mirrors of Masculine Desire: Narcissus and Pygmalion in Victorian Representation". Victorian Poetry, No. 32, 1994: pages 35-53.
  • Edward A. Shanken. (2005) “Hot 2 Bot: Pygmalion’s Lust, the Maharal’s Fear, and the Cyborg Future of Art,” Technoetic Arts 3:1: 43-55.
  • (2005). Almost Human: Puppets, Dolls and Robots in Contemporary Art, Hunterdon Museum of Art, Clinton, NJ. (Catalogue for a group exhibition Mar 20 - Jun 12 2005)

See also

External links

Sister project Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Pygmalion and Galatea

Wikipedia content modification information:

  • This page was last modified on 5 January 2009, at 13:11.

Wikipedia Authorship and Review

Wikipedia content provided here is not reviewed directly by PediaView.com. Wikipedia content is authored by an open community of volunteers and is not produced by or in any way affiliated with PediaView.com.

Wikipedia Usage Guidelines

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article on "Pygmalion (mythology)".

The URL for this specific entry is:

All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License. (See Copyrights for details). Wikipedia® is a registered trademark of the Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.