Rich with implications for the history of sexuality, gender issues, and patterns of Hellenic literary imagining, Marcel Detienne's landmark book recasts long-standing ideas about the fertility myth of Adonis. The author challenges Sir James Frazer's thesis that the vegetation god Adonis-- whose premature death was mourned by women and whose resurrection marked a joyous occasion--represented the annual cycle of growth and decay in agriculture. Using the analytic tools of structuralism, Detienne shows instead that the festivals of Adonis depict a seductive but impotent and fruitless deity--whose physical ineptitude led to his death in a boar hunt, after which his body was found in a lettuce patch. Contrasting the festivals of Adonis with the solemn ones dedicated to Demeter, the goddess of grain, he reveals the former as a parody and negation of the institution of marriage.
Detienne considers the short-lived gardens that Athenian women planted in mockery for Adonis's festival, and explores the function of such vegetal matter as spices, mint, myrrh, cereal, and wet plants in religious practice and in a wide selection of myths. His inquiry exposes, among many things, attitudes toward sexual activities ranging from "perverse" acts to marital relations.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.
Shipping:
US$ 4.00
Within U.S.A.
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. New. Fast Shipping and good customer service. Seller Inventory # Holz_New_0691001049
Book Description Condition: New. Book is in NEW condition. Seller Inventory # 0691001049-2-1
Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # FrontCover0691001049
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. New. Seller Inventory # Wizard0691001049
Book Description Paperback. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think0691001049
Book Description Soft Cover. Condition: new. Seller Inventory # 9780691001043
Book Description paperback. Condition: New. Language: ENG. Seller Inventory # 9780691001043
Book Description Condition: New. Seller Inventory # 403105-n
Book Description Paperback or Softback. Condition: New. The Gardens of Adonis: Spices in Greek Mythology - Second Edition 0.65. Book. Seller Inventory # BBS-9780691001043
Book Description Condition: New. Seller Inventory # ABLIING23Feb2416190100453