Icarus, Brueghel and the poets a study of meaning in the myth of Daedalus and Icarus

[摘要] The myth of Daedalus and Icarus has always seemed such a simple story: a cautionary taleabout disobedience and hubris. The fallacy of that presumption has resulted in thisdissertation.The research question took an equally simple form: What does the myth of Daedalus andIcarus mean? Such a question presumes that there is a definitive original version of themyth. This turned out not to be the case. As a result, three subordinate research questionsemerged: (a) how might the myth be understood if different versions of it existed?, (b) whatform might these differing variants take?, and (c) what broader, connotative meanings mightthe myth possess?In attempting to answer the main research question and its corollaries, the dissertation has anumber of purposes, the first of which is to try to define what we mean when we talk or writeabout myth. While some of the major debates are touched upon, Chapter 1 pretends to belittle more than an introduction to a vast and amorphous topic. Some of the theoreticalmatters underpinning this research are also dealt with here.The second purpose is to offer a critical reading of Melville's translation of Ovid'sMetamorphoses. This is the focus of Chapter 2. However, what we understand and perceiveabout the myth, its main characters, and what the mythic events mean createpresuppositions and presumptions that impinge on our understanding of its meaning/soConsequently, the second chapter begins with an overview of the inter-relationships of themajor characters involved in the myth and those tales associated with Minos and Crete.Chapter 3 may be considered almost as an adjunct to the first two. It presents several ofversions and variants of the Icarus myth. Most of these alternatives affect the way hispremature demise is perceived and its significance or meaning understood.The dissertation's third purpose is to study how a number of poets from America, Britain, andSouth Africa have made use of various aspects of the myth to create poems that serve asinterpretations or variants of the myth. Six poems comprise the subject of Chapter 4.Chapter 5 has a narrower focus, given over, as it is, to an examination of how three majorEnglish-speaking poets have used one of Brueghel's paintings of the myth in various ways toproduce poems about, or related to, the subject of Icarus. To this end, the chapter opens witha discussion of Brueghel's work as well as some earlier depictions of the myth.Chapter 6 explores several broader connotative meanings of the myth. It explores what elsethe myth could mean. A brief opening discussion of denotative and connotative meaning leadsto a range of reflections on such matters as exile, flight, the rebel and conformity, and thefather/son relationship among others. The various sections of the chapter are intended toinitiate, even provoke discussion and debate about the myth's meaning; it offers nothing thatshould be construed as either comprehensive or definitive.Chapter 7 contains a collection of more than two dozen poems (in English) inspired in someway by the Icarian myth. It goes without saying that many more texts exist in German,French, and Spanish, to say nothing of examples in Eastern European languages. The textsincluded here provide nothing more than a soupcon of the range and diversity of responsesthe myth has provoked. Their inclusion should not be taken as any sort of benchmark forcreative quality or otherwise.The dissertation concludes with a list of references.

[发布机构] University of the Free State