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Aphrodite - unabridged notes, research, resources, further reading (Patreon)

Published:
2016-05-11 19:16:41
Imported:
2022-03

Content

  • Background/history

For a character who doesn’t have many stories of her own, she gets namedropped a lot.


Thesis: Aphrodite is beloved in pop culture more as a symbol or an idea than as a well-rounded character. Combine this with confused ideas on sexual female characters, and her portrayals are a bit all over the place.


  • Antiquity - virgin/whore dichotomy -

  • Greek goddesses tended to either be virgins, whores, or jealous nags.

  • Aphrodite is a bit of an odd duck from that point of view as she is more like Zeus than any of the other goddesses - married, sleeps around with whoever, highly sexualized but still a goddess and therefore not demonized, jealous spouse, etc.

  • Important distinction on Greek ideas of love - The modern idea of romantic love is a very 20th century idea

    • Agápe love, charity; the love of God for man and of man for God. Agape is used in ancient texts to denote feelings for one's children and the feelings for a spouse, and it was also used to refer to a love feast. Agape is used by Christians to express the unconditional love of God for his children. This type of love was further explained by Thomas Aquinas as "to will the good of another.

    • Éros  love, mostly of the sexual passion. Plato: Although eros is initially felt for a person, with contemplation it becomes an appreciation of the beauty within that person, or even becomes appreciation of beauty itself. Plato does not talk of physical attraction as a necessary part of love, hence the use of the word platonic to mean, "without physical attraction." In the Symposium, the most famous ancient work on the subject, Plato has Socrates argue that eros helps the soul recall knowledge of beauty, and contributes to an understanding of spiritual truth, the ideal "Form" of youthful beauty that leads us humans to feel erotic desire – thus suggesting that even that sensually based love aspires to the non-corporeal, spiritual plane of existence; that is, finding its truth, just like finding any truth, leads to transcendence. Lovers and philosophers are all inspired to seek truth through the means of eros.

    • Philia "affectionate regard, friendship," usually "between equals."It is a dispassionate virtuous love, a concept developed by Aristotle. In his best-known work on ethics, Nicomachean Ethics, philia is expressed variously as loyalty to friends (specifically, "brotherly love"), family, and community, and requires virtue, equality, and familiarity. Furthermore, in the same text philos denotes a general type of love, used for love between family, between friends, a desire or enjoyment of an activity, as well as between lovers.

    • Storge love, affection especially of parents and children" It's the common or natural empathy, like that felt by parents for offspring. Rarely used in ancient works, and then almost exclusively as a descriptor of relationships within the family. It is also known to express mere acceptance or putting up with situations, as in "loving" the tyrant. This is also used when referencing the love for one’s country or a favorite sports team.

  • Therefore pop-culture iterations of Aphrodite are imposing a modern idea of romantic love onto a character that was an embodiment of a completely different idea of love

    • “ At first glance (murals, pottery paintings, etc) many aspects of Athenian life might appear to justify the modern popular belief that Greeks lived in a rosy haze of uninhibited sexuality, untroubled by fear, guilt, shame which later cultures were to invent. The Greeks did, after all, treat sexual enjoyment as the province of a goddess, Aphrodite (in the same way as they regarded other activities as the provinces of other deities), calling it ‘what belongs to Aphrodite’ (ta aphrodisia!). HOWEVER it was actually thought honorable for a woman and her husband to have intercourse in the privacy of their own home. And Greeks were shocked to see barbarian cultures having sex in public places (Greek Popular Morality https://books.google.com/books?id=XvyoMAUCTh8C&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false)

  • Love as we conceive it today, back in antiquity was considered a literal disease - The normal infatuation associated with falling in love was basically looked upon as a mental disorder

    • During the Hellenistic period in Athens, the famous philosopher Aristotle thought that women would bring disorder, evil, and were “utterly useless and caused more confusion than the enemy.” Because of this, Aristotle thought keeping women separate from the rest of the society was the best idea. (Pry, Kay O (2012). "Social and Political Roles of Women in Athens and Sparta". Sabre and Scroll Vol 1 Issue 2.)

    • Though Aristotle denied that women were slaves or subject to property, arguing that "nature has distinguished between the female and the slave", but he considered wives to be "bought". He argued that women's main economic activity is that of safeguarding the household property created by men. According to Aristotle the labour of women added no value because "the art of household management is not identical with the art of getting wealth, for the one uses the material which the other provides". ( Gerhard, Ute (2001). Debating women’s equality: toward a feminist theory of law from a European perspective. Rutgers University Press. pp. 32–35. ISBN 978-0-8135-2905-9.)

      • There were schools of thought that disagreed with this of course, like the Stoics who wanted sexual equality, and things were muuuuuuuch better for women in Sparta than Athens.

    • Socrates wrote “women are the weaker sex...being born a woman is a divine punishment, since a woman is halfway between a man and an animal.” Aristotle wrote: “The male is by nature superior and the female inferior and one rules and the other is ruled. This inequality is permanent because the woman’s deliberative faculty is without authority, like a child’s.” For Aristotle “menstrual discharge was semen, but lacking only the soul.” According to Aristotle, women were imperfect or malformed males produced as a result of a conjugal act stained by some impurity.

  • Tried looking up if aristotle had beef with Aphrodite, and this quote was from “The Moral Philosophy of Aristotle” but as sung by Homer: “Again, men are the more evil the more they are deliberate in their wrongdoings. Now neither the angry man nor anger itself are the results of deliberate intention but are open and undisguised. On the other hand Desire is crafty in its working; just as Aphrodite herself is said to be ‘The Goddess Cyprus-born, the weaver of deceit.” Homer sings of her embroidered girdle how upon it was “the temptress tongue that guiles the thought even of the prudent mind”  (https://play.google.com/books/reader?id=ekMNAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&output=reader&hl=en&pg=GBS.PA1)

  • Femme Fatale/Vamp in modern culture

    • Aphrodite’s modern portrayals - sexualized, either a ditz or a femme fatale.

    • Started off as a vampire-like woman (sometimes literally a vampire) as portrayed in art/poetry/gothic novels/opera before the 20th century. Often portrayed as foreign-looking Asian/Arabian/Romany

    • A femme fatale is defined by “Her ability to entrance and hypnotise her victim with a spell was in the earliest stories seen as being literally supernatural; hence, the femme fatale today is still often described as having a power akin to an enchantress, seductress, vampire, witch, or demon, having power over men. One of the most common traits of the femme fatale include promiscuity and the, "rejection of motherhood," seen as, "one of her most threatening qualities since by denying his immortality and his posterity it leads to the ultimate destruction of the male." Typically villainous, or at least morally ambiguous, and always associated with a sense of mystification and unease”

      • Curiously, aphrodite is neither - she is both sexually liberated, and a mother, as the mother of Eros/Cupid.

      • That said, we pretty much never see the motherhood aspect in pop culture iterations. The fact that she's married to Festus/Vulcan gets included sometimes, but Venus the mother figure, almost never

      • Which is why earlier portrayals tend to be less sexualized, since Aphrodite is a “good guy”, but as we move forward in time and being sexualized isn’t necessarily a rejection of motherhood or soooo evil, we start seeing more variation.

    • Historically: Mohini, Lilith, the Sirens, the Sphinx, Scylla, Aphrodite, Circe, Medea, Clytemnestra, Lesbia, Helen of Troy and Visha Kanyas. Salome, Jezebel, Cleopatra, Morgan le Fay.

    • For the Marquis de Sade the femme fatale symbolised not evil, but all the best qualities of Women; his novel Juliette 1797 is perhaps the earliest wherein the femme fatale triumphs

    • 1913 “The Vampire” by Robert Vignola credited as the first “vamp” movie

    • 1915 “A Fool There Was” starring Theda Barda -credited with defining the “vamp”

      • Title based on a Kipling Poem describing a seduced man

    • 1940s and 1950s Film Noir era

    • Contrast to the Heroic seductress Trope

      • Women who epitomize sex as good (not evil/punishable). She uses sex to get what she wants, but what she wants is for the greater good, not selfish/evil

      • Felicity in Austin powers 2, Barbarella, Grace Kelly in Rear Window. Inara in Firefly, Margaery in GOT, Black Widow (after she turns good).



  • Venus Conflated with Galatea?
    • The Tinted Venus by Thomas Anstey Guthrie

      • Loosely based on the Pygmalion myth

    • 1948 One Touch of Venus - Ava Gardner as Venus

      • http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0040669/

      • Originally a 1943 Broadway Musical (Starring Mary Martin aka Peter Pan)  based on the novella

        • This movie is the inspiration for the 1987 film Mannequin.

      • Wealthy department-store mogul Whitfield Savory II buys a statue of Venus for $200,000. He plans to exhibit it in the store. Eddie Hatch, a window dresser, kisses the statue on a whim. To his shock, Venus comes to life. Hijinks and love spells ensue

      • “To Venus, the goddess of love”

      • One sip of champagne and making out with a statue seems like a reasonable course of action.

      • This one she seems to have an effect on his sanity, not the I dream of genie vibe of the remake

      • Eighties remake the mortal love interest is soooooo reasonable- 40s version she's a paranoid nag

      • Surprising amount of sexual innuendo for a 40s movie (bed)

      • Venus talks about past lovers

      • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YO-Q_O2vb14 (scene where she comes to life)

      • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UluAL7GMPWw (musical number about love, seems to be the biggest song from both show and movie)

      • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQxXjVYgUQg (Mary Martin singing from the musical on a radio show, but then at 5:20ish a scene starts which gives a little more plot)

    • 1988 “Goddess of Love” TV movie starring Vanna White - more or less the exact same thing

      • http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095230/

      • The god Zeus sends Venus, the goddess of love, to Earth to find her own true love.

      • Zeus banishes her because she doesn’t goddess of love good enough

      • 1:13 - “I prefer to be called venus”

      • “Prove that she can keep his love without killing him” well then

      • This is why her most famous role is non-speaking

      • 9:06 - “Hi Thor, how’s the old hammer?”

      • So I guess the world was goddess of love-less for a couple thousand years

      • Corpse bride contrivance

      • More Galataea confluence

      • That south carlolinian accent

      • Home alone villains who keep trying to steal back the statue

      • Requisite 80’s shopping montage set to a song just called “shopping spree”

    • 1988 Uma Thurman - Adventures of Baron Munchausen

      • What the christ did I just watch

    • Marvel Comics has Venus, who is a Greek nymph that started out as an evil temptress but was cursed by a wizard to have a soul as "beautiful" as her appearance. Now, she uses her beauty and Glamour powers to help people.


  • Modern Fare
  • Percy Jackson Books:

      • (stuff from the wiki that’s NOT just basic mythology facts, cause it’s a lot of that)

        • Aphrodite’s depiction is pretty similar to her traditional personality from mythology - temperamental, vain, crafty, flirtatious, and disloyal to her husband Hephaestus, having many affairs (most notably with Ares). She was shown to have a deep grudge against those who have "perverted" notions of love, such as the self-absorbed Narcissus and the asexual Hippolytus, and would punish them severely if she could. Aphrodite could also be cruel and vindictive against those who either disrespect her, as seen by the example of Smyrna, who refused to worship and respect the goddess. As a result, the goddess cursed Smyrna into falling in love with Cinyras, her own father. Afterwards, an infuriated Cinyras pursued her with a bared sword, threatening to kill her. The goddess was infamously brutal towards Psyche in Percy Jackson's Greek Heroes, since the latter had not only unintentionally taken away the spotlight from Aphrodite, but had also won the love of the goddess' own son, Eros. Despite her dark side, Aphrodite could be truly sweet, loving, and passionate, and she has a faith in love that is absolute and true. She could also be gentle and gracious to those she favors (such as Pygmalion and Adonis in Percy Jackson's Greek Gods), and she deeply cares for her children as well as their fathers. Her graciousness could even extend towards those who had initially incurred her wrath by offending her, as seen by how she ultimately took pity on Smyrna and transformed her into a myrrh tree to protect her from her father's wrath. Presiding over the most powerful of human feelings, Aphrodite has great insight into mortal emotions, as well as mortal nature by extension. It is nearly impossible to disagree with her.

      • She was elegant without trying, fashionable without effort, stunning without makeup.  –-Piper complimenting Aphrodite, The Lost Hero

      • As a daughter of Ouranos, Aphrodite is an extremely powerful goddess who surpassed many others, especially since - in her own words - "love can bring even the gods to their knees." Even Percy once acknowledged that Aphrodite's powers scared him more than Ares'.

      • As the personification of beauty, Aphrodite's true appearance is actually unknown as she would appear to others as their personal epitome of physical attraction. In Percy Jackson's Greek Gods, it was confirmed that Aphrodite's appearance would change to appeal to each person who gazed upon her. Before she was presented to the other gods at Olympus, the Horai dressed her in a beautiful white gossamer dress, placed a delicate golden crown on her head, hung gold earrings in her ears, and draped a gold necklace at the base of her throat. She was so beautiful that she immediately excited desire and admiration in all the gods, and envy and resentment in all the goddesses. In Percy Jackson's Greek Heroes, it is mentioned that Aphrodite's eyes glow pink when she is infuriated. In The Titan's Curse, Aphrodite was portrayed as wearing a red satin dress, with hair curled in a cascade of ringlets, perfect makeup, dazzling eyes like pools of spring water, and a smile that would have lit up the dark side of the moon. Her beauty was such that at his first sight of her, Percy forgot his location and how to speak coherently, and he noted that when she smiled, she looked like a mixture of Annabeth and a TV actress he had a crush on in fifth grade. Aphrodite was also shown to take especial care of her looks and can see the tiniest flaw, as demonstrated by her asking Percy to hold her mirror while she amended some flaw he could not see. In The Lost Hero, when Piper first saw Aphrodite in Medea's department store during a dream, she wore a different appearance, but was still gorgeous to behold: shoulder-length hair, a graceful neck, perfect features, and an amazing figure tucked into jeans and a snowy-white top. Piper also noted that Aphrodite was different from other extremely beautiful women she had seen before: her mother was elegant without trying, fashionable without effort, stunning without makeup. However, she was unable to determine the exact color of her mother's hair and eyes, given that Aphrodite's appearance changed as she observed her, due to her trying to match Piper's ideal of beauty. In The Mark of Athena, Aphrodite appeared to Annabeth as a breathtakingly beautiful woman with dark chocolate curls and eyes that sparkled playfully, going from green to blue to amber. She was dressed like a Southern belle: her gown had a low-cut bodice of pink silk and a three-tiered hoop skirt with white scalloped lace, and she wore long white silk gloves, and held a feathered pink-and-white fan to her chest. Her face was said to be hard to describe as her features seemed to shift from those of one glamorous movie star to another, becoming increasingly beautiful as it changed by the second. Annabeth was instantly, irrationally jealous of her because she had always wished she had dark hair so she would be taken more seriously than a blonde. Aphrodite also manifested other traits that served to make Annabeth feel inadequate: the easy grace with which she wore her dress, the perfect yet understated makeup, and the way she radiated feminine charm that no man could possibly resist.

        • Appearances in Books:

      • The Lightning Thief

        • Aphrodite is mentioned as constantly cheating on her husband with Ares (and mortals judging from all of her children). Hephaestus constantly makes traps to embarrass her in front of the other gods, one of which Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase get trapped in while recovering Ares' shield at an abandoned waterpark. Percy finds Aphrodite's scarf, which Annabeth snatches away from him before he can get intoxicated by the perfume. Later in the series, Percy finds the scarf in the attic of the Big house whilst visiting the Oracle and wonders why Annabeth kept it since he thought she had just thrown it away.

      • The Titan's Curse

        • When Percy visits the attic to see the Oracle, he sees Aphrodite's scarf from the events of The Lightning Thiefand wonders why Annabeth had left it in the attic. He later meets Aphrodite and Ares outside of the Junkyard of the Gods in the desert. She expresses her interest in Percy's love life, saying that his desire to save Annabeth is very cute. She also says that she isn't going to make Percy's love life easy and that she was the one who gave the poisoned T-shirt to Connor and Travis Stoll to pass to Phoebe as to give Percy entrance to the Quest. She is also seen at the winter solstice voting for Percy and Thalia Grace not to be disintegrated.

      • The Battle of the Labyrinth

        • When Percy lands on the island of Ogygia, he meets Calypso and thinks that she is more beautiful than Aphrodite, but doesn't dare to say it out loud for fear of being zapped by her. Also, when Hephaestus comes to the island to ask Percy if he wants to leave, he tells him to beware of love due to the lack of loyalty from his wife. Percy also assumes Aphrodite landed him on Ogygia to make his love life interesting because she "likes him", although he later learns that it was Hera who had sent him to Ogygia.

      • The Last Olympian

        • When Annabeth is chosen to be the official architect of Olympus, Aphrodite goes along with Apollo saying that there should be many statues of her as well.

      • The Lost Hero

        • Aphrodite claims Piper McLean soon after her arrival at Camp Half-Blood. She gives Piper her blessing with new magic makeup, hairdo and a pretty sleeveless dress with gold bracelets. She later makes an appearance in her daughter Piper's dream and talks to her. After the talk, Leo Valdez,Jason Grace, Gleeson Hedge, and Piper all have new clothes and a bag with supplies. In the dream, she tells Piper of their true enemy, Gaea. She also reveals why she considers herself to be the most powerful goddess as well as the oldest, being created out of Ouranos. When he was defeated his immortal essence created the sea foam from which Aphrodite was born. She believes she is the most powerful due to the fact that love can bring the gods to their knees. She also tells Piper that she truly loved Tristan McLean, and understood him well enough not to reveal her real nature. Aphrodite reveals a more caring nature, appearing to care for her children far more than the other gods, and treating people she loves in a kinder way, she seems to understand humans more than the other gods and it is likely that without Aphrodite they would not have been able to complete the quest.

      • The Mark of Athena

        • Aphrodite/Venus appears as both her Greek and Roman counterpart to Piper, Annabeth, and Hazel Levesque. She explains that because love is universal, her Greek and Roman sides stay the same, unlike the rest of the gods.

      • The Blood of Olympus

        • When Reyna, with the help of six pegasi finally manages to place the Athena Parthenos on Half-Blood Hill, golden light ripples across the ground, seeping warmth into the bones of both Greek and Roman demigods, and curing all of Aphrodite's fellow Olympians of their split personalities. As a result, Aphrodite promptly arrives in Athens to participate in the final battle with the Giants. She helps her daughter Piper fight and kill the Giantess Periboia (strewing numerous rose petals into the latter's eyes), after which Hades sends her slayed body back to Tartarus.

      • http://riordan.wikia.com/wiki/Aphrodite's_Cabin


    • 2005-08 Class of the Titans (animated) - she appears in 4 episodes, Portrayed by: Tabitha St. Germain

    • 2008 Mamma Mia

      • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d925YDGfhPQ

      • There’s some legend on the island where the hotel is, about Aphrodite (the hotel was supposed to be the ultimate romantic destination because it was supposedly built on top of Aphrodites fountain, and if anyone drinks the water he is supposed to find true love and perfect happiness), and then when the Chekhov's crack in the floor explodes into a geyser in the final wedding scene, Meryl Streep cries out rapturously “it’s aphrodite!” (in weird slow motion) aka Aphrodite is blessing the wedding(s). Paul insists you include the clip of when she says this at some point because of how ridiculously hilarious it is

    • 2008-09 Valentine (tv series, only 8 episodes long)

      • Valentine was a CW show that aired in 2008 and was cancelled after only a few episodes.

      • Being a CW show it surrounds romance - Aphrodite is the family matriarch.

      • The show focuses on the Valentine family, a group of gods living amongst humans. They must keep their true identities secret as they do whatever it takes to bring soulmates together. In modern times however the gods' methods have become less effective, and unless they improve their matchmaking skills they will end up becoming mortal. As a result Grace, aka the goddess Aphrodite, has decided to recruit romance novelist Kate Providence to help them adapt their skills. With help from the fates and the Oracle of Delphi, now housed in a hot tub, it is up to the gods and Kate to help bring love back into people's lives.

      • Grace Valentine (portrayed by Jaime Murray): Family matriarch and the goddess Aphrodite. Grace oversees the Valentines' Earthly operations and is the one to bring Kate on board after she discovers that their lack of success has made them start to become mortal. She was recently involved in a relationship with her former husband Ray Howard, the god Hephaestus. She left him for Ari thousands of years ago, and has regretted the decision ever since: suffering psychological abuse, and unable to get a divorce. She tells Kate that Ray is the only man she has ever truly loved, and she considers Ari nothing more than a fling. She is attacked by the Egyptian Goddess Bastet, who wields the Adamantium Blade, after Bastet fatally stabs Ari. She is last seen weeping over Ari's body.

      • Episode summaries: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valentine_(TV_series)#Episodes

      • First episode, opening narration by Grace/Aphrodite https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50sULVxonN4&nohtml5=False

    • 2011 eCupid (Gay romance), played by morgan Fairchild

      • Marshall Thomas (Houston Rhines), an advertising designer, and his partner of seven years, cafe owner Gabe Horton (Noah Schuffman), who live in Los Angeles, California, are in a rut. Gabe seems too busy for intimacy and Marshall is feeling the pressure of a frustrating dead-end job. Marshall discovers asmart phone application called eCupid and agrees to install it without reading the terms of agreement (despite multiple warnings.) The application (voiced byMorgan Fairchild) proceeds to take over Marshall's phone and computer, and by proxy his life. Gabe finds out and the two split. eCupid begins arranging various encounters and situations designed to help Marshall find the things he thinks he wants: the recapturing of his youth via fun, romance and freedom.

      • The goddess aspect is all subtexty

      • We don’t see her until the end - she shows up to give us the moral of the story

      • The ecupid software is created by “Divinity”



Comments

Anonymous

Prosper Mérimée in 1837 wrote "The Venus of Ille", where a statue of Venus gets a wedding ring and ends up (somehow) in bed with the poor groom, killing him. Clark Ashton Smith wrote a story about Venus, "The Disinterment of Venus", where a statue of her was dug up and disrupts the monastery, so a pair of monks go out to destroy it and are caught, fatally, in her embrace.