In an institution called Olympus, a human named Patricia, stood on a railing outside the third-floor window. With her eyes closed, she recalled her past year at this institution.
“Get lost!” a demi-god screamed
“Lowly human” a god cried out
She was one of the humans selected by Zeus in an experiment to test whether humans and gods could co-exist. She had initially been excited but for the past one year, she had been abused, mentally and physically. The god-students had treated her worse than Cronos’s treatment of his children.
“Just because I was different”, she thought.
Patricia’s steeled her heart and jumped. Screams could be heard around her.
“A mortal jumped off the building”
“Someone save her”
Patricia expected her body to hit something hard, yet it ended up colliding with a breathing being. Before she could comprehend the situation, she heard multiple screams.
“Offending the Lord of the Underworld! Does she not fear hell?”
“Oh my God! Hades”
She looked up and came face to face with a man. Instead of being relieved for being alive, she felt dread and Hades’s frown solidified this feeling within her. She fainted in fear.
Looking at the delicate creature in his arms, Hades sighed. He was assigned to inspect the institution today and became a witness to this spectacle. He felt pity for the girl and decided to take her to the underworld where she would be safe. But he couldn’t understand why he wanted to protect her.
The news of this incident spread like wildfire. Diana, Patricia’s adoptive mother, begged the gods of the institution to save Patricia. But they turned a blind eye to her plea. Zeus himself saw no wrong with Hades’s actions. Resentful, Diana revealed her true form, the goddess Demeter, who had taken pity on the orphan Patricia and raised her as her own. Worried that Patricia would be terrified of her god form, she had disguised herself as a human.
Demeter cursed out aloud. She wanted everyone to suffer a plight worse than hers. And soon, they experienced a phenomenon never heard of before.
Harvests declined … earth experienced massive famines … there were no trees for shade … temperatures grew on barren land … no ice remained frozen … water levels rose …. massive flooding … diseases spread
Gods were losing their sacrifices
Zeus realized his mistake and sent Hermes to bring Patricia back. However, it was too late. Patricia was dead. She had refused to eat anything in the underworld and had tried to escape several times. And Hades, who had unknowingly fallen in love with Patricia, refused to let her go. Hence, Hermes saw a grieving Hades and a starved body lying in his arms as he entered the underworld.
Since then, Demeter’s curse hasn’t been broken. Just as Patricia slowly suffered when she starved herself to death, those that led Patricia to that condition continue due to global warming. And eventually everyone will perish just like Patricia, helpless and alone.
Analysis
The myth “Curse of Diana” is a remaking of “To Demeter” in the Homeric Hymns. There are many similarities and differences between the two myths, and the reasons for this are mentioned below.
Firstly, unlike the original narrative, I began my version of the myth by heightening the tension in the story because I want to grab the reader’s attention successfully. The protagonist, Patricia, is standing on top of a building, ready to kill herself. Some people who aren’t interested in ancient mythology might find the beginning of the original myth boring, where the author discusses the setting of the myth in detail (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.4-15). There isn’t any sort of conflict involved in its introduction. Thus, I began the story by presenting a conflict.
To add on to that, I specifically focus on the interaction between Hades and Patricia, who is the human version of the god Persephone. This is something that is not touched on at all in the original myth. In the original myth, Hades carries off Persephone and that is all that is ever mentioned about their first interaction (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.16-20). While there are various ways this can be interpreted, it is evident that Hades must have fallen in love with Persephone (Cartwright) because he chooses her above all potential options. And I work with this interpretation in my adaptation. In the “Curse of Diana”, I make Hades witness Patricia’s unwillingness to admit her defeat to the gods. She chooses her pride above misery, and jumps off the building, being saved by Hades in the process. This is the moment Hades falls in love with Patricia. However, what I did not change in my version was Persephone’s fear and unwillingness to be with the god of the underworld. In the original version, at the beginning, Persephone resists Hades during her kidnapping (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.20-21). Later, during her time as Hades’s consort, she spends most of her time grieving for her mother (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.344-345). Similarly, Patricia in the remake, is carried off to the underworld without her consent. She refuses to eat and tries to escape several times, which shows her unwillingness to be with Hades. I also do so to incorporate the themes of my choice in my adaptation.
In order to fit the original myth in the modern world, I decided to fit the setting of the story into a fictional institution called Olympus, where two difference types of races, human/mortal race and the immortal/god race, have been forced to co-exist. This also indirectly focuses on the themes of bullying due to racial discrimination. Bullying is defined as unwanted negative actions, which may take the form of hostile behavior (UNESCO 14). These actions are repeated again and again (UNESCO 14). There is a difference of strength between the bully or bullies and the victim (UNESCO 14). It is something quite frequent at schools in places lacking adult supervision, such as in playgrounds, hallways and cafeterias (he@lth). In the institution, Patricia gets bullied for being a human, a being inferior to the gods. As a result, she wants to commit suicide. There are several instances where this has happened in the world. According to statistics, 10.9% of students who have been bullied reported that it was due to their race and nationality (UNESCO 29). In the original myth, Persephone is also not strong enough to resist Hades and the rest of the gods refuse her mother’s request for help because they don’t know her origin (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.16-20).
I also changed the character of Persephone’s mother Demeter a little. In the story, she disguises herself as a human named Diana. Both characters share a strong bond to their daughters and would beg for help shall it be required. In both myths, Demeter serves as the goddess of fertility, harvest and agriculture, and decides to cause a famine on earth, which would lead to the extinction of human race and prevent the gods from getting their sacrifices (Homer, Homeric Hymns 2.310-314). She curses both, the mortals and immortals. This is where the theme of global warming plays out. Crops fail, plants and animals die, water bodies evaporate, and temperatures rise. These are all evidence of issues of global warming or climate change. The average temperature on earth has increased by 0.8-1.2 °C (Selin and Mann). Ice mass depletion has tripled in Antarctica (Selin and Mann). Sea levels have risen twice their rate in the last century (Selin and Mann). There are shifts in patterns of agriculture (Selin and Mann). These issues will not be solved anytime soon and hence, I end the myth by stating that the curse shall continue until everyone perishes. This is a concern in real life world as well. While governments have started programs to keep global warming to 1.5 °C, not everyone is cooperating (Selin and Mann). Hence, the myth incorporates this element to raise awareness.
I also make a reference to Cronos’s treatment of his infants to show the severity of threats Patricia is receiving due to her race. Patricia is unable to defend herself against the gods because she does not possess any divine power. In this way, she is similar to Cronos’s infants, who are helpless and vulnerable in the face of threat. They get swallowed by their father and if it were not for Zeus, they would have never experienced their lives (Apollodorus, The Library 1.4-5). This is symbolic of Patricia’s situation. She receives threats and is abused, which leads her to contemplate suicide. If not for Hades, she would have ended her life. In short, Zeus is to his siblings, like Hades is to Patricia. And Cronos is to his children, like immortals are to Patricia.
Zeus’s role in my version of the myth is not very significant compared to other characters. In the original and the new version of the myth, Zeus doesn’t find Hades’s at fault and doesn’t take action until calamity strikes the gods. There is barely any mention of him, as the plot focuses on the actions of Demeter. Helios, on the other hand, isn’t crucial to the plot of the new myth because Hades’s actions are witnessed by the crowd present during Patricia’s attempted suicide. Hence, there is no need of a specific god to tell the mother where her daughter went. Thus, I did not mention him in my myth.
A mother casting a curse upon mortals/gods also has a precedent with the myth Meleager in Bacchylides. In the myth, Meleager sets out to hunt a beast terrorizing farms (Callistratus, Philostratus Younger 10-17.15). He accomplishes his task but provides Atalante, a woman he falls in love with, the beast’s skin to prove that she killed the beast, earning her praises for her bravery (Callistratus, Philostratus Younger 10-17.15). As a result, Meleager’s brothers feel betrayed and steal the skin from Atalante (Callistratus, PhilostratusYounger 10-17.15). When Meleager demands it back, they refuse (Callistratus, Philostratus Younger 10-17.15). Hence, he kills them all, earning the ire of his mother, Althaea (Callistratus, PhilostratusYounger 10-17.15). She curses him by demanding his death and Meleager eventually dies (Callistratus, Philostratus Younger 10-17.15). In the same way, Demeter/Diana curses her own race once they turn their back on her and her words becomes true as well.
There are various instances where gods disguise themselves as humans in Greek mythology in a similar context. One such example is of Zeus and Hermes in Baucis and Philemon. Zeus and Hermes disguise themselves as peasant, travelling around and asking people for help in a town (Ovid, Metamorphoses 8.626-637). No one helps them except for one poor couple (Ovid, Metamorphoses 8.626-637). Hence, both Zeus and Hermes decide to punish the town’s people using a flood to destroy everyone (Griffin 63). This is similar to my adaptation. Demeter disguises herself as a human and raises her adopted daughter. When Patricia is taken to the underworld, Demeter asks for help from those around her, just as Zeus and Hermes had. In both stories, the gods are refused help and they decide to punish the perpetrator. Both stories use nature to bring disaster, one example being floods (66).
We also see instances of humans raising children who are not their own. These humans eventually turn themselves into gods. For example, in Nonnus Dionysiaca, Ino raises Dionysus, the son Zeus and Semele (Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9.61). Ino is human (Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9.61). But when Hera threatens her for protecting Dionysus (Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9.244-247), she jumps into the sea and becomes a goddess, Leucothea (Nonnus, Dionysiaca 9.84-91). Similarly, after the safety of her daughter is threatened, Diana transforms into a goddess Demeter and exacts revenge on those that have wronged the mother-daughter duo. However, the only difference is that Ino was initially a human, while Demeter was a human disguised as a god.
In conclusion, these are the reasons for the choices and composition of my version of the myth.
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