Week 9 Story Planning: Eurydice

With this next obituary in my series, I want to strike a bit more of a bittersweet note with the story of Eurydice. 

Orpheus and Eurydice by
Frederic Leighton. Source:
Wikipedia Commons.

Some background I've gathered on Eurydice: she was one of Apollo's (god of the sun) daughters, and an oak nymph (nymphs are divine spirits but not gods, and therefore, not immortal). Eurydice was married to the poet, musician and prophet Orpheus, a child of one of the muses, and the two were deeply in love (though their marriage was predicted to be extremely short by Hymen, the god of marriage ceremonies). 

Eurydice's story is an interesting one for this storybook since it mostly begins after her death. One day, as she's being chased by the shepherd Aristaeus (who was swept away by her beauty), she's bitten by a viper and quickly dies of its poison. Orpheus is so wrecked by her death that he journeys to the underworld to retrieve her. 

Orpheus' grief is great in this story — when he beseeches them for his wife's soul, even Hades and Persephone are moved to help him out (this is actually an impressive feat, so it's one Hermes might recognize or respect). They give him Eurydice, but only on the condition that he not look back at her as they leave the underworld. Orpheus, of course, looks back at Eurydice just before she passes back into existence. Orpheus couldn't return for her, since no mortal can enter the underworld more than once while alive. 

I think Hermes, my storyteller, would find pity in his heart for Eurydice, since she's a fellow semi-deity and is temporarily separated from the one she loves. He might have a few words for Orpheus, whose foolish look back doomed his wife to years alone in the underworld awaiting his death (as is evident from Hermes' last column, he has little tolerance for fools).

Bibliography: "Eurydice," Wikipedia. Web source. 

"Hades," Theoi. Web source.