Mythology in The Virgin Suicides

In Greek mythology, there are many stories pertaining to divine vengeance and mortals. There are many different reasons as to why the gods penalize humans, and likewise, an assortment of punishments cast down upon these offenders. Throughout the book, Powell gives many examples of the wrath of the gods and the differences in their punishment styles based on their gender. Male gods do not usually punish male offenders with a quick and easy death. They prefer to use a more prolonged and torturous style of punishment; where as female gods use a quick, more destructive punishment that affects more than just the offenders themselves.

As a result of being isolated from others, the girls become depressed. Lux makes the statement "I can't breathe in here" (The Virgin Suicides). The girls become extremely lonely. Even before Cecilia, the youngest daughter, committed suicide the girls were still sheltered. Cecilia's psychiatrist told the parents that the girls needed another social outlet besides school. This proves that it is not healthy for adolescents to not be social. With the girls now without the social outlet of school, the girls became lonely and depressed. According to neuropsychiatrist, Rajesh Parikh, "Alcoholism and suicide become a handmaiden due to loneliness and depression". In other words, people who are lonely and depressed have a higher risk of committing suicide. Since the girls were lonely and depressed, they were at a higher risk of committing suicide.

This part of the monomyth is represented by the archetype of the fairy godmother or the guardian angel. Mary is a perpetual messenger of god, a virtuous woman who represents the very ideals of power, struggle, despair, perseverance, and courage. Mary is considered a religious figure, a woman who sacrificed everything to god. Lily sees the picture of the Black Mary as a sign from heaven that she needs to go to Tiburon, where she will find what she is looking for. Lily puts her trust in god, as the virgin Mary aids her on her quest of self-fulfillment The Mary picture gives her the courage to go to Tiburon in search of her mothers past.

The imagery used in the story is to help exhibit the respect and admiration that the narrator has for Clarisa. An example of said admiration is when Clarisa arrives home from the parade for the Pope distraught and confused. “I combed her meringue hair high on her head, tied it with a ribbon, and then sat down to accompany her through this crisis, not knowing exactly what it was,” (Allende, 438). This gives the reader a clue about Clarisa’s age, as well as provides a brief description of Clarisa. This text also gives insight into the narrator’s feelings towards Clarisa, and how concerned she is for Clarisa’s well being. Throughout the story Allende hints at the fact that Clarissa is at an age where she has become more fragile and certain activities become too much for her body to handle. “She was exhausted when she reached the house, with the din of bells and cheering still ringing in her temples” (Allende, 438). This

Mary Magdalene and Mary the Mother of God are both biblical women who were faced with similar societal standards even thought these time periods are hundreds of years apart. Mary Magdalene was always seen as the “rebellious” women in the bible when it turns out she really wasn 't doing anything wrong. Similarly David Van Biema wrote about this topic in Time Magazine saying that Mary was first seen in the Gospel of Luke as

The narrators tell the Lisbon girls' story through their subjective theories and assumptions, fantasies and dreams. They do not know the girls well on a personal level, only rarely coming into contact with them, and most of their evidence comes from watching and admiring the girls from afar, or collecting as many small snatches of them as they can ; admitting to “looking through (the Lisbon's) order slips” (Eugenides 89), “analyzing the contents of their lockers” (Eugenides 142), and watching them through “binoculars” (Eugenides 146) in order to glean some sort of information about them. They desperate wish to understand them through these vain methods , saying that “We felt that if we kept looking hard enough we might begin to understand what they were feeling and who they were.” (Eugenides

When discussing the Bible’s New Testament, there are several individuals aside from Jesus that gander a lot of attention. It is not uncommon to hear pastors and priest preaching about the disciples that walked with the messiah during his time of great works during a Sunday service. There are many lessons to be learned from the experiences of and trails faced by the men that knew best. However, even though the Bible is considerable a masculine text, there are many notable women sprinkled throughout it. Most notable, of course, would be the mother of Jesus, Mary. She made several appearances throughout the Gospel from the moment the angel came to her and said “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28) to let her know that she was going to be the mother of the “Son of the Most High” (Luke 1:32) to the moment she stood witness to the crucifixion of that Son. Today, after Jesus, Mary – sometimes also called The Virgin Mary – is among those most revered in the Bible. However, she is not the only Mary to have close ties to the Biblical savior. There are actually at least three other Marys to walk along side with Jesus at some point, but none more conversational than Mary Magdalene.

I am explicating on passage 16 of ‘The Moths’ by Helena Maria Viramontes on page 20 of the American Family Album.

gives the court reason to believe that Mary is a witch. Relating back to the universal theme

     From Mary's tragic life, we can draw some eerily similar parallels between her life and the novel. One of the most obvious links that can be made is the connection

Sylvia Plath uses great many mythical allusions to illustrate her perceptions about virgins, especially in Ancient Greek mythology, many of which have been a direct bearing on the title of the poem; 'Virgin in a

This reenforces the idea that the boys' sight is the main determining factor for much of the information they recount, as at they are unable to differentiate the Lisbons until the party, after having known the girls for much of their lives, and also lusting after them for almost as long as they have, they are isolated from the girls to such a degree that they are unable to see any difference in them until they are in the same room. Most of the community also associates all the girls with one another and rarely sees any distinguishable differences amongst them. In the section when Trip Fontaine and the other neighborhood boys take the Lisbon girls tot he homecoming dance, they boys realize they can't tell the girls apart. "Trip Fontaine, of course, had dibs on Lux, but the other three girls were up for grabs. Fortunately, their dresses and hairdos homogenized them. Once again, the boys weren't even sure which girl was which. Instead of asking, they did the only thing they could think of doing: they presented the corsages" (117). The boys' superficiality is highlighted; the only time in the novel in which the girls are allowed out of the house, they boys are still unable to determine one girl from another. Furthermore, the only way they determine who their dates are by simply lining up in front of them with flowers ready. When the remaining Lisbon girls commit suicide at the end of the novel, Mary is the only daughter to survive, and

Among the saints, the Virgin has a primordial place because she is the Mother of God and the

In paragraph 8 Mary says “I was in the center of life and I didn’t miss a thing; nothing slipped by unobserved or unnoted”. Which can be related to “21 The LORD sees everything you do. Wherever you go, he is watching” (Proverbs 5:21). Mary says “the whole backyard slanted down” in paragraph 9. Her rock placed promntly at the top. God is always referred to as “above”. He is always watching over us. He, so to say, is sitting on a big rock on top of a hill. In paragraph 10, Mary refers to three rocks. The number three appears countless times in the Bible. For example: “The Ark of the Covenant contained three sacred objects” (Heb. 9:10). John visions a triple entrance way marked on all four sides of the city of the New Jerusalem (Rev 21:13). David “bowed down before Jonathan three times, with his face to the ground” (1 Sam 20:41). In paragraphs in 12 and 13, Mary describes the glorious feeling of drinking water from the well. “With joy you will draw water from the wells of salvation” (Isaiah 12:3). God created man in his own image and people all over the world have different perception of what God looks like. In paragraph 15, Mary tells us about what she thinks God looks like. The color purple has a lot of significance in the Catholic

The subject matter of both of these National Gallery of Ireland Madonna and Child works is unmistakably Mary, who was assumed into heaven upon her death, and her son, Jesus Christ, born free of original sin through the Immaculate Conception. A central icon of Christianity, Mary traditionally exemplifies love, passion and devotion. As Mary represents universal motherhood, the subject of the Madonna appeals to all people. Although both Madonna and Child paintings depict Mary holding