Latest Posts by sapphic-terror - Page 6

I’m totally normal about characters who are defined by their goodness, who then go through hell and have to cling to their faith in humanity with their bloody nails, wdym???

Girls be like ‘this is my comfort song’ and it’s the most emotional self destructive pining you’ve ever heard

yes all my favorite characters are desperate to be loved. no i don’t think that says anything about me

“i want you to know, i will love you as long as i breathe.”

dune part ii / ojibwa / waiting for this story to end before i begin another, jan heller lev

obsessed where stories where it is like. the mistakes are unfixable and the worst thing that could happen happened and nothing can go back to how it was. but there was still love in this and love will continue after this and love endures always.

aidyn ♪ on X: "It pains me that people genuinely just see these names as numbers. Each name belonged to a life, a life that Israel took. Do not stop talking about Palestine." / X

Irulan is such a petty bitch but I'm pettier. She was like "I'm playing the long game," well I'm not. Paul won't fuck me because he's with Chani exclusively? Fine, well I'll fuck Chani. You and I are sister-wives now Paul!

“i want you to know, i will love you as long as i breathe.”

dune part ii / ojibwa / waiting for this story to end before i begin another, jan heller lev

The IOF opened fire on starving civilians trying to collect food aid murdering dozens and injuring an estimated hundreds or more they then crushed some of the injured by running over them with tanks. This was their “reason.”

On this year women's day, all we could think about are Palestinian women in Gaza.

Nearly 9,000 women have been killed in Israeli attacks in five months. Another 2,100 are missing and presumed dead, while 23,000 have been wounded and over half a million are displaced.

“Palestinian women, especially in the Gaza Strip, are exposed to the worst humanitarian catastrophe,” Ashraf al-Qudra, the health ministry’s spokesperson, said on Thursday.

Dozens of women and girls have also been detained and face harsh conditions in Israeli custody, including sexual abuse.

Women in Gaza also struggle to find menstruation products and access the necessary pregnancy and post-natal care. The consequences on reproductive health, including a rise in stress-induced miscarriages, stillbirths and premature births, have increased significantly.

Women in labour are undergoing caesarean procedures without anaesthetics, and a shortage of post-operative care such as medication, antibiotics and pain relief further exacerbates the situation.

According to the health ministry, 5,000 women give birth monthly in Gaza under “harsh, unsafe and unhealthy” conditions caused by Israeli bombing and displacement.

There are 60,000 pregnant women in Gaza suffering from “malnutrition, dehydration and lack of medical care.

There have also been repeated cases of Israeli soldiers mocking Palestinian women by posting videos and pictures of themselves rummaging through personal belongings in Gaza homes, making derogatory comments and posing with women’s underwear.

scott street - phoebe bridgers

"B-but Palestinians can get their freedom with peace not violence 🥺🥺" no. Screw your feelings. The armed resistance against colonizers and murderers is what will give Palestinians their freedom and what will eventually achieve real peace.

An enemy that bombs and uses white phosphorus against civilians doesn't know nor practice what your broken moral compass describes as "peace". Freedom was proven throughout history not to be achieved through kneeling and asking the oppressor to kindly stop. Freedom needs to be taken by force. Your little Utopian way of thinking doesn't work in the real world. Your feelings don't matter because you're not the one living under occupation. Your feelings don't matter because you're not one of the thousands of children who lost their limbs. You're not one of the children who became orphans due to this genocide. You're not the mother who lost her child to the carpet bombing. You're not the father carrying the remains of your child in plastic bags. You're not the newlywed woman who lost her husband. You're not the one at risk of either getting killed any second or losing your loved ones in the blink of an eye!

"Peace" is not really a thing you see during a live ethnic cleansing!

sorry bro i lost focus and forgot where u begin and i end i hope nothing gay happened

We are witnessing the grotesque reality of the martyred Palestinians and thousands of their massacred children being written off as mere afterthoughts. The way western media outlets steadfastly refuse to call the Israeli aggression and onslaught for what it is, which is genocide and ethnic cleansing, is just another way of dehumanizing Palestinians. 

I am Jewish. I am an anti-Zionist. I am always and forever pro-Palestine.

My grandmother was born in Palestine before Israel existed. My grandmother, who died less than a decade ago (in her 70s) was already older than the settler colonial state of Israel. Judaism exists without Zionism. Zionism goes against the Jewish religion. Zionism is white supremacy.

From the river to the sea Palestine WILL BE FREE

a man self immolated in front of the israeli embassy in washington dc yesterday. not just any man. an active member of the us air force. he live streamed his death, and said that he refused to be complicit in a genocide any longer. he said that compared to what palestinians were facing every day, setting himself alight was nothing.

let me reiterate. an active duty air force member burned himself alive because he was so disgusted by what the us government was openly supporting. he live-streamed his own suicide, so the whole world could bear witness as a man in his military uniform set himself on fire to protest his government’s complicity in the horrors that we have all been forced to watch happen in real time. he became a new horror. footage of the immolation blurs him out the moment the fire catches, but you can hear him. it is over in seconds, really, but you can hear him screaming. he shouts “free palestine” until his body physically cannot make any sounds other than guttural screams of agony. and then he falls silent. a police officer arrives and points a gun at his still burning body, shouting at him to get down on the ground. and it is over.

his name was Aaron Bushnell. he was twenty five years old. and he isn’t here anymore because the political ruling class has decided that genocide is perfectly fine as long as it preserves imperialism. in the coming days, people will try to discredit him. to say that he was mentally unstable. they will try to bury his actions to save face and defend israel’s propaganda. do not let them. aaron knew what he was doing. he knew what he was doing when he put on his military uniform, set up his twitch stream, and made his final walk up to the embassy. he knew what would happen to him when he flicked that lighter. do not let them forget. aaron’s blood is on the hands of the political ruling class.

Y'all remember "cops aren't supposed to kill guilty people, either", right?

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to die beneath the rubble of their homes.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to be shot with expanding bullets that cause massive tissue damage leading to amputation.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to have their flesh burned away with white phosphorous.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve their fishing boats blown up.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to see their husbands and fathers executed in front of them along evacuation routes.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve an anonymous phone call threatening to destroy their lives and families.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to be detained for years without charges.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to be tortured, starved, and sexually assaulted in prison.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to be deprived of water.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve their olive trees to be uprooted while they look on.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve sixteen years of blockade.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve to be prevented from traveling for lifesaving medical care.

Palestinians who have done something wrong don't deserve this genocide.

on getting better

?// ?// call your mom, noah kahan// letters to friends, family and editors, franz kafka// call your mom, noah kahan// september affirmation (Don’t Be Afraid), Keaton St. James (@boykeats) // @smuktvejr // ?// ?// 'east boston, 1996; night walk' in god's silence, franz wright// ending, jonny bolduc// listen, tara bray// the haunting of hill house, shirley jackson// little red cap, carol ann duffy// @daisies-on-a-cup// evermore, taylor swift// @angelwarm// long story short, taylor swift

i love tragedy.

i love when a story is sworn to end horribly, no happy endings. it’s fated to fail, and everyone within it will either be dead or go mad or lose everything they love and then some. if only orpheus hadn’t turned back. if only achilles would have listened to patroclus. if only romeo had received the second letter. if only they weren’t all doomed right from the start.

but they’d do it anyway, every single time. to continue to go on knowing something will end in pain is the epitome of love.

if we didn’t love so much, there would be no tragedy. if we don’t accept tragedy, there would be no love at all.

in the darkness, two shadows,

reaching through the hopeless, heavy dusk. their hands meet.

love letter to fanny brawne, john keats // orestes, euripides // wait for me (intro) ("hey, the big artiste"), hadestown // ghost photographs - doug and brenda, angela deane // les misérables, victor hugo // achilles come down, gang of youths // how to become a myth, nikita gill // romeo and juliet, shakespeare // lovers of valdaro // song of achilles, madeline miller // i will follow you into the dark, deathcab for cutie // planet of love, richard siken

slaughter-house five - kurt vonnegut / orpheus and eurydice - catharine adelaide sparkes / user sawasawako / orpheus mourning the death of eurydice - ary scheffer / metamorphoses - ovid / orpheus and euridice - enrico scuri / talk - hozier / orpheus and eurydice - michel martin drolling

In the past I've shared other people's musings about the different interpretations of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Namely, why Orpheus looks back at Eurydice, even though he knows it means he'll lose her forever. So many people seem to think they've found the one true explanation of the myth. But to me, the beauty of myths is that they have many possible meanings.

So I thought I would share a list of every interpretation I know, from every serious adaptation of the story and every analysis I've ever heard or read, of why Orpheus looks back.

One interpretation – advocated by Monteverdi's opera, for example – is that the backward glance represents excessive passion and a fatal lack of self-control. Orpheus loves Eurydice to such excess that he tries to defy the laws of nature by bringing her back from the dead, yet that very same passion dooms his quest fo fail, because he can't resist the temptation to look back at her.

He can also be seen as succumbing to that classic "tragic flaw" of hubris, excessive pride. Because his music and his love conquer the Underworld, it might be that he makes the mistake of thinking he's entirely above divine law, and fatally allows himself to break the one rule that Hades and Persephone set for him.

Then there are the versions where his flaw is his lack of faith, because he looks back out of doubt that Eurydice is really there. I think there are three possible interpretations of this scenario, which can each work alone or else co-exist with each other. From what I've read about Hadestown, it sounds as if it combines all three.

In one interpretation, he doubts Hades and Persephone's promise. Will they really give Eurydice back to him, or is it all a cruel trick? In this case, the message seems to be a warning to trust in the gods; if you doubt their blessings, you might lose them.

Another perspective is that he doubts Eurydice. Does she love him enough to follow him? In this case, the warning is that romantic love can't survive unless the lovers trust each other. I'm thinking of Moulin Rouge!, which is ostensibly based on the Orpheus myth, and which uses Christian's jealousy as its equivalent of Orpheus's fatal doubt and explicitly states "Where there is no trust, there is no love."

The third variation is that he doubts himself. Could his music really have the power to sway the Underworld? The message in this version would be that self-doubt can sabotage all our best efforts.

But all of the above interpretations revolve around the concept that Orpheus looks back because of a tragic flaw, which wasn't necessarily the view of Virgil, the earliest known recorder of the myth. Virgil wrote that Orpheus's backward glance was "A pardonable offense, if the spirits knew how to pardon."

In some versions, when the upper world comes into Orpheus's view, he thinks his journey is over. In this moment, he's so ecstatic and so eager to finally see Eurydice that he unthinkingly turns around an instant too soon, either just before he reaches the threshold or when he's already crossed it but Eurydice is still a few steps behind him. In this scenario, it isn't a personal flaw that makes him look back, but just a moment of passion-fueled carelessness, and the fact that it costs him Eurydice shows the pitilessness of the Underworld.

In other versions, concern for Eurydice makes him look back. Sometimes he looks back because the upward path is steep and rocky, and Eurydice is still limping from her snakebite, so he knows she must be struggling, in some versions he even hears her stumble, and he finally can't resist turning around to help her. Or more cruelly, in other versions – for example, in Gluck's opera – Eurydice doesn't know that Orpheus is forbidden to look back at her, and Orpheus is also forbidden to tell her. So she's distraught that her husband seems to be coldly ignoring her and begs him to look at her until he can't bear her anguish anymore.

These versions highlight the harshness of the Underworld's law, and Orpheus's failure to comply with it seems natural and even inevitable. The message here seems to be that death is pitiless and irreversible: a demigod hero might come close to conquering it, but through little or no fault of his own, he's bound to fail in the end.

Another interpretation I've read is that Orpheus's backward glance represents the nature of grief. We can't help but look back on our memories of our dead loved ones, even though it means feeling the pain of loss all over again.

Then there's the interpretation that Orpheus chooses his memory of Eurydice, represented by the backward glance, rather than a future with a living Eurydice. "The poet's choice," as Portrait of a Lady on Fire puts it. In this reading, Orpheus looks back because he realizes he would rather preserve his memory of their youthful, blissful love, just as it was when she died, than face a future of growing older, the difficulties of married life, and the possibility that their love will fade. That's the slightly more sympathetic version. In the version that makes Orpheus more egotistical, he prefers the idealized memory to the real woman because the memory is entirely his possession, in a way that a living wife with her own will could never be, and will never distract him from his music, but can only inspire it.

Then there are the modern feminist interpretations, also alluded to in Portrait of a Lady on Fire but seen in several female-authored adaptations of the myth too, where Eurydice provokes Orpheus into looking back because she wants to stay in the Underworld. The viewpoint kinder to Orpheus is that Eurydice also wants to preserve their love just as it was, youthful, passionate, and blissful, rather than subject it to the ravages of time and the hardships of life. The variation less sympathetic to Orpheus is that Euyridice was at peace in death, in some versions she drank from the river Lethe and doesn't even remember Orpheus, his attempt to take her back is selfish, and she prefers to be her own free woman than be bound to him forever and literally only live for his sake.

With that interpretation in mind, I'm surprised I've never read yet another variation. I can imagine a version where, as Orpheus walks up the path toward the living world, he realizes he's being selfish: Eurydice was happy and at peace in the Elysian Fields, she doesn't even remember him because she drank from Lethe, and she's only following him now because Hades and Persephone have forced her to do so. So he finally looks back out of selfless love, to let her go. Maybe I should write this retelling myself.

Are any of these interpretations – or any others – the "true" or "definitive" reason why Orpheus looks back? I don't think so at all. The fact that they all exist and can all ring true says something valuable about the nature of mythology.

Oh to love someone so much you damn them, you damn yourself, you never stood a chance.

— the love was there. (it didn't change everything, but it changed me)

x. // erin slaughter // state of grace - taylor swift // x. // architecture - maisie peters // white ferrari - frank ocean // begin again - emma lord // x. // lunar years - maisie peters // king lear // hope ur ok - olivia rodrigo // cheryl strayed // 19 - xana // begin again - emma lord // the only exception - paramore // anne sexton // there it goes - maisie peters // road to hell (reprise) - hadestown // the things they carried - tim o'brien // in case you don't live forever - ben platt // molly templeton // for good - wicked // jeanette winterson

the inescapable structure of tragedy, the lines of causality

matthew stover, star wars episode III: revenge of the sith novelization / prophetic perfect tense / louise glück, the triumph of achilles / hadestown, “road to hell” / sunnyscenegenerator / joanna newsom, “waltz of the 101st lightborne”

i've come to realize there are only two kinds of tragedies: preventable and inevitable. preventable tragedies are the kind where everything could have maybe worked out if only. if only romeo had gotten the second letter. if only juliet had woken up earlier. if only creon had changed his mind about antigone sooner. if only orpheus hadn't turned around.

inevitable tragedies are the kind where everything was always going to end terribly. of course macbeth gets deposed, he murdered his way to the throne. of course oedipus goes mad, he married his own mother. of course achilles dies in the war, he had to fulfill the prophecy in order to avenge his lover.

both kinds have their merits. the first is more emotionally impactful, letting the audience cling to hope until the very end, when it's snatched away all at once leaving nothing but a void. the second is more thematically resonant, tracking an inherent fatal flaw in its hero to a natural and understandable conclusion, making it abundantly clear why everything has to happen the way it does.