Aphrodite, Goddess of Love, Beauty
and Pleasure, sat atop the highest peak of Mount Olympus, exhausted from a day’s
work of gazing at her own reflection. As she reclined in her beautifully ornate
throne, Ares, her ex-lover, came barreling toward her on his chariot of fire
with a look of anger coloring his chiseled face. Upon seeing her angry
ex-lover, Aphrodite immediately descended Mount Olympus with her handmaids and
quickly found a suitable cave to hide in.
As soon as Aphrodite fled from the
top of Mount Olympus, the people below began to mourn the loss of the Goddess
of Love, as her absence caused them to lose both the ability to bare children
and to appear beautiful. After this disappearance, the people prayed and prayed
for the return of Aphrodite to no avail. One day, Gelos, who was the divine
personification of laughter, crafted a beautiful golden mirror and set out to
find the cave in which she was hiding. After days of searching, Gelos and his
crew stumbled upon the cave after recognizing the faint glow that often
followed the Goddess of Beauty around peeking out from behind a cluster of
trees. They waited outside the cave and began to make a loud commotion.
Within the cave, Aphrodite heard a
sudden outburst of laughter coming from close by. The laughter continued for
several minutes, and when she could no longer take it, she stormed out of the
cave to see what all of the commotion was about. Outside of the cave, she found
Gelos and several other Gods and Goddesses crowded around an object laughing
hysterically.
"What is all of this about?
What is so funny that you have disturbed me in such a way?" demanded
Aphrodite. To this, Gelos replied: "Foolish Aphrodite. In your absence, a
new Goddess has captured the hearts of the people, and she is even more
graceful and beautiful than you will ever be!" Upon hearing this,
Aphrodite was enraged and demanded to see the Goddess at once. Gelos handed
Aphrodite the mirror he had made and watched as she looked upon her own
reflection with pure jealousy. After shattering the golden mirror, the irate
Goddess bolted from the cave and let out a blood-curdling scream. While she was
preoccupied, Gelos rolled a stone in front of the cave entrance and summoned Pegasus
to bring her back to the top of Mount Olympus. As soon as she was back in her
throne, all was right in the world again, and the people rejoiced at her
return!
 |
| Aphrodite looking at Ares, aminoapps |
Author's Note: This week, I read
The Miraculous Mirror from the Japanese Mythology collection. While reading
this story Ii found that there were a lot of similarities between the
princesses and gods/goddesses in Japanese mythology and Greek mythology, so I
wanted to mix the elements of this story with well-known Gods and Goddesses of
Greek mythology. The focus of The Miraculous Mirror is a princess who is very
beautiful and very vain, so I wanted to rewrite this story using Aphrodite.
Bibliography: Romance of Old Japan, Part I: Mythology and Legend by E. W. Champney and F. Champney (1917). The Miraculous Mirror
Hello Emily! Your story's first sentence intrigued me because I really like Greek Mythology and reading stories about it. Aphrodite is one of my favorite characters to read about, too. Did Gelos trick Aphrodite in order to return her so that civilians could be beautiful and bare children again? And was Ares coming to hurt Aphrodite? Was that why she was running away? I was a little confused by those things, but I loved the detail to you gave your story--really great job!!
ReplyDeleteHello again, Emily! For a minute there I was confused, thinking, “didn’t we already cover Greek mythology?” Now I see that this is a story with a twist! I like how you told a story about Aphrodite inspired by a tale from Japanese folklore, I would have never thought about that! I also enjoyed reading “The Miraculous Mirror,” so this was a nice call back. Overall, well done!
ReplyDeleteHello,
ReplyDeleteThat was a great story! I have to say Greek mythology will always have a special place in my heart, so when I read your story it really peaked my interest. I love the way you brought something from another type of mythology and turned it into something from Greek mythology using characters I am aware of and fond of. I did not read the original but I have to say I am blown away by your version.
Hello,
ReplyDeleteThat was a very interesting story about Japanese Mythology! I didn't even realize that this story was not based upon Greek mythology until I read the authors note. I am very impressed that you were able to intertwine two distinct mythological cultures into one story! The story flowed great. I would love to read my Japanese/Greek mythology stories like this in the future!
This story is super clever!!! I never thought about retelling the story of Aphrodite this way. I never even heard of Gelos so good work with putting in some mythological lore! One thing that I wondered was why Aphrodite had to hide in the cave? Could she not have just talked to Ares and get it over with? Also, why did Gelos have to do the work to get her out of it?
ReplyDeleteHi Emily! This is such a creative way to combine two different stories from separate cultures that have similarities within them. I have not had the chance to learn much about Greek mythology before, so this story helped me to understand how vain Aphrodite truly is! I also like how much detail you put into your retelling because it sets the scene wonderfully and allows readers to picture what is happening.
ReplyDeleteHey Emily! I love the concept of combining two cultures of mythology into one story -- I don't think I've seen that in anyone's stories yet! The way Aphrodite was jealous of her own reflection reminded me of a fable by Aesop in which a dog, holding a bone, sees its reflection in a lake and thinks it's another dog with a bigger bone. He opens his mouth to take the bigger bone, and his falls into the water, so he has no bone. Back to your story -- I really enjoyed the details you used to describe the scene, and I also really felt like you portrayed Aphrodite's emotions very well!
ReplyDeleteHello Emily! The story was awesome! The combination of cultures in your story was truly artful and was really interesting to read and think about while I was reading the story. The number of details that you included in the story were amazing and that really helped me paint a picture in my head of what was going on in the story and made it a story that was truly a work of art!!
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