This presentation sums up the work done by class I H with Mrs. Marconi and Mr. Mesolella on the expressive power of myths. It is included in the eTwinning project The book of Life 2012-2013

1. Mythology as a form of
story telling about life,
eTwinning, BOL, 2013

2. Each civilization which has existed on the Earth has
developed a huge quantity of myths (from the Greek word
mythos= story), stories which were fantastic on one hand
and realistic on the other.
The necessity of man to answer the big question about
his origins brought him to reply with symbolical stories,
the myths.
Even if myths are very fascinating from a narrative point
of view, they are the moral and religious foundations on
which ancient people’ s social structure is based.
Epic stories were written to build a ‘’collective identity’’, a
man’ s prototype which shows his permanence in the
future.
While we are searching for this identity, we often ask
ourselves a very important question: ‘’Who am I ?’’.
Today’ s answer is that everyone is different in their
individuality, but the ancients wanted to underline the

3. Cyris
Ulysses Penelope
Psyche

4. CYRIS
Cyris is a complex character, powerful and terrible, but
also wise and humane.
Projected in a magical fairy atmosphere, she represents
the fears and wishes of the Ancient Greek man in
comparison with the woman: first of all, the fear that
woman could make him fall in her power with seduction
or magic filters, making him lose his identity and
reducing him into a passive, wild state of nature.
The opposite of Cyris is Penelope , the symbol of
fidelity.

5. Itacus and Peribea’ s daughter, of Spartan origins,
Penelope married Ulysses and, according to Odissey,
she faithfully waited for him for the 20 years of his
absence, administrating her properties and repulsing
her suitors.
Other than being a faithful wife, Penelope was also a
solicitous mother to Telemachus and a wise woman.
She is bound to Ulysses thanks to a virtue they
had in common: the astuteness.
PENELOPE

6. Psyche was a beautiful princess, so beautiful that she caused
the envy of Venus.
The goddess sent her son Cupid so that he could make Psyche
fall in love with the ugliest and meanest man of the world, but
the god fell in love with the mortal and, thanks to Zephyr, he
transported her to his palace imposing that their meetings
could take place only in darkness in order not to make Venus
angry, he took her for his own.
Psyche’ s sisters convinced her to commit an unfair action, looking at her lover.
This desire of knowledge, the same which killed Ulysses , was fatal for her: a
drop fell from her lamp and burned Cupid, who flew away.
After some time, Venus captured the princess to subdue her to her punishment: three
tests.
The tests demonstrated her real love for Cupid and especially her good will and
obstinacy. In the end, Psyche understood she had made a mistake and so she
regained Cupid’ s love.

7. δυσσεύςὈδυσσεύςὈ
Ανδρα µοι εννεπε,
Μουσα, πολυτροπον,
Οs µαλα πολλα πλαγχΘη,
Επει Τροιηs ιερον
πτολιεΘτρον επερσε
Narrami, o Musa, dell’eroe
multiforme, che tanto vagò, dopo
che distrusse la rocca sacra di Troia

8. Odysseus literally means “the man who is hated”; his grandfather Acresio, who
predicted how long he would have spent fighting, gave him this name.
The <<Odyssey>> is the story of the hero’ s painful return to Ithaca, at the end of the
Trojan War. Odysseus’ s will of returning home without renouncing his experiences
and the knowledge which had been offered to him during his journey. Ulysses has
assumed, in time, the value of a symbol:
- Ulysses is the clever man, he is curious of each experience, he is ready to risk
everything to satisfy his wish for knowledge ;
- Ulysses is the man who is sensitive to natural affection, he wants to arrive at his
native land: therefore his journey represents the necessity of finding his roots, to give
security to existance.
From Omero’ s poem Ulysses’ s image has been given to future literature as ‘’hero of
knowledge’’ and ‘’hero of the return’’.
This character is bound to Psyche because they both represent curiosity .
The Greek Odysseus and the Roman
Ulysses

9. Monica De Vincentis and Federico Mequio
R. Benigni

10. Dante and Ulysses’ s last journey
In «The Divine Comedy», he is
convicted because he pushes
himself over the world’ s limits,
which were marked by Hurcules’ s
Column.
In Ulysses’ s opinion, man has not
been created to live in ignorance,
but to follow virtue and to look for
the knowledge.
Ulysses is a courageous man who passes every limit, here, he is
ready to go aganist the divine laws and he will founder near the
Purgatory Mountain because of his arrogance.

11. The images have been taken from these web sites:
www. Almacattleya.blogspot.com;
www.tanogato.it;
La maga Circe o Melissa (1531 ca.) olio su tela cm. 176x174 – sito dellla
Galleria Borghese;
www.pantheon.org/areas/gallery/mythology/europe/greek_people/circe;
http://www.elhuevodechocolate.com;
http://www.fmboschetto.it/Utopiaucronia/cronologia_mitologica.htm;
www.inx.whipart.it;
http://www.homolaicus.com;
www.wikipedia.org.

12. This project has been realised by class IH
thanks to the contribution of:
-Claudia Capasso
-Elena Carucci
-Alessandra Cetroni
-Monica De Vincentis
-Elena Eusepi
-Aurora Lombardi
-Alice Maiorano
-Federico Mequio
-Alessandra Mihai