Monday, February 3, 2025
7pm ET (NYC Time)

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When the hero Theseus enters the labyrinth to slay the Minotaur, Ariadne provides the thread that leads him back to daylight. For this, Theseus promises to marry smitten Ariadne and whisk her away to Athens. But midway through their journey, on the island of Naxos, Ariadne is abandoned while slumbering on the beach. Waking to the sight of Theseus’ sails in the distance shocks and rends Ariadne into an outpouring of lament, a scene captured painstakingly across literature, art, and music. And yet, this lament is ultimately a song attracting the heart of Dionysos, whose arrival to Naxos and ascension with Ariadne is itself a favorite subject of artists. Unlikely as it may seem for the god of uninhibited sexuality and transgression of norms, the marriage of Dionysos and Ariadne is the sole loyal union on Olympos. Then again, there is no one version of any myth.

In this illustrated talk, we will look deeply at the devastation of heartbreak and the ecstatic arrival of true love as mythically entwined. Throughout, we will entertain multimedia versions and interpretations of the myth. Ariadne’s laments and her fate with Dionysos vary intensely across sources, even while themes of trauma and transformation archetypally repeat. Was Ariadne abandoned, or was her sleep a ruse to absolve herself of Theseus? Did her tears draw the chariot of Dionysos or had the god already driven the hero away? Can this new love thrive in the heavens or will it return to the dark mazes in which it began? Yes and yes and yes.

This talk previews a portion of an upcoming class for Morbid Anatomy on myths of metamorphosis, radical transformations of embodiment, disembodiment, and hybridization across Greco-Roman mythology and myths of pop culture.

Devon Deimler is a writer, artist, and researcher. She earned her PhD in Mythological Studies with an emphasis in Depth Psychology from Pacifica Graduate Institute (PGI) with a dissertation on Dionysian aesthetics. She holds a BA in Interdisciplinary Sculpture from the Maryland Institute College of Art. Her experience in the arts includes founding an independent record label, Wildfire Wildfire Productions, and working as Assistant to the Director at the Dennis Hopper Art Trust. She is Assistant Professor in PGI’s Mythological Studies program; Curator at OPUS Archives and Research Center; and former Scholar-in-Residence and and a Contributing Artist at the Philosophical Research Society. She is currently working on a book about metamorphoses and ghost stories, as well as revising her doctoral work on the Dionysian mythos. She has given several talks for Morbid Anatomy. More at devondeimler.com