Perséphone ou Eurydice ? Antithèse ou inversion ?
Persephone or Eurydice? Antithesis Or Inversion?

Summary/Abstract: A duality of being is inscribed in the mythical story of Persephone, therefore its character is both antithetical and inversive. The antithesis is defined by the seeming dichotomy between the earthly existence of Demeter’s daughter Cora and her underground life when she becomes Hades’s wife Persephone. However, the myth shows the Cora of daylight and Persephone of darkness as a unity; the cyclical return to the surface of the earth and disappearance in its depth point to inversion rather than antithesis. In the works of French romanticism the dramatic character of Persephone is sometimes placed close to Eurydice. The present paper discusses the issue in the writings of Gérard de Nerval and Alphonse Esquiros’s Le Magicien.

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