June 8, 2024 • 31 mins
Join Jordan and Kit as they retell and ret-con the mythology of the constellation Perseus.
00:00 Intro
00:34 Background and History
01:58 Myth Retelling
13:56 Myth Analysis
18:02 Retconstellations
26:16 Oracle AI
30:22 Outro
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
>> Jordan (00:00):
[Music]
(00:17):
Hi, I'm Jordan.
>> Kit (00:18):
And I'm Kit.
>> Jordan (00:19):
Welcome to Starry Time, where stars
plus lines
>> Kit (00:23):
equal stories.
>> Jordan (00:25):
Today we're going to be continuing our exploration
of the constellation Perseus with a
focus today on the myth and history of this
constellation.
>> Kit (00:34):
So this constellation is named after the
Greek ahem quote unquote hero
Perseus Though there is some
debate about Perseus's origins,
at least from an etymological
perspective. Uh, there's some suggestion that
Perseus is just a very uncommon
name in Greek, and so maybe it's not actually
(00:56):
Greek but, uh, then again,
like his origin story is that he's from a Greek
island. So he's a Greek hero, just
a unique name.
>> Jordan (01:06):
However, this part of the night sky hasn't
always been Perseus domain. In Babylonian
star lore, this is known as the old man
constellation. But not just any old man Enmesharra, who's
basically like a, uh, primordial underworld
god. He's later supplanted by other gods in
Babylonian mythology.
>> Kit (01:25):
And in traditional chinese star lore, this part of
the night sky is in the western quadrant
in the White Tiger of the West. And it has
parts in several different mansions, including bond,
stomach, hairy head and net.
>> Jordan (01:39):
Hairy head's definitely got to be my favorite.
>> Kit (01:42):
There are also some other associations in other
cultures and periods with this constellation, but
they seemed a bit more tenuous or there was sort of like some
question as to whether or not I, or to what extent this
was actually recognized as other things. So I think we'll leave our
history at that for now.
>> Jordan (01:58):
Perfect. Let's move on to talking about the Greek myth
of Perseus If you listen to our episode on
Cassiopeia, Cepheus and
Andromeda from earlier this season, you'll
know Perseus as, uh, the guy who
rolled in and instantly fell in
love with a naked Andromeda tied to a
rock, killed the sea monster and then whisked
(02:21):
the princess away to his homeland to be his wife.
>> Kit (02:24):
Yeah, we don't hear any more about Andromeda.
And they just go on and have like, uh, like
seven kids or something like that. As
most hero stories in Greek
myth begin, Perseus is the son of a
god. Which god, do you want to guess?
>> Jordan (02:41):
Uh, Hermes?
>> Kit (02:42):
No.
>> Jordan (02:43):
Ares?
>> Kit (02:44):
No.
>> Jordan (02:44):
Poseidon?
>> Kit (02:45):
Nope.
>> Jordan (02:45):
Is it the most promiscuous?
Is it the big Z?
>> Kit (02:51):
Perhaps, it may, in fact be the
big Z. Perseus's dad is none
other than the King of the
gods, lord of the lightning bolts, Zeus.
>> Jordan (03:03):
So of course this means his mother is Hera,
Zeus's wife. Right?
>> Kit (03:09):
Yep, no.
>> Jordan (03:10):
No? Shocker. [laughter]
>> Kit (03:12):
Shocking. Perseus's mother is a
mortal woman called Danae. And Danae
is the only child of a king,
who is the King of Argos.
>> Jordan (03:23):
Of course. Zeus
>> Kit (03:26):
mm m so
Danae's life is kind of interesting
because her dad is basically
mad because he doesn't have a male heir. Just
the one child.
>> Jordan (03:37):
Well, surely that's her fault. Yeah, of
course.
>> Kit (03:41):
So the King of Argos goes to the Oracle
at Delphi to find out if, you know, um, is
there a son coming? Is he gonna get a son or
what? But as oracles do, this one
simply says, you're gonna get murdered
by your grandson.
>> Jordan (03:58):
Classic. I mean, that does provide some
answers. Not exactly the answers he was looking
for, but an answer.
>> Kit (04:06):
Yep. So the King does
what any normal father would
do and puts Danae into a
tower. Just locks her up in a tower.
>> Jordan (04:16):
Well, when in doubt, tower your daughter.
>> Kit (04:19):
Then you might ask, okay, so she's locked in a tower
and the tower's kind of in the middle of the property, sort of like
a panopticon situation. um,
how does she get pregnant?
Well, I want you to really, I really
want you to get ready for this because this is gonna be a
lot. This is a lot to think about. Are you ready?
>> Jordan (04:39):
How does she become pregnant?
>> Kit (04:40):
Okay, so Zeus comes to her in
the form of a
golden shower.
>> Jordan (04:48):
No. No. I wasn't ready for that.
No. I mean, if you had given me 50
guesses I'm not sure that would have
been- I didn't know that was even in Zeus's
repertoire. Leave it up to me to underestimate the
guy.
>> Kit (05:04):
And so that is how
Perseus comes to be.
So instead of murdering
Danae and the baby and,
um, incurring the wrath of Zeus, of course
her father, the King of Argos puts them in a
box and sets them out to
sea.
>> Jordan (05:24):
Perfect. Yeah. Let nature kill them.
It's indirect. If you indirectly kill
people, just set them on the course to die,
surely Zeus will be like, I don't know how they wound up
in this box. It won't come back to
you at all.
>> Kit (05:39):
No. So somehow,
uh, Danae and Perseus survive.
They are taken in by a fisherman whose
brother is named Polydectes and is
the king of the island they washed ashore
on.
>> Jordan (05:54):
Mmhmm
>> Kit (05:55):
So this is where things kind of get interesting.
Um, Perseus grows up and
that seems to happen without issue. So Danae is
taken in by this fisherman, raises
Perseus and then Perseus is grown
and Polydectes the brother of the fisherman, is
like, okay, Danae,
(06:16):
you are looking good.
>> Jordan (06:20):
Perseus's mom has got it going on.
>> Kit (06:23):
Yeah, exactly. But Perseus is
like, I don't like the way that Polydectes
is looking at my mom. And he's like, back
off.
>> Jordan (06:32):
Yeah, come on.
>> Kit (06:33):
Because for some reason, not having
Perseus's blessing is a problem. Probably
because women are property in ancient Greece, and
somehow now that he's a grown man, he
owns his mom. I guess. I don't, I don't really, I don't know the
laws of ancient Greece. So
Polydectes comes up with a plan to get rid of
Perseus. And the basic idea is a
(06:55):
classic tried and true, send them on
an unachievable quest. And this
quest was to kill the Gorgon Medusa.
>> Jordan (07:04):
This is seen as an unachievable
quest as Polydectes intends it
wholly to be. The Gorgons are three
sisters that are the children of the primordial
sea goddess Phorcys and
Ceto. However, Medusa is the only
one of these three sisters who's mortal.
(07:24):
And her sisters, Euryale and
Stheno were immortal for
some, I'm sure, very sensible reason.
>> Kit (07:33):
Yeah, it's confusing. Like, Greek myth
genetics are confusing. You have two
primordial god
parents who are siblings, by the
way. Um, but you're,
Medusa, mortal. It doesn't, I don't,
I don't.
>> Jordan (07:50):
Basically, one of them has to be mortal, so
Perseus has a chance to win, right?
>> Kit (07:56):
Yeah, I mean, I guess so. Right. Just has to serve the
story. Um, also, so this idea that
the Gorgons are these three sisters of the
primordial sea gods is actually somewhat
contested. So in the Ovid's
version of this myth, Medusa has a very different
origin story. So in his work, Medusa
has been cursed to having snake hair,
(08:18):
to becoming this snake haired creature when
Neptune, aka Poseidon, sleeps
with her in Minerva, aka Athena's,
temple. And so Athena becomes enraged
that they would dare to have sexual relations
in her temple and turns
Medusa into a snake haired
creature that turns people to stone. So, yeah, so
(08:40):
that's the sort of contested alternative version of who
Medusa is and where she comes from. And then
there's also some suggestion that
at one point in time, these Gorgons were
just purely monsters. So they were
depicted as not human like at all, just
sort of, um, creatures. But somewhere
along the way, they were translated
(09:02):
or depicted also as beautiful
women who also had snake hair.
So that's another sort of evolution of this myth. And um,
what these Gorgons are
>> Jordan (09:14):
Like there's a variety of myths as to
Medusa's origin, there are quite a few different
versions as to her demise, including a
couple different versions of what happens when Perseus goes to
kill her, all depending on who's telling the story, of
course. However, it's usually agreed
that Perseus got some help
from his Daddy Z,
(09:35):
Zeus, by way
of Hermes and Athena.
Hermes provides Perseus his winged
sandals, as well as a nice
shiny shield along with a special
bag to hold the head of the Gorgon,
which is given to him by Athena.
Athena also lets Perseus know that, uh,
(09:58):
you might want to try to avoid this whole, like,
looking in the Medusa's eye thing.
It doesn't tend to go well for
people. So he's getting some cheat codes,
he's getting some hints. Zeus by way
of Hermes and Athena.
>> Kit (10:14):
And then some versions of the myth, Perseus also gets
a special sword from Hephaestus and
also gets Hades' helm of
invisibility. So Perseus is coming into this
fight geared, uh, up with some magical
objects.
>> Jordan (10:29):
In the most common version of the myth, Perseus is
cunning and essentially gets Medusa to look
at herself in the shiny shield and then cuts off
her head. But in at least one
other depiction, Perseus beheads her as
she sleeps in an act of cowardice.
>> Kit (10:47):
Okay, so remember in the Ovid
origin story that she had
sex with Poseidon? Well, one
way or another, Medusa was pregnant
in some versions of the myth. And so
when she was killed by Perseus
she birthed Pegasus.
>> Jordan (11:07):
The Pegasus? The winged horse,
Pegasus? Wow.
>> Kit (11:12):
Right. Birthed the winged horse and
also Pegasus's, I guess,
paternal twin who is a
human. Well, an, um, immortal but not a horse
called Crys-a-saur? [laughter]
How do you say that?
>> Jordan (11:27):
I would say it as Chrysosaur
but I like Crysasaur
>> Kit (11:32):
Crys-a-saur [laughter]
Okay.
>> Jordan (11:36):
So, I guess chrysosaur or Chrysosaur
or you want to call it and Pegasus, they just
kind of fly off or otherwise, you know, they
let Perseus go on his way because he
leaves and they leave, go their separate ways, and he
takes Medusa's head in a bag and
leaves the scene. And at this point, you know,
he intends to be heading home.
(11:59):
However, along the way, he stumbles
upon Andromeda.
>> Kit (12:04):
Yeah. So just insert the myths and retcons from
our previous episodes in the Andromeda
episode, the Cassiopeia episode, they can all just kind of go
right here.
>> Jordan (12:14):
Well, eventually, Perseus does return
home with Andromeda and the head
of Medusa. He returns all of his
godly objects and gifts and artifacts.
And Medusa's head is affixed, to
Athena's shield- The Aegis
>> Kit (12:30):
Perseus's story isn't over after all,
the Oracle said he was gonna kill his granddad.
>> Jordan (12:35):
He's got a granddad to kill. And he
does. In two of the three traditional myths,
however, he didn't do it, you know, on purpose.
It was, it was an accident. It was an accidental
grandpatricide. I mean, who hasn't accidentally
thrown a discus and killed their estranged grandfather?
>> Kit (12:53):
Great point.
>> Jordan (12:53):
I mean, just accidentally.
>> Kit (12:54):
Right.
>> Jordan (12:55):
Perseus's story ends with him becoming King
of somewhere, probably hiring a lot
of other people to do his dirty work for him, like all the
other kings in this story. And he lives happily
ever after with seven sons
and two daughters. And
get this, this guy,
(13:16):
he names one of his daughters
Gorgophone. You know what that
means?
>> Kit (13:23):
Uh-uh
>> Jordan (13:25):
Gorgon killer.
>> Kit (13:27):
Oh, yikes.
And yeah, so Perseus gets to live happily ever
after. We don't hear, I don't think, really
anything about Danae or Andromeda or
Medusa's sisters.
>> Jordan (13:41):
So since we already talked about Andromeda
and her backstory, our analysis today will be
both on Danae and the Zeus origin
story as well as the Medusa
murder story.
>> Kit (13:55):
One last comment, uh, on Perseus.
He is somehow both the
grandfather and
half brother of Hercules.
So I'll be sure to post that very confusing family
tree over on our socials so we can all puzzle over
that. One of the many strange
(14:16):
things happening in this story.
I think there are a few familiar elements that
we've seen before in other myths, in the Danae and
Zeus story, we have this idea of how
inevitable fate is. Um, we
have a punishment, however long in coming
for imprisoning the innocent. Um, so there
are some things here that I think we've seen before. We have
(14:39):
this idea of divine births, the mythological
origins of Greek heroes. It's interesting
to see just how often these Greek heroes
are demigods. They're not just regular mortals.
And this reinforces the idea that to navigate the
world of the gods, you yourself have to be sort
of special in some way. And even the
heroes that don't have god like
(15:01):
powers or aren't demigods are often
conceptualized or understood as being favored or
protected by a god, which, again, just
reinforces this boundary between god and mortal that we
see a lot in these Greek myths. I'm really
kind of perplexed by the whole golden rain
choice. um I don't
like the idea of thinking about gods's semen as
(15:24):
golden, and so
I think I'm going to move on from that.
>> Jordan (15:30):
Kit,
>> Kit (15:31):
Yep.
>> Jordan (15:31):
Fair enough. Let's just pass on the rest of that.
And I think you said a lot of it there. So let's move
on to the Medusa and the Gorgon myth. There's been a
lot of great analysis of this myth already,
so I'll summarize some of the
ideas that I've been reading about. Historically,
some believe this is a mythological version
(15:52):
of a real event where Perseus
or another hero, essentially
destroyed the shrines of local goddesses
or deities, and it was retold in
this type of story to make sense of the trauma.
Freud, unsurprisingly,
saw this as a fear of castration story
(16:12):
and or, uh, Oedipus related situation,
with the idea being that Medusa is
the forbidden, mother, and her
snake hair is a stand in for pubic hair.
And Freud supports this interpretation with
the fact that we don't hear about Medusa or the
(16:32):
Gorgons turning women
into stone.
>> Kit (16:36):
You know, I'm really glad
that Sigmund decided to weigh in on this
really, uh, really a compelling
interpretation.
>> Jordan (16:46):
Unsurprisingly, I am more convinced
or interested and compelled by the feminist
interpretations. And these analyses focus on the
way the myth functions to either
demonize women's rage or women's
desires, and then how
society rewards or even makes
heroes out of men who take it
(17:08):
upon themselves to destroy powerful
women.
>> Kit (17:11):
Yeah. And there's definitely some overlap here,
although it's a bit more, I think, explicit in the
Medusa myth, but a little overlap with the idea of the Amazons
and the Maenad stories that we talked about in our
Maenad episode.
>> Jordan (17:24):
Definitely this vilification of a
feminine power.
>> Kit (17:28):
Yeah. And there has been a lot of writing and thinking about the
Medusa myth, um, from that sort of feminist
perspective. And so I'll be sure to post some of those, uh, over
on the socials if you want to get in a little bit deeper into
those. But I think ultimately,
I think it's pretty clear what we need
here. We need some retcons.
>> Jordan (17:48):
Kit, it's reconstallation time,
so let's take a quick break, and we'll return
with our rec constellations of this myth.
Welcome back to our segment, ret-constellation
(18:09):
In this segment, we reimagine,
reboot, and revise the myths of our
monthly constellation in hopes that we can
modernize them, subvert them, or perhaps even
deepen the story of our monthly constellation.
Sometimes, Kit, it's the best we can do just to make them a little
less cringy. I think we got a lot
of room to work with with this one, Kit. So
(18:32):
would you start us off this week?
>> Kit (18:34):
Yeah. So I think especially when
thinking about the Medusa
myth and also the Andromeda myth to some extent,
but I'm going to sort of leave that in the Andromeda episode.
I think this is an area where, like the Orpheus stories
we've seen some ret- constellations already been
done. Um, again, a
(18:54):
shout out to the book shadow of In the Shadow of
Perseus by Claire Heywood, which I think I mentioned in
a previous episode. I'm not sure if I had read it in
that previous episode. I have now read it. So if you're looking
for a retelling of
Perseus's life, but from the perspective of his
mother and Medusa and Andromeda, this
is definitely one, um, that you should check out.
(19:17):
Um, I do want to sort of add a caveat here, which is that
it is, like, persistently
discouraging. Um, it
is not really a ret-constellation as much
as a recentering. And so that
recentering, I think, is really interesting, but
it is kind of a book that I really, I did really enjoy
it, but it definitely were parts where I was like, this is just
(19:38):
unrelenting. Unrelenting in terms
of just feeling really depressing and just
frustrating that, um, this hero was sort of
behaving in this way. But a really beautiful book that really thinks
about how these recasts
Perseus and thinks about how the, um, people
around him are impacted by him.
>> Jordan (19:57):
And it seems like there's some other Medusa and
Perseus myths that have also been recentered
and retold in a few ways.
>> Kit (20:06):
Yeah. Uh, Natalie Hayes, who's another person that writes
in that sort of Greek myth, uh, retcon has Stone
Blind which I haven't read that one. Um, but it is
a sort of perspective shift. But yeah, so these stories,
the ones especially that I've read already, you know, there's a whole genre
of these- Song of Achilles- uh, are
really about recentering. Right. They're
(20:27):
about perspective shift. Um, but they're not
necessarily changing the story, if that makes sense.
And so anyways, all this is really just to
say that there are big names in this
retelling space that are working with these stories.
And, yeah, I wasn't really, really sure,
you know, where to go with it. So, yeah, so I went back to
(20:47):
our Andromeda episode to see if I could come up with
any inspiration there. So I thought maybe,
um, Medusa could be part of the Maenads
mythos, which kind of works in that we're
thinking about misbehaving women. We're thinking about
people that like snakes. And so I thought
maybe there's something there.
>> Jordan (21:06):
Maenads often are depicted with snakes.
See our asterisms on the Maenads
episode for more. So. All right, I see some of
the symbols that you're pulling together
here.
>> Kit (21:17):
Okay, so here's what I got. Perseus sets
off to kill Medusa to win over his soon to be
stepdad. But when he gets there, he actually
finds himself quite afraid of Medusa,
not because she turns people to stone or
has snake hair, but because she behaves
unlike any woman that Perseus has ever
met. She's free and wild and,
(21:40):
like, maybe she's a little bit of a
stoner. Um, so she gets Perseus
high, and he spills his
guts. He's got a bad stepdad. He has a
bad grandpa. He's literally the
child of Zeus's golden
rain. And Medusa's like, bro,
that does sound rough. So she helps him devise
(22:02):
a plan where they tie together a bunch of dead
snakeskins into a knot, and he can just bring
it back to his stepdad's house in all the glory.
And she's like, I, cool, I'll be dead
that's fine. I don't really like living in this cave
anyways. And so she decides to
relocate with her sisters, and they find a new
community and home with the Maenads,
(22:24):
who, of course, in my podcast extended
universe, are the neighbors of the Amazons.
Meanwhile, Perseus goes back with the
snakeskin head, quote
unquote. And people are like, oh, my gosh,
wow, Perseus, look at you. What
a hero. But his time
with Medusa has actually really changed him.
(22:46):
And he decides, you know, he's not really cut out to be a
hero. Um, he doesn't want to kill
random people or kidnap people.
And so he decides that he's gonna eschew
all the expectations of him and focus on his
real passion games.
So he goes on to invent
(23:07):
quoits, which is what the
myths say he does. It's basically like ring toss.
And maybe he creates the first tabletop game,
too. And he just decides to commit himself
to a life of creativity and play
instead of murder and vengeance.
>> Jordan (23:25):
Wow, Kit, love this
one.
>> Kit (23:28):
So how about you, Jordan? Where did you go with this Perseus
myth?
>> Jordan (23:32):
So my ret-constellation here,
Kit, I think it also is a
bit of a recentering, but I did try to take
some of the elements of the original myth and
reimagine or ret- constellation them
to the best of my ability. In my
myth, we have two
(23:53):
scientists specializing in
bioengineering and infectious diseases.
When the first cases of something known as the
Medusa's curse begin to
surface, which is a disease that
creates the seeming ability of turning people
into stone.
>> Kit (24:13):
Mhm.
>> Jordan (24:13):
After an expedition into the deep
sea. And these two
doctors, Doctor Perseus and
Doctor Andromeda
>> Kit (24:24):
yeahh!!
>> Jordan (24:26):
must work together to solve the
Medusa's curse and find a cure.
And as they do, they discover secrets about the
world that they never knew. That the Medusa's
curse, it was designed by a malevolent
corporation known as
CETUS
>> Kit (24:45):
ooooo!
>> Jordan (24:47):
which can be an acronym for all sorts of great
things that I made the Internet tell me.
I came up with this corporation called
the Corporate Energy Torment
Utility Services.
>> Kit (25:00):
Okay.
>> Jordan (25:02):
Answers from Chat GPT are much better.
So in my ret-constellation Doctor
Perseus and Doctor
Andromeda work together
to discover a serum to
counteract the petrification
process. And throughout their journey,
they fall in love and
(25:23):
tackle the CETUS Corp together.
And instead of killing in
order to feel a sense of
purpose or a sense of connection, they
use science and the
profound impact of
molecular biology to stand
up to true malevolence and forge
(25:45):
a love and a bond
that saves humanity itself.
>> Kit (25:51):
Oh, my gosh, I want this book to
exist. I think we should write it.
I think we should cut this entire section out so we can
write this book.
It's a contemporary retake that has
like, oh, it's so good. I'm obsessed with it.
>> Jordan (26:09):
Kit, I did the best I can to do
a better version, or at least a little bit less
cringey version.
Now it's time to see where our Oracle took this
myth in our segment, Oracle AI.
>> Kit (26:21):
Uh, so we first asked the Oracle to
retell us the myth of Perseus and Medusa and
then to tell us about its problematic
features and then to tell us in about
a paragraph or so, uh, another version of the myth
that addresses these problematic themes.
So to start off with, the problematic elements that the
Oracle identified in the Perseus and Medusa myth
(26:44):
included victim blaming and punishment,
glorification of Perseus specifically for
killing Medusa. Misogynistic
undertones. Lack of
agency for Medusa, and
divine intervention and moral ambiguity,
which was very vague, and I
(27:05):
think was getting at, like, this idea that gods
treat people unfairly. It's like, like everyone's helping
Perseus whereas, like, Athena's punishing Medusa.
But I I didn't really understand that one.
>> Jordan (27:16):
Kit, well, it sounds like some of these are
reasonable and others may be a little bit,
um, less so. But in asking
the Oracle for a short retelling that addresses these
issues, so saith, our friend the
Oracle (27:30):
In a reimagined version of the
myth, Medusa was a revered priestess of
Athena, known for her wisdom and beauty.
One day, Poseidon approached her with unwanted
advances. But this time,
Medusa courageously defended herself and
sought Athena's protection.
Recognizing Medusa's bravery and the injustice
(27:52):
she was facing, Athena bestowed upon her the
power to turn anyone who meant her harm
into stone, ensuring her safety
and autonomy. Meanwhile,
Perseus was a young hero on a quest to
prove his valor, not through violence,
but through wisdom and compassion.
(28:12):
Hearing of Medusa's plight, he sought her out,
not to kill her, but to learn from her
strength and resilience. When he found
Medusa, he approached her with respect
and empathy. Instead of a battle,
their meeting became an exchange of stories
and wisdom. Together, Medusa and
(28:33):
Perseus formed a bond, and he
vowed to spread the tale of her courage
and the injustices that she endured,
challenging the dominant narratives that vilified
her. Athena, seeing the
positive outcome of the meeting, honored
Medusa by lifting the curse that caused
her isolation, allowing her to live
(28:56):
freely and to continue her role as a
wise and respected priestess.
>> Kit (29:01):
Already, like in a one paragraph thing, it has a
contradiction. It's like I thought you had a protective
skill and now it's actually a curse. Okay.
>> Jordan (29:09):
Okay, good. I'm glad I wasn't the only one.
>> Kit (29:11):
It didn't make sense. Anyways, okay, so,
according to the Oracle and I quote, this version
of the myth celebrates Medusa's strength and agency
and redefines Perseus's heroism as one
of empathy and understanding rather than
conquest, promoting a narrative of mutual respect and
justice.
>> Jordan (29:30):
Great microcosm of what
oracles do.
>> Kit (29:34):
Mhm.
>> Jordan (29:34):
They recycle a lot of words that have
meaning and a lot of symbols. Wisdom, um,
compassion, empathy, respect,
justice. Challenging narratives,
isolation, curse, bravery. They
say all these things, but at the end of the day, when
you take what the Oracle is saying at face
value, it's completely self contradictory and makes
(29:56):
no sense whatsoever, but it gives
you a lot of the gestures of
sense or a lot of the
echoes of meaning, and
we fill in the blanks and overlook the
contradictions or the parts that just
blatantly are quite silly. So in
this sense, I think AI is doing a great job
(30:18):
of representing what oracles have done for
all time.
This brings us to the end of our episode this
week. Please join us next week for the
pop culture segment of our exploration of
the constellation Perseus
>> Kit (30:40):
This has been Kit
>> Jordan (30:42):
And Jordan.
>> Kit (30:43):
Sisters, lovers of stars and stories.
>> Jordan (30:46):
And we'll see you next time
>> Kit (30:48):
On Starry Time.
[Music]
(00:17):
Hi, I'm Jordan.
>> Kit (00:18):
And I'm Kit.
>> Jordan (00:19):
Welcome to Starry Time, where stars
plus lines
>> Kit (00:23):
equal stories.
>> Jordan (00:25):
Today we're going to be continuing our exploration
of the constellation Perseus with a
focus today on the myth and history of this
constellation.
>> Kit (00:34):
So this constellation is named after the
Greek ahem quote unquote hero
Perseus Though there is some
debate about Perseus's origins,
at least from an etymological
perspective. Uh, there's some suggestion that
Perseus is just a very uncommon
name in Greek, and so maybe it's not actually
(00:56):
Greek but, uh, then again,
like his origin story is that he's from a Greek
island. So he's a Greek hero, just
a unique name.
>> Jordan (01:06):
However, this part of the night sky hasn't
always been Perseus domain. In Babylonian
star lore, this is known as the old man
constellation. But not just any old man Enmesharra, who's
basically like a, uh, primordial underworld
god. He's later supplanted by other gods in
Babylonian mythology.
>> Kit (01:25):
And in traditional chinese star lore, this part of
the night sky is in the western quadrant
in the White Tiger of the West. And it has
parts in several different mansions, including bond,
stomach, hairy head and net.
>> Jordan (01:39):
Hairy head's definitely got to be my favorite.
>> Kit (01:42):
There are also some other associations in other
cultures and periods with this constellation, but
they seemed a bit more tenuous or there was sort of like some
question as to whether or not I, or to what extent this
was actually recognized as other things. So I think we'll leave our
history at that for now.
>> Jordan (01:58):
Perfect. Let's move on to talking about the Greek myth
of Perseus If you listen to our episode on
Cassiopeia, Cepheus and
Andromeda from earlier this season, you'll
know Perseus as, uh, the guy who
rolled in and instantly fell in
love with a naked Andromeda tied to a
rock, killed the sea monster and then whisked
(02:21):
the princess away to his homeland to be his wife.
>> Kit (02:24):
Yeah, we don't hear any more about Andromeda.
And they just go on and have like, uh, like
seven kids or something like that. As
most hero stories in Greek
myth begin, Perseus is the son of a
god. Which god, do you want to guess?
>> Jordan (02:41):
Uh, Hermes?
>> Kit (02:42):
No.
>> Jordan (02:43):
Ares?
>> Kit (02:44):
No.
>> Jordan (02:44):
Poseidon?
>> Kit (02:45):
Nope.
>> Jordan (02:45):
Is it the most promiscuous?
Is it the big Z?
>> Kit (02:51):
Perhaps, it may, in fact be the
big Z. Perseus's dad is none
other than the King of the
gods, lord of the lightning bolts, Zeus.
>> Jordan (03:03):
So of course this means his mother is Hera,
Zeus's wife. Right?
>> Kit (03:09):
Yep, no.
>> Jordan (03:10):
No? Shocker. [laughter]
>> Kit (03:12):
Shocking. Perseus's mother is a
mortal woman called Danae. And Danae
is the only child of a king,
who is the King of Argos.
>> Jordan (03:23):
Of course. Zeus
>> Kit (03:26):
mm m so
Danae's life is kind of interesting
because her dad is basically
mad because he doesn't have a male heir. Just
the one child.
>> Jordan (03:37):
Well, surely that's her fault. Yeah, of
course.
>> Kit (03:41):
So the King of Argos goes to the Oracle
at Delphi to find out if, you know, um, is
there a son coming? Is he gonna get a son or
what? But as oracles do, this one
simply says, you're gonna get murdered
by your grandson.
>> Jordan (03:58):
Classic. I mean, that does provide some
answers. Not exactly the answers he was looking
for, but an answer.
>> Kit (04:06):
Yep. So the King does
what any normal father would
do and puts Danae into a
tower. Just locks her up in a tower.
>> Jordan (04:16):
Well, when in doubt, tower your daughter.
>> Kit (04:19):
Then you might ask, okay, so she's locked in a tower
and the tower's kind of in the middle of the property, sort of like
a panopticon situation. um,
how does she get pregnant?
Well, I want you to really, I really
want you to get ready for this because this is gonna be a
lot. This is a lot to think about. Are you ready?
>> Jordan (04:39):
How does she become pregnant?
>> Kit (04:40):
Okay, so Zeus comes to her in
the form of a
golden shower.
>> Jordan (04:48):
No. No. I wasn't ready for that.
No. I mean, if you had given me 50
guesses I'm not sure that would have
been- I didn't know that was even in Zeus's
repertoire. Leave it up to me to underestimate the
guy.
>> Kit (05:04):
And so that is how
Perseus comes to be.
So instead of murdering
Danae and the baby and,
um, incurring the wrath of Zeus, of course
her father, the King of Argos puts them in a
box and sets them out to
sea.
>> Jordan (05:24):
Perfect. Yeah. Let nature kill them.
It's indirect. If you indirectly kill
people, just set them on the course to die,
surely Zeus will be like, I don't know how they wound up
in this box. It won't come back to
you at all.
>> Kit (05:39):
No. So somehow,
uh, Danae and Perseus survive.
They are taken in by a fisherman whose
brother is named Polydectes and is
the king of the island they washed ashore
on.
>> Jordan (05:54):
Mmhmm
>> Kit (05:55):
So this is where things kind of get interesting.
Um, Perseus grows up and
that seems to happen without issue. So Danae is
taken in by this fisherman, raises
Perseus and then Perseus is grown
and Polydectes the brother of the fisherman, is
like, okay, Danae,
(06:16):
you are looking good.
>> Jordan (06:20):
Perseus's mom has got it going on.
>> Kit (06:23):
Yeah, exactly. But Perseus is
like, I don't like the way that Polydectes
is looking at my mom. And he's like, back
off.
>> Jordan (06:32):
Yeah, come on.
>> Kit (06:33):
Because for some reason, not having
Perseus's blessing is a problem. Probably
because women are property in ancient Greece, and
somehow now that he's a grown man, he
owns his mom. I guess. I don't, I don't really, I don't know the
laws of ancient Greece. So
Polydectes comes up with a plan to get rid of
Perseus. And the basic idea is a
(06:55):
classic tried and true, send them on
an unachievable quest. And this
quest was to kill the Gorgon Medusa.
>> Jordan (07:04):
This is seen as an unachievable
quest as Polydectes intends it
wholly to be. The Gorgons are three
sisters that are the children of the primordial
sea goddess Phorcys and
Ceto. However, Medusa is the only
one of these three sisters who's mortal.
(07:24):
And her sisters, Euryale and
Stheno were immortal for
some, I'm sure, very sensible reason.
>> Kit (07:33):
Yeah, it's confusing. Like, Greek myth
genetics are confusing. You have two
primordial god
parents who are siblings, by the
way. Um, but you're,
Medusa, mortal. It doesn't, I don't,
I don't.
>> Jordan (07:50):
Basically, one of them has to be mortal, so
Perseus has a chance to win, right?
>> Kit (07:56):
Yeah, I mean, I guess so. Right. Just has to serve the
story. Um, also, so this idea that
the Gorgons are these three sisters of the
primordial sea gods is actually somewhat
contested. So in the Ovid's
version of this myth, Medusa has a very different
origin story. So in his work, Medusa
has been cursed to having snake hair,
(08:18):
to becoming this snake haired creature when
Neptune, aka Poseidon, sleeps
with her in Minerva, aka Athena's,
temple. And so Athena becomes enraged
that they would dare to have sexual relations
in her temple and turns
Medusa into a snake haired
creature that turns people to stone. So, yeah, so
(08:40):
that's the sort of contested alternative version of who
Medusa is and where she comes from. And then
there's also some suggestion that
at one point in time, these Gorgons were
just purely monsters. So they were
depicted as not human like at all, just
sort of, um, creatures. But somewhere
along the way, they were translated
(09:02):
or depicted also as beautiful
women who also had snake hair.
So that's another sort of evolution of this myth. And um,
what these Gorgons are
>> Jordan (09:14):
Like there's a variety of myths as to
Medusa's origin, there are quite a few different
versions as to her demise, including a
couple different versions of what happens when Perseus goes to
kill her, all depending on who's telling the story, of
course. However, it's usually agreed
that Perseus got some help
from his Daddy Z,
(09:35):
Zeus, by way
of Hermes and Athena.
Hermes provides Perseus his winged
sandals, as well as a nice
shiny shield along with a special
bag to hold the head of the Gorgon,
which is given to him by Athena.
Athena also lets Perseus know that, uh,
(09:58):
you might want to try to avoid this whole, like,
looking in the Medusa's eye thing.
It doesn't tend to go well for
people. So he's getting some cheat codes,
he's getting some hints. Zeus by way
of Hermes and Athena.
>> Kit (10:14):
And then some versions of the myth, Perseus also gets
a special sword from Hephaestus and
also gets Hades' helm of
invisibility. So Perseus is coming into this
fight geared, uh, up with some magical
objects.
>> Jordan (10:29):
In the most common version of the myth, Perseus is
cunning and essentially gets Medusa to look
at herself in the shiny shield and then cuts off
her head. But in at least one
other depiction, Perseus beheads her as
she sleeps in an act of cowardice.
>> Kit (10:47):
Okay, so remember in the Ovid
origin story that she had
sex with Poseidon? Well, one
way or another, Medusa was pregnant
in some versions of the myth. And so
when she was killed by Perseus
she birthed Pegasus.
>> Jordan (11:07):
The Pegasus? The winged horse,
Pegasus? Wow.
>> Kit (11:12):
Right. Birthed the winged horse and
also Pegasus's, I guess,
paternal twin who is a
human. Well, an, um, immortal but not a horse
called Crys-a-saur? [laughter]
How do you say that?
>> Jordan (11:27):
I would say it as Chrysosaur
but I like Crysasaur
>> Kit (11:32):
Crys-a-saur [laughter]
Okay.
>> Jordan (11:36):
So, I guess chrysosaur or Chrysosaur
or you want to call it and Pegasus, they just
kind of fly off or otherwise, you know, they
let Perseus go on his way because he
leaves and they leave, go their separate ways, and he
takes Medusa's head in a bag and
leaves the scene. And at this point, you know,
he intends to be heading home.
(11:59):
However, along the way, he stumbles
upon Andromeda.
>> Kit (12:04):
Yeah. So just insert the myths and retcons from
our previous episodes in the Andromeda
episode, the Cassiopeia episode, they can all just kind of go
right here.
>> Jordan (12:14):
Well, eventually, Perseus does return
home with Andromeda and the head
of Medusa. He returns all of his
godly objects and gifts and artifacts.
And Medusa's head is affixed, to
Athena's shield- The Aegis
>> Kit (12:30):
Perseus's story isn't over after all,
the Oracle said he was gonna kill his granddad.
>> Jordan (12:35):
He's got a granddad to kill. And he
does. In two of the three traditional myths,
however, he didn't do it, you know, on purpose.
It was, it was an accident. It was an accidental
grandpatricide. I mean, who hasn't accidentally
thrown a discus and killed their estranged grandfather?
>> Kit (12:53):
Great point.
>> Jordan (12:53):
I mean, just accidentally.
>> Kit (12:54):
Right.
>> Jordan (12:55):
Perseus's story ends with him becoming King
of somewhere, probably hiring a lot
of other people to do his dirty work for him, like all the
other kings in this story. And he lives happily
ever after with seven sons
and two daughters. And
get this, this guy,
(13:16):
he names one of his daughters
Gorgophone. You know what that
means?
>> Kit (13:23):
Uh-uh
>> Jordan (13:25):
Gorgon killer.
>> Kit (13:27):
Oh, yikes.
And yeah, so Perseus gets to live happily ever
after. We don't hear, I don't think, really
anything about Danae or Andromeda or
Medusa's sisters.
>> Jordan (13:41):
So since we already talked about Andromeda
and her backstory, our analysis today will be
both on Danae and the Zeus origin
story as well as the Medusa
murder story.
>> Kit (13:55):
One last comment, uh, on Perseus.
He is somehow both the
grandfather and
half brother of Hercules.
So I'll be sure to post that very confusing family
tree over on our socials so we can all puzzle over
that. One of the many strange
(14:16):
things happening in this story.
I think there are a few familiar elements that
we've seen before in other myths, in the Danae and
Zeus story, we have this idea of how
inevitable fate is. Um, we
have a punishment, however long in coming
for imprisoning the innocent. Um, so there
are some things here that I think we've seen before. We have
(14:39):
this idea of divine births, the mythological
origins of Greek heroes. It's interesting
to see just how often these Greek heroes
are demigods. They're not just regular mortals.
And this reinforces the idea that to navigate the
world of the gods, you yourself have to be sort
of special in some way. And even the
heroes that don't have god like
(15:01):
powers or aren't demigods are often
conceptualized or understood as being favored or
protected by a god, which, again, just
reinforces this boundary between god and mortal that we
see a lot in these Greek myths. I'm really
kind of perplexed by the whole golden rain
choice. um I don't
like the idea of thinking about gods's semen as
(15:24):
golden, and so
I think I'm going to move on from that.
>> Jordan (15:30):
Kit,
>> Kit (15:31):
Yep.
>> Jordan (15:31):
Fair enough. Let's just pass on the rest of that.
And I think you said a lot of it there. So let's move
on to the Medusa and the Gorgon myth. There's been a
lot of great analysis of this myth already,
so I'll summarize some of the
ideas that I've been reading about. Historically,
some believe this is a mythological version
(15:52):
of a real event where Perseus
or another hero, essentially
destroyed the shrines of local goddesses
or deities, and it was retold in
this type of story to make sense of the trauma.
Freud, unsurprisingly,
saw this as a fear of castration story
(16:12):
and or, uh, Oedipus related situation,
with the idea being that Medusa is
the forbidden, mother, and her
snake hair is a stand in for pubic hair.
And Freud supports this interpretation with
the fact that we don't hear about Medusa or the
(16:32):
Gorgons turning women
into stone.
>> Kit (16:36):
You know, I'm really glad
that Sigmund decided to weigh in on this
really, uh, really a compelling
interpretation.
>> Jordan (16:46):
Unsurprisingly, I am more convinced
or interested and compelled by the feminist
interpretations. And these analyses focus on the
way the myth functions to either
demonize women's rage or women's
desires, and then how
society rewards or even makes
heroes out of men who take it
(17:08):
upon themselves to destroy powerful
women.
>> Kit (17:11):
Yeah. And there's definitely some overlap here,
although it's a bit more, I think, explicit in the
Medusa myth, but a little overlap with the idea of the Amazons
and the Maenad stories that we talked about in our
Maenad episode.
>> Jordan (17:24):
Definitely this vilification of a
feminine power.
>> Kit (17:28):
Yeah. And there has been a lot of writing and thinking about the
Medusa myth, um, from that sort of feminist
perspective. And so I'll be sure to post some of those, uh, over
on the socials if you want to get in a little bit deeper into
those. But I think ultimately,
I think it's pretty clear what we need
here. We need some retcons.
>> Jordan (17:48):
Kit, it's reconstallation time,
so let's take a quick break, and we'll return
with our rec constellations of this myth.
Welcome back to our segment, ret-constellation
(18:09):
In this segment, we reimagine,
reboot, and revise the myths of our
monthly constellation in hopes that we can
modernize them, subvert them, or perhaps even
deepen the story of our monthly constellation.
Sometimes, Kit, it's the best we can do just to make them a little
less cringy. I think we got a lot
of room to work with with this one, Kit. So
(18:32):
would you start us off this week?
>> Kit (18:34):
Yeah. So I think especially when
thinking about the Medusa
myth and also the Andromeda myth to some extent,
but I'm going to sort of leave that in the Andromeda episode.
I think this is an area where, like the Orpheus stories
we've seen some ret- constellations already been
done. Um, again, a
(18:54):
shout out to the book shadow of In the Shadow of
Perseus by Claire Heywood, which I think I mentioned in
a previous episode. I'm not sure if I had read it in
that previous episode. I have now read it. So if you're looking
for a retelling of
Perseus's life, but from the perspective of his
mother and Medusa and Andromeda, this
is definitely one, um, that you should check out.
(19:17):
Um, I do want to sort of add a caveat here, which is that
it is, like, persistently
discouraging. Um, it
is not really a ret-constellation as much
as a recentering. And so that
recentering, I think, is really interesting, but
it is kind of a book that I really, I did really enjoy
it, but it definitely were parts where I was like, this is just
(19:38):
unrelenting. Unrelenting in terms
of just feeling really depressing and just
frustrating that, um, this hero was sort of
behaving in this way. But a really beautiful book that really thinks
about how these recasts
Perseus and thinks about how the, um, people
around him are impacted by him.
>> Jordan (19:57):
And it seems like there's some other Medusa and
Perseus myths that have also been recentered
and retold in a few ways.
>> Kit (20:06):
Yeah. Uh, Natalie Hayes, who's another person that writes
in that sort of Greek myth, uh, retcon has Stone
Blind which I haven't read that one. Um, but it is
a sort of perspective shift. But yeah, so these stories,
the ones especially that I've read already, you know, there's a whole genre
of these- Song of Achilles- uh, are
really about recentering. Right. They're
(20:27):
about perspective shift. Um, but they're not
necessarily changing the story, if that makes sense.
And so anyways, all this is really just to
say that there are big names in this
retelling space that are working with these stories.
And, yeah, I wasn't really, really sure,
you know, where to go with it. So, yeah, so I went back to
(20:47):
our Andromeda episode to see if I could come up with
any inspiration there. So I thought maybe,
um, Medusa could be part of the Maenads
mythos, which kind of works in that we're
thinking about misbehaving women. We're thinking about
people that like snakes. And so I thought
maybe there's something there.
>> Jordan (21:06):
Maenads often are depicted with snakes.
See our asterisms on the Maenads
episode for more. So. All right, I see some of
the symbols that you're pulling together
here.
>> Kit (21:17):
Okay, so here's what I got. Perseus sets
off to kill Medusa to win over his soon to be
stepdad. But when he gets there, he actually
finds himself quite afraid of Medusa,
not because she turns people to stone or
has snake hair, but because she behaves
unlike any woman that Perseus has ever
met. She's free and wild and,
(21:40):
like, maybe she's a little bit of a
stoner. Um, so she gets Perseus
high, and he spills his
guts. He's got a bad stepdad. He has a
bad grandpa. He's literally the
child of Zeus's golden
rain. And Medusa's like, bro,
that does sound rough. So she helps him devise
(22:02):
a plan where they tie together a bunch of dead
snakeskins into a knot, and he can just bring
it back to his stepdad's house in all the glory.
And she's like, I, cool, I'll be dead
that's fine. I don't really like living in this cave
anyways. And so she decides to
relocate with her sisters, and they find a new
community and home with the Maenads,
(22:24):
who, of course, in my podcast extended
universe, are the neighbors of the Amazons.
Meanwhile, Perseus goes back with the
snakeskin head, quote
unquote. And people are like, oh, my gosh,
wow, Perseus, look at you. What
a hero. But his time
with Medusa has actually really changed him.
(22:46):
And he decides, you know, he's not really cut out to be a
hero. Um, he doesn't want to kill
random people or kidnap people.
And so he decides that he's gonna eschew
all the expectations of him and focus on his
real passion games.
So he goes on to invent
(23:07):
quoits, which is what the
myths say he does. It's basically like ring toss.
And maybe he creates the first tabletop game,
too. And he just decides to commit himself
to a life of creativity and play
instead of murder and vengeance.
>> Jordan (23:25):
Wow, Kit, love this
one.
>> Kit (23:28):
So how about you, Jordan? Where did you go with this Perseus
myth?
>> Jordan (23:32):
So my ret-constellation here,
Kit, I think it also is a
bit of a recentering, but I did try to take
some of the elements of the original myth and
reimagine or ret- constellation them
to the best of my ability. In my
myth, we have two
(23:53):
scientists specializing in
bioengineering and infectious diseases.
When the first cases of something known as the
Medusa's curse begin to
surface, which is a disease that
creates the seeming ability of turning people
into stone.
>> Kit (24:13):
Mhm.
>> Jordan (24:13):
After an expedition into the deep
sea. And these two
doctors, Doctor Perseus and
Doctor Andromeda
>> Kit (24:24):
yeahh!!
>> Jordan (24:26):
must work together to solve the
Medusa's curse and find a cure.
And as they do, they discover secrets about the
world that they never knew. That the Medusa's
curse, it was designed by a malevolent
corporation known as
CETUS
>> Kit (24:45):
ooooo!
>> Jordan (24:47):
which can be an acronym for all sorts of great
things that I made the Internet tell me.
I came up with this corporation called
the Corporate Energy Torment
Utility Services.
>> Kit (25:00):
Okay.
>> Jordan (25:02):
Answers from Chat GPT are much better.
So in my ret-constellation Doctor
Perseus and Doctor
Andromeda work together
to discover a serum to
counteract the petrification
process. And throughout their journey,
they fall in love and
(25:23):
tackle the CETUS Corp together.
And instead of killing in
order to feel a sense of
purpose or a sense of connection, they
use science and the
profound impact of
molecular biology to stand
up to true malevolence and forge
(25:45):
a love and a bond
that saves humanity itself.
>> Kit (25:51):
Oh, my gosh, I want this book to
exist. I think we should write it.
I think we should cut this entire section out so we can
write this book.
It's a contemporary retake that has
like, oh, it's so good. I'm obsessed with it.
>> Jordan (26:09):
Kit, I did the best I can to do
a better version, or at least a little bit less
cringey version.
Now it's time to see where our Oracle took this
myth in our segment, Oracle AI.
>> Kit (26:21):
Uh, so we first asked the Oracle to
retell us the myth of Perseus and Medusa and
then to tell us about its problematic
features and then to tell us in about
a paragraph or so, uh, another version of the myth
that addresses these problematic themes.
So to start off with, the problematic elements that the
Oracle identified in the Perseus and Medusa myth
(26:44):
included victim blaming and punishment,
glorification of Perseus specifically for
killing Medusa. Misogynistic
undertones. Lack of
agency for Medusa, and
divine intervention and moral ambiguity,
which was very vague, and I
(27:05):
think was getting at, like, this idea that gods
treat people unfairly. It's like, like everyone's helping
Perseus whereas, like, Athena's punishing Medusa.
But I I didn't really understand that one.
>> Jordan (27:16):
Kit, well, it sounds like some of these are
reasonable and others may be a little bit,
um, less so. But in asking
the Oracle for a short retelling that addresses these
issues, so saith, our friend the
Oracle (27:30):
In a reimagined version of the
myth, Medusa was a revered priestess of
Athena, known for her wisdom and beauty.
One day, Poseidon approached her with unwanted
advances. But this time,
Medusa courageously defended herself and
sought Athena's protection.
Recognizing Medusa's bravery and the injustice
(27:52):
she was facing, Athena bestowed upon her the
power to turn anyone who meant her harm
into stone, ensuring her safety
and autonomy. Meanwhile,
Perseus was a young hero on a quest to
prove his valor, not through violence,
but through wisdom and compassion.
(28:12):
Hearing of Medusa's plight, he sought her out,
not to kill her, but to learn from her
strength and resilience. When he found
Medusa, he approached her with respect
and empathy. Instead of a battle,
their meeting became an exchange of stories
and wisdom. Together, Medusa and
(28:33):
Perseus formed a bond, and he
vowed to spread the tale of her courage
and the injustices that she endured,
challenging the dominant narratives that vilified
her. Athena, seeing the
positive outcome of the meeting, honored
Medusa by lifting the curse that caused
her isolation, allowing her to live
(28:56):
freely and to continue her role as a
wise and respected priestess.
>> Kit (29:01):
Already, like in a one paragraph thing, it has a
contradiction. It's like I thought you had a protective
skill and now it's actually a curse. Okay.
>> Jordan (29:09):
Okay, good. I'm glad I wasn't the only one.
>> Kit (29:11):
It didn't make sense. Anyways, okay, so,
according to the Oracle and I quote, this version
of the myth celebrates Medusa's strength and agency
and redefines Perseus's heroism as one
of empathy and understanding rather than
conquest, promoting a narrative of mutual respect and
justice.
>> Jordan (29:30):
Great microcosm of what
oracles do.
>> Kit (29:34):
Mhm.
>> Jordan (29:34):
They recycle a lot of words that have
meaning and a lot of symbols. Wisdom, um,
compassion, empathy, respect,
justice. Challenging narratives,
isolation, curse, bravery. They
say all these things, but at the end of the day, when
you take what the Oracle is saying at face
value, it's completely self contradictory and makes
(29:56):
no sense whatsoever, but it gives
you a lot of the gestures of
sense or a lot of the
echoes of meaning, and
we fill in the blanks and overlook the
contradictions or the parts that just
blatantly are quite silly. So in
this sense, I think AI is doing a great job
(30:18):
of representing what oracles have done for
all time.
This brings us to the end of our episode this
week. Please join us next week for the
pop culture segment of our exploration of
the constellation Perseus
>> Kit (30:40):
This has been Kit
>> Jordan (30:42):
And Jordan.
>> Kit (30:43):
Sisters, lovers of stars and stories.
>> Jordan (30:46):
And we'll see you next time
>> Kit (30:48):
On Starry Time.
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