Mythistorema - Triceratops Home

32 JOURNAL OF THE HELLENIC DIASPORA
developed in poem "16," which alludes to the reasons for the failure of
the journey—an act of hubris committed in the past.
In poem "4" of the sequence, the myths of the Odyssey and the
Argonauts are blended. As in poem "1," the journey is endless; the
Argonauts neither reach their destination nor recover the golden fleece
(a symbol, for Seferis, of the erotic drive). These Argonauts and the
modem Odysseus' companions end up in the underworld, unable to complete
their journey. The reasons for the failure to complete the journey
in this and most of the other poems of Mythistorema are not spelled out
but are indirectly suggested. The blending of the myths already mentioned,
especially those of Orestes, Prometheus and Andromeda, the
symbolism implied in the inability to recover the golden fleece, the
destructive effect of the water on the Argonauts, all point to the hubris
that these voyagers had committed by wasting the gift of love. The association
of the failure of the journey with a failure in love is evident if
one follows some of these motifs as they are reiterated in later poems,
most notably in "The Thrush."
Poem "5" describes the deep yearning for a journey of the protagonist
who, obsessed by the desire to join his friends, creates the illusion of a
voyage by drawing the images of boats and figureheads.
Poem "6," addressed to Maurice Ravel, conveys the idea of a journey
not realized because of a psychological arrest, symbolized by a pane of
glass which separates the protagonist from the mythical garden and its
fountains of water.
In poem "7," the protagonist longs for a journey and makes a desperate
plea for communication with a person with whom he is in love. The
imaginary voyage to the past is not a "recherche du temps perdu," because
in Seferis' memory, "wherever you touch it," hurts. The poem ends with
the seizure of mad longings.
Poem "8" is an agonizing wandering on "rotting sea-timbers," which
conveys a painful sense of homelessness and precariousness. It portrays
the fragmented existence of a person—and of his whole generation—who
feels like a foreigner to life.
Poem "9" expresses the fatigue of the protagonist waiting for his
friends who do not come. He feels unable to start a journey unless he
turns to the friends he lost, and this brings him to the territory of the
asphodels (the territory of the dead) and of the wounded Adonis.
The slain vegetation god with which poem "9" ends forecasts a
period of drought and devastation, which is presented in poem "10."
The land is a dead desert, and voices echo from exhausted cisterns. The
people suffer from a terrible feeling of deprivation along with a strange
wondering, a doubt whether they have ever experienced love. As the
poem ends, they yearn for the sea, but they have been drained of any
drive for travel.
Poem "11" can be seen as a nostalgic, symbolic journey to the lost
paradise of childhood. The blood of a dead friend spreads its wings and