PERSEUS

Notice

Perseus sets to music a moving Greek poem by Simonides of Keos (556-467), sung in the text. The author (one of the creators of the dithyramb), and his poem, made a particular impression on Nietzsche. The theme relates to one of my favorite myths, already present in my works Danae (1970) and Andromeda (1980). Danae, thrown into the sea in a chest where she is locked up with her newborn son Perseus, tries to exorcise her anguish in the midst of the storm, and sings a lullaby. Son of the Sun, and future founder of a dynasty that will rule Mycenae and Tirynthe, the predestined hero sleeps, unaware of the drama… Beyond the Greek setting, the myth animates a universal archetype: it is always through a threatened and persecuted child that humanity will be saved.