The Mother-Daughter Dynamic of Demeter and Persephone
In my first posting for my independent study, I was asked to read three articles from The Homeric Hymn to Demeter edited by Helene P. Foley: “Gender Conflict and the Cosmological Tradition”, “The Mother/Daughter Romance” and “The Psychology of the Mysteries”. All of these of course were read after reading this version of the myth of Hades and Persephone. This myth in particular is one of my absolute favorites, largely due to the more recent portrayals and interpretations of their relationship and the fact that yes, I’m a hopeless romantic, so maybe I fall a bit prey to this established trope (it’s good, okay?). But this particular Homeric hymn is a bit different — it focuses solely on Demeter’s response as the mother and the grief process she goes through to get her daughter back in her arms.
Upon reading this myth and the subsequent articles, I have pretty much just come to the conclusion that Demeter is simply one badass woman. She completely defies gender tradition, yet also somehow manages to maintain it at the same time. I’m still not entirely sure how this happened, but if she doesn’t prove that women are multi-faceted, I don’t know who will. She nearly causes the extinction of humanity in order to get her daughter back; it’s an extreme example of what a mother will do to protect her children. Foley makes a point that Zeus is so concerned with maintaining the sphere of the gods — in addition to making sure the gods’ respective spheres are kept as separate as possible — and the sphere of the mortals separate that he won’t dare cross into the Underworld in order to retrieve Persephone, despite Demeter’s threats of destruction. Demeter carves a space of power for herself that Zeus left untouched — the earth itself. She forces herself to be heard.
It is in Foley’s “The Mother/Daughter Romance” that we really dig deep into the dynamic that Demeter and Persephone have. In many modern adaptations — especially where Hades and Persephone are truly in love — Demeter is often seen as an antagonist, trying to take her daughter away from her husband; their relationship is almost toxic and codependent. In this adaptation, this is not the case — at least not as extreme. In my opinion, even in this version, their relationship is codependent to a dangerous level. Foley mentions the work of Freud and the development of a relationship between a mother and daughter in the Oedipal stage of development. As a psychology student, I honestly have a deep, deep dislike for Freud and his psychosexual stages of development. Thankfully, Foley steers away from this perspective and focuses more on a different approach, attempting to explain the pair’s relationship. While I firmly believe in the strength of a maternal bond — one of my favorite examples is that of Lily Potter and Molly Weasley in the Harry Potter series — Demeter feels almost controlling of her daughter. Foley mentions that it is possible Persephone is altering the story of how terrible Hades is to her to appease her mother. She threatens the entirety of humanity and Zeus sends every one of the gods to plead with her to stop this. Foley also writes that Persephone is in a strange position not often seen in many Greek myths — trying to mediate between her husband and her mother when it is often the father that must be placated.
This myth feels like the story of a teenage daughter growing up and her mother not accepting it, and it’s very possible those tropes exist because of this very myth. I’m excited to dig further into this myth and compare just exactly how this myth has evolved and how it changes from perspective to perspective.
