Week 3 Story: Cupid and Psyche
Based on "Cupid and Psyche" from "The Golden Ass" by Apuleius
NEED ADVICE!!!! My mother in law hates me -- I can't find my husband -- family drama -- PLEASE HELP ME
So, here's the story. I have to go back a couple of years so this might be kind of a long post, sorry! I hope you guys will read to the end because I realllly need advice.
Basically, until a few years ago I lived with my dad and my two older sisters. Then he married them both off to rich old kings and I was pretty jealous, but I get it, I'm the youngest so I knew I'd be the last to get married anyway. So after a while I started getting a lot of attention for my looks, but nobody wanted to marry me! I guess I'm pretty but not like, in an approachable way. I don't know what that's about. Anyway, I started getting some really negative attention too, especially from Venus (the goddess of beauty!), who you all know is super beautiful, but really envious too.
A couple of months down the road, my dad got this message from the gods telling him to marry me off to a monster! I was really upset, of course, but we didn't really have a choice in the matter, so he sent me to the mountains to marry this monster. Luckily, it turned out it wasn't some monster who wanted to eat me. I actually got to live in this awesome palace with live music and fresh food all the time, and it turns out my husband is really nice! The only problem is that he only comes to see me at night, so I've never actually seen him. And he wouldn't let me see any of my friends or family.
After a while, I was super happy with my husband, but I missed my sisters so much that I begged him to let them visit. So he did, and they came and saw my home and I sent them away before they could figure out anything was weird about my relationship. They came to visit a few more times, and I must have accidentally said something because they figured out pretty quickly that I didn't actually know who my husband was. They told me he must be a monster and it scared me so I agreed to try and look at him next time he came to visit.
That night, I lit a lamp and looked at my husband - my sisters were totally wrong!!! They must have tried to scare me because they're jealous... Get this - I'm married to Cupid himself! He's soooo handsome. But I messed up and spilled the lamp oil on his back and he woke up and he was super angry. He flew off and I haven't seen him in days. I've been asking around, none of the gods will talk to me because they're so loyal to Venus, and I still can't find Cupid! I'm totally heartbroken and scared. I don't know what to do.
And here's the biggest issue: Cupid is Venus' son. Venus hates me, and now Cupid hates me too! Plus, I'm pretty sure my sisters tried to sabotage me. What do I do??????? If anyone's been in a similar situation, please let me know what you did and what advice you have for me </3
xoxoxo Psyche
Author's note: I started with the story of "Cupid and Psyche", which is about a young woman who has angered Venus by being incredibly beautiful. She ends up marrying Cupid, Venus' son, but Cupid refuses to reveal his identity to her because he doesn't want to upset Venus. When Psyche accidentally pours hot wax on Cupid, he flies to his mother's house for her help. Psyche has to submit to a series of impossible challenges from Venus in order to get her permission to marry Cupid. Luckily, the story has a happy ending. Psyche is initiated into the family of the gods and is allowed to marry Cupid.
I chose to write this as a post online (think Yahoo Answers, Reddit, etc.) seeking advice about her situation, because I think the level of family drama in the story lends itself to this format. I also wanted to work from Psyche's perspective because she is portrayed as a fairly passive character in the original story, and I wanted to give her more agency.
NEED ADVICE!!!! My mother in law hates me -- I can't find my husband -- family drama -- PLEASE HELP ME
So, here's the story. I have to go back a couple of years so this might be kind of a long post, sorry! I hope you guys will read to the end because I realllly need advice.
Basically, until a few years ago I lived with my dad and my two older sisters. Then he married them both off to rich old kings and I was pretty jealous, but I get it, I'm the youngest so I knew I'd be the last to get married anyway. So after a while I started getting a lot of attention for my looks, but nobody wanted to marry me! I guess I'm pretty but not like, in an approachable way. I don't know what that's about. Anyway, I started getting some really negative attention too, especially from Venus (the goddess of beauty!), who you all know is super beautiful, but really envious too.
A couple of months down the road, my dad got this message from the gods telling him to marry me off to a monster! I was really upset, of course, but we didn't really have a choice in the matter, so he sent me to the mountains to marry this monster. Luckily, it turned out it wasn't some monster who wanted to eat me. I actually got to live in this awesome palace with live music and fresh food all the time, and it turns out my husband is really nice! The only problem is that he only comes to see me at night, so I've never actually seen him. And he wouldn't let me see any of my friends or family.
After a while, I was super happy with my husband, but I missed my sisters so much that I begged him to let them visit. So he did, and they came and saw my home and I sent them away before they could figure out anything was weird about my relationship. They came to visit a few more times, and I must have accidentally said something because they figured out pretty quickly that I didn't actually know who my husband was. They told me he must be a monster and it scared me so I agreed to try and look at him next time he came to visit.
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| A polemical allegory presented as a five-headed monster, 1618 via Wikipedia |
And here's the biggest issue: Cupid is Venus' son. Venus hates me, and now Cupid hates me too! Plus, I'm pretty sure my sisters tried to sabotage me. What do I do??????? If anyone's been in a similar situation, please let me know what you did and what advice you have for me </3
xoxoxo Psyche
Author's note: I started with the story of "Cupid and Psyche", which is about a young woman who has angered Venus by being incredibly beautiful. She ends up marrying Cupid, Venus' son, but Cupid refuses to reveal his identity to her because he doesn't want to upset Venus. When Psyche accidentally pours hot wax on Cupid, he flies to his mother's house for her help. Psyche has to submit to a series of impossible challenges from Venus in order to get her permission to marry Cupid. Luckily, the story has a happy ending. Psyche is initiated into the family of the gods and is allowed to marry Cupid.
I chose to write this as a post online (think Yahoo Answers, Reddit, etc.) seeking advice about her situation, because I think the level of family drama in the story lends itself to this format. I also wanted to work from Psyche's perspective because she is portrayed as a fairly passive character in the original story, and I wanted to give her more agency.
Hi Natalie!
ReplyDeleteI think the format you chose for this story works really well! I definitely felt like I was reading either a post on r/relationships or circa 2008 yahoo answers, so you nailed it.
I'm not super familiar with the story of Cupid & Psyche, but I definitely understood the main points in your author's note so that helped a lot. I like the airheaded personality that you gave Psyche, and the tone of the story definitely helped to emphasize that. My favorite detail was when Psyche said people referred to her as "pretty, but not in an approachable way".
I'm kind of sad this isn't an actual post, because I want to see the "updates" like an r/relationships post lol. Nice job!
Hey Natalie,
ReplyDeleteWow I truly thought this was a fascinating storytelling strategy. I have not seen a story in such a unique way yet. I love the format of using like a yahoo answers advice seeking quest to frame your original story. Your original story in which the story was based upon definitely has soap opera levels of drama so this was a perfect storytelling strategy. Does she end up getting the advice that she seeks? I also like how you used punctuation and wording to really fit your online post type format. At first, it caught me off guard thinking this was a real yahoo answers post, which speaks to the expertise you had in crafting the story. I would like to see maybe a response post or two from another character’s perspective seeking to lend advice. That would be a cool addition. Great work on this story and I look forward to reading more.
-Andy
Hi Natalie, I just want to say I love the way you changed the Cupid and Psyche story and wrote it from Psyche's perspective after she has discovered the true identity of Cupid. It was really engaging and well written. This is a comment from the perspective of a character in the story for the “Let’s Pretend” feedback assignment.
ReplyDeleteThis is Psyche's sister here. Wow Psyche, first of all I can't believe you would post such a personal problem like that online. That isn't really something you should want the public to know. Everyone is going to think this family is crazy if they read this! Also, you really paint dad and me in a really negative light. You have no idea what he was going through when he decided to give you to a monster. He had to appease the gods, he didn't have a choice.
Also, we were just looking out for you when we suggested you find out who your husband really was. What kind of woman doesn't know who she's married to? There are a lot of scary guys out there these days, as your family, we wanted to make sure you were safe. I certainly wasn't jealous or anything! Please, you might have a nice house and all but I am not envious in the least.
Seriously though, stop sharing your private life on the internet! It's just as bad as all those selfies you post!