Week 2: Cupid and Psyche

This week I am reading Cupid and Psyche. This story has been very interesting to me. There are many parts that have stuck out. A girl is kidnapped and told the story by an old lady.
First is the fact that Venus becomes basically jealous of Psyche. This happens because Venuses followers believe Psyche is the human embodiment of Venus. Thus, they stop worshiping Venus and start worshiping Psyche.
Second, Psyche is so beautiful that every mortal is overcome by the thought of marrying her that no one tries to.
Then the fact that Cupid is actually a bad guy surprised me. He supposedly flies around causing trouble. Venus, who is his mom, sends him to ruin Psyche's life. Cupid instead marries her without her knowing that it is him.
Psyche wealth and happiness makes her sister envy her and causes them to plan a way to destroy her marriage with cupid. This works and ends up with the sisters dieing.

The second half of the story starts getting really good. All the introduction of the main characters is done by this point. I have decided to write what stands out in each little section.
Venus and the Goddesses: Venus finds out about her son, Cupid, disobeying her and marrying Psyche instead. This infuriated her and caused her to threaten to take away all of Cupids possessions like his wings. She also threatened to destroy Psyche.

 Psyche's Prayer: Psyche sees a temple and thinks that Cupid might be there but instead find harvest material scattered about. Psyche organized the temple and then prays to the harvest god. The harvest god says that she cannot protect her but will let her go instead of keeping her captive. She next makes it to the temple of Jove, Venuses mother-in-law, who also tells her she cannot protect her.

Venus and Mercury: Venus uses Mercury to tell everyone that she will give 7 sweet kisses and one deeply honeyed kiss of her tongue to bring Psyche to her. Instead Psyche decides to go to Venus herself.


Venus and Psyche: Venus tortures Psyche then gives her the task of sorting a huge pile of different material like wheat and barley. An ant takes pity on her and calls on other ants to help Psyche sort the pile.

Psyche's next task:  Venus mad that Psyche completed the first task gave her another task to gather golden wool from a flock of sheep. A reed keeps Psyche from killing herself and tells her how to gather the golden wool without being injured. Psyche returns with the wool and is given another task to gather water from the heart of a stream.

The Third task: Jupiter's eagle helps Psyche gather the water she needed because there was no way for her to pass without being killed.

The Jar of Beauty:  The last task is to get a jar of beauty from Proserpine who lives in the underworld. Psyche again believes she will die doing the task but is talked out of killing herself and is told how to complete the task. She does all of what she is told and makes it back to the surface but then she gets the idea to take a drop from the jar.

The Sleep of the Dead: Psyche does open the jar but it isn't beauty it is eternal sleep and it falls upon Psyche. Cupid is now healed and comes to her rescue. He puts the sleep back in the jar and sends Psyche on her way. Cupid goes to Jupiter for his help against Venus. In return Jupiter wants a beautiful woman.

The Wedding Feast: Jupiter called a gathering and put a high fine for the gods not to show up. He gave Psyche a cup of ambrosia to make her immortal. This he says will allow Cupid and Psyche to be married forever. Also allows the wedding to be between two equals. They then were married and had a daughter we know as Pleasure.

The Escape:The overall story was being told by a man stuck in the body of a donkey. The end he tries to escape because the robbers he is with plan to kill him. As he tries to escape the kidnapped girl frees him from the old ladies grasp. She tells him she will take care of him if he will just take her home.