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snake-goddess; how the last chamber contained the horror: the
Minotaur on a throne, before a flower-strewn bed, surrounded by the dead; how the priests and guards bound the Athenians with thongs and left. Theseus cut his thongs and freed his companion, Euthycles. The Minotaur, seeing the danger, seized a long sword to hold off the unarmed Greeks while it made to escape. Euthycles sprang at it and was killed, allowing Theseus time to crush the creature with its throne. They discover that the Minotaur was King Minos himself in a bull-mask. Hearing this, the horrified Ariadne thinks of the golden tress she left on her father's pillow, as a loving token of farewell. She absolves Theseus of blood-guilt. The ship beaches for the night on
117:'s kingdom, dominated by the King's ambitious nephew Agrion, a reward is offered for the wanderer's head. Eyewitnesses give accounts. One unmasks a hooded youth in the crowd as the perpetrator. The youth identifies himself as the King's lost son, Theseus. Agrion, who has suborned the guard, attempts a coup. Theseus appeals to the people, who drive Agrion out. The same day, the Cretan ambassador, who has come for the Athenian tribute, demands satisfaction. Lots are drawn for seven youths and seven maidens to be sent to Crete (Lucas makes this a once-every-nine-years event). Queen
154:. When Theseus's plea for clemency is brushed aside, Aegle reveals Theseus's identity, in the hope of saving his life – to no avail. Theseus wrenches a spear from a guard and has Minos at his mercy, but one of the King's daughters, the beautiful Ariadne, intervenes daringly to save her father, and Theseus is disarmed. As he is led out Theseus praises Ariadne for her courage, loyalty and beauty, adding: "May God give you, / One day, a lover as brave and fair and true!" Pasiphaë smiles darkly, having already divined the attraction between Theseus and Ariadne.
195:. Aegle watches Theseus sadly, then goes off alone. Theseus finds her, blames Aphrodite for sending him a new love, and offers her a dowry. Aegle is devastated. That night Theseus and Ariadne become lovers. He promises to make her Queen of Athens. At dawn Aegle's body is discovered. She has stabbed herself. Ariadne learns of Theseus's earlier love for Aegle, and decides to leave him. The single love based on ecstasy is what she wants (and which she later seeks in
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182:(Lucas places the Labyrinth in a cave-complex on Juktas), Ariadne uses Phaedra to pass a message to Euaemon, to delay his departure and watch for a signal. That night the signal is seen by Ariadne; she parts tearfully from Phaedra, and arrives on the beach in time to see the survivors of the Labyrinth staggering down from the hills. The ship slips away.
178:. Ariadne doesn't want to know. She accepts his plan and bluffs her way into Theseus' cell, where she files his chain and hands over file, spool and dagger. "I half hate this land of weasel priests," she tells Theseus in the course of a passionate exchange. An escape plan is agreed, should Theseus survive. Next day, while the captives toil their way up
307:, New York, in November 1932, in a limited edition of 500 copies. The Theseus and Minotaur device on the upper board (Theseus dragging the dead Minotaur into the light), and the Deeds of Theseus illustration on the title-page and dust-cover, were taken from the well-known Attic red-figured kylix, c.440–430 BC (from Vulci), in the
26:
125:, Theseus's mother, and urges his son to value true love when he finds it. Theseus, resenting the Cretan yoke, takes the place of one of the doomed youths. Next morning the two ships sail for Crete. One of the maidens sings a farewell lament to Athens, voicing sorrow that she will die without ever having been loved.
330:
The poem's emphasis on 'true love', on shared values of courage and loyalty, may be seen as its primary theme. The realistic, psychological interpretation of the
Minotaur story reflects Lucas's interest in the discoveries of modern psychology. The contrast between light-loving Athens and benighted
150:'s young daughter on the way to Athens.) At dawn the south wind prevents departure; the party spend three days on the isle, during which time Theseus and Aegle are happy together. Reaching Crete, the Athenians, wondering at the primitive bull-totems, are led before King Minos and Queen Pasiphaë in
133:
The ships stop for the night at an uninhabited islet. Around the campfire, Euaemon, the Greek ship's master, pitying the young, tries to distract them with travellers' tales; but Aegle, the girl who sang the lament, demands to be told the truth about what lies in store. Euaemon tells the little he
190:
On board, while the exhausted survivors sleep, Theseus tells
Ariadne of the night's events: how the Athenian maidens were bathed and perfumed by African eunuchs and dressed as brides; how the captives were led into the cave, down mazy passages and dim chambers, each with statues of the Cretan
408:. "The story is constructed with classic dexterity and neatness," Bell wrote, "and both story and verse have a breath-taking rapidity that is wholly admirable." He regretted, however, that Lucas had not used language in the modernist way, with obliqueness and ambiguity.
174:. Daedalus, a Greek exile, has long loved Ariadne in silence, this fair-haired daughter of Minos by a Thracian captive-woman of royal blood. In the small hours Ariadne calls on Daedalus, who hints sadly that he has guessed the secret of the
315:
Classics graduate
Prudence Wilkinson (1911–1944), whom Lucas married in December 1932. It includes a serious-playful dedicatory love-poem to her, divided into Prologue and Epilogue. "The wild Greek hills," Lucas notes in the former,
215:, with many run-on lines, the underlying iambic pentameter being varied by counterpoint and occasional trochaic lines. Other devices include a varying caesura and occasional hexameters and terminal triplets. Aegeus in Book I:–
311:. The University Press continued to use the Theseus and Minotaur device on the front of Lucas's books in the 1930s (and their postwar reprints). The poem was dedicated to Lucas's fiancée, the 21-year-old
374:
singled out as forceful "the six-page passage where
Theseus, as a philanderer with good intentions, argues with Ariadne, who defends with resigned eloquence the ecstatic and single love".
380:
praised "the frequent grace of description. Lucas has studied the natural touch in every scene and every colloquy, giving to images of primitive force a modern psychological dress".
146:, by a bull-god. The young people pair off for the night, Theseus choosing Aegle, who has impressed him by her courage and grace. They become lovers. (Theseus had already seduced
390:
found the poem "better than many a modern novel. It is even in texture, agreeably and skilfully phrased, calls for no great intellectual effort, and would surely have pleased
121:
and her young son arrive to welcome
Theseus. Her plot to poison him fails and her husband banishes her. Aegeus tells Theseus the story of his love for and betrayal of
96:, with details drawn from various sources and original touches based on modern psychology. It was Lucas's longest poem. His other epic reworking of myth was
162:
In her chamber that night
Ariadne thinks about Theseus – and about the sort of husband her father is likely to choose for her. Her brilliant little sister
416:
is a continuous refreshment of it, and is free at once of archaic pedantries and modernist affectations." More recently, Simon
Tidworth in
420:(1970) believed that making the Minotaur Minos in a bull-mask was "a real stroke of originality", but, comparing the two works, preferred
886:
113:
Athens assembles to hear news that the serial killers on the south road have been killed by an unknown traveller, acting alone. In old
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366:. "Its plot is a model of epic construction in its compactness, directness and speed." "The poetry is skilful," wrote the journal
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528:
699:
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was, in the main, well received. "An exception to the generalisation that all modern epics are tedious," declared
398:). "But it makes no new music; never surprises by a fine excess." The poem was reviewed by Lucas's former tutee,
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he forgets to raise the signal white sail, Aegeus commits suicide, and the hero's homecoming is joyless.
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Minoan Crete, hag-ridden with religion, reflects another authorial preference. (The epigraph, from
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did not share this regret: "While preserving the great metrical tradition," its reviewer wrote, "
166:, who witnessed events in court and who is also smitten by Theseus, urges her to seek help from
339:, 'Set out for Athens, land that loves the light'.) Extracts from the poem were read on the
800:
685:
8:
876:
163:
292:
The Deeds of
Theseus, Attic red-figured kylix, c.440–430 BC (from Vulci); British Museum
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421:
304:
147:
60:
730:
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340:
84:(1932) is a short epic or long narrative poem of 3,300 lines, by the British poet
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199:). Too late, Theseus recognises that Aegle was his one true love. Approaching
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403:
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370:. "The parts concerning the lovers sometimes rise to a fine lyric passion."
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532:, by Frank Laurence Lucas, Cambridge University Press, 2014
219:"How strange, how strange the thing that is done and gone,
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knows, including the usual story, that the monster in the
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Sweet that had been, so sweet, as night grew late...
326:They were little changed three thousand years ago.
320:And war, and death, and that worse pain that kills
267:Like a scared fawn's, and sweet low piteous cries,
234:I have paid to learn it. Think not true love grows
858:
432:) (1949), as (in his view) richer in symbolism.
252:Youth does not know." The old man smiled to see
225:When he looks back, himself to fathom it !
323:Love in two hearts gown bitter – these I know:
237:Through all the world, as the wild poppy blows
693:
477:(Cambridge University Press, 1932), p. 28-29.
283:
261:Where he had slain the Pine-bender – and then
243:Youth thinks it so – to find just as it wills
222:Past God's own power to undo; past man's wit,
276:Trembling and sobbing for her father's fate.
270:As he dragged forth his quarry, a slim maid
258:With memory of the Isthmus – that grim glen
240:Red on a thousand fields, a thousand hills.
228:For I loved Aethra. – O learn this, my son,
700:
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501:The Decline and Fall of the Romantic Ideal
490:(Cambridge University Press, 1932), p. ix.
464:(Cambridge University Press, 1932), p. 98.
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592:journal, vol. 42, May 1933, p. 115-116.
264:A rustle in the thicket, two brown eyes
231:This lesson I can teach, the only one –
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513:Passages from 'Ariadne' by F. L. Lucas
255:His son's eyes dreamy now with memory;
249:Easy to pluck, to drop, to find again.
246:The red bloom of desire in every lane,
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519:, 6 Sept. 1934: genome.ch.bbc.co.uk
273:Shy as a Dryad in a woodland glade,
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887:Works based on classical mythology
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882:Cambridge University Press books
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672:, ed. Anne Ward (London, 1970).
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451:, Golden Cockerel Press (1948).
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740:The Woman Clothed with the Sun
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603:The Times Literary Supplement
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337:δίζησθαι δὲ φιλαγλάους Ἀθάνας
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394:" (a reference to Morris's
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584:R. P. Blackmur, review of
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301:Cambridge University Press
284:Background and publication
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634:New Statesman and Nation
449:Gilgamesh, King of Erech
405:New Statesman and Nation
98:Gilgamesh, King of Erech
88:. It tells the story of
628:Julian Bell, review of
575:, p. 13, 26 March 1933.
550:Julian Bell, review of
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211:The poem is in 'open'
872:Epic poems in English
670:The Quest for Theseus
418:The Quest for Theseus
347:was reprinted by the
299:was published by the
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556:The Cambridge Review
364:The Cambridge Review
138:is the offspring of
636:, 11 February 1933.
558:, 10 February 1933.
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615:William Plomer in
503:(Cambridge, 1936).
430:Kouros, or Theseus
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668:Tidworth, Simon,
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422:Nikos Kazantzakis
305:Macmillan Company
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845:D. W. Lucas
748:Doctor Dido
709:F. L. Lucas
400:Julian Bell
333:Bacchylides
303:and by the
142:, Queen to
86:F. L. Lucas
37:F. L. Lucas
877:1932 poems
861:Categories
802:Land's End
645:Review of
567:Review of
515:, read by
436:References
207:Verse form
63:, New York
847:(brother)
813:Criticism
402:, in the
355:Reception
343:in 1934.
172:Labyrinth
136:Labyrinth
53:Publisher
47:Epic poem
424:' drama
201:Phalerum
197:Dionysus
176:Minotaur
168:Daedalus
158:Book III
140:Pasiphaë
100:(1948).
59:, &
892:Ariadne
832:Related
767:Ariadne
716:Fiction
647:Ariadne
632:in the
630:Ariadne
586:Ariadne
569:Ariadne
552:Ariadne
530:Ariadne
488:Ariadne
475:Ariadne
462:Ariadne
414:Ariadne
360:Ariadne
345:Ariadne
297:Ariadne
186:Book IV
164:Phaedra
152:Knossos
129:Book II
104:Summary
94:Ariadne
90:Theseus
81:Ariadne
18:Ariadne
841:(wife)
824:(1955)
805:(1935)
797:(1933)
778:(1940)
770:(1932)
759:Poetry
751:(1938)
743:(1937)
735:(1930)
732:Cécile
727:(1926)
590:Poetry
537:
313:Girton
123:Aethra
115:Aegeus
109:Book I
33:Author
821:Style
786:Plays
573:Books
396:Jason
368:Books
335:, is
193:Naxos
144:Minos
119:Medea
43:Genre
535:ISBN
92:and
73:1932
649:in
588:in
571:in
554:in
384:in
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701:e
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428:(
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