DESPARATE ROMANTICS: THE EVOLUTION OF HADES AND PERSEPHONE’S MYTH FROM ANCIENT GREEKS TO PRE-RAFAELITES AND A. BELIY

The myth about Hades and Persephone is analyzed in this article as an archetypical pattern, “characters’ structural precondition”. The pattern was widely used by artists and writers throughout the history of humankind. The paper is based on Homeric Hymn to Demeter, Metamorphoses by Ovid and a novel written by A. Beliy The Baptized Chinaman. Additional resources are the Renaissance and the Pre-Raphaelites art masterpieces and psychological work by C.G. Jung and С. Kerenyi Essays on a Science of Mythology. Methods such as comparative, mythological, psychological and linguistic analysis are applied in the paper. Cultural and philosophical ground of Hades and Persephone’s archetypes is examined. The most important characteristic among others is highly controversial relationship between gods and ambivalence of their characters, which demands a link component (mediator) to resolve the conflict. Pomegranate seeds are used as such symbolic mediators in the myth and a child narrator - in A. Beliy’s novel. The representation and embodiment of Hades’ archetype is Michael Letaev, while Kotik’s mother possesses Persephone’s traits. Plot allusions were distinguished and linguistic comparisons were made to prove the notion that neomyth about Hades and Persephone became the source of A. Beliy’s “desperate symbolism”. This neomyth contains archetypical motives and images which help Beliy to cross the line between reality and the world of unconscious, between words and symbols.