In the Dark

Genre/Style: folk/sunshine pop; psychedelic rock

Touchstones: Peter, Paul, and Mary, “Puff, the Magic Dragon”; The Mamas & The Papas, “California Dreamin’”; The Doors, “Light My Fire,” “People are Strange”; Classics IV, “Spooky”

Themes: Violence, multivalence in myth, (gendered) initiation rites, ritual bridal kidnapping, adolescence, loss of innocence, close reading techniques, folk etymology, women’s rights in Greece

Myth: Persephone

Notable Telling: Homeric Hymn 2 to Demeter (late 7th. to early 6th C. BCE)

Read the myth in Ancient Greek at the Perseus Project (ed. Evelyn-White, 1914)
Read Hugh Evelyn-White's 1914 translation, also at the Perseus Project