Ivory Shackles: A Look At The Greek Myth Of Pygmalion
The perfect woman carved out ivory and bound to you forever... Pygmalion, a Greek myth that has been retold many of times in several variations. In this essay, the focus will be on Ovid’s version of Pygmalion in the book Metamorphoses. In Metamorphoses, Ovid describes Pygmalion as a sculptor who is so horrified with the Propoetides, women who have defied the Goddess Venus (Aphrodite as some may know her), and now “spend their days in wickedness”. So, he begins to make his own ‘perfect’ woman out of ivory and dresses her in lavish robes, jewels and more to make her look real. When the longing for his ivory girl to be real becomes too much, he goes to the temple of Venus on her day of worship and sacrifices a cow for the wish of a blessing to make his ivory girl at home real. She grants his wish and when he returns home, the woman starts to “warm” up for him, she’s alive and then nine months later, they have a daughter Paphos. In this essay, I will be discussing and exploring the reasons for Pygmalion’s creation of the ivory girl along with material he chooses for his making of her. The relationship between the art and the artist and how his decision effect greater things than just the statue and himself.
Before our tale of Pygmalion begins, the tale of the Hyacinth is before it in the Metamorphoses text, and Ovid tells the readers about Hyacinth, Apollo, and The Propoetides who denied Venus as their Goddess and with that become prostitutes, lost their shame and turned to stone. As the Ovid states, “For that the goddess’ rage, it’s said, made them the first strumpets to prostitute their bodies’ charms. As shame retreated and their cheeks grew hard, they turned with little change to stones of flint” (Ovid, Metamorphoses 232). From seeing the Propoetides, Pygmalion becomes so “horrified at all the countless vices nature gives to womankind”, that he decides to live a life of celibacy before he decides to carve out his own “snow-white ivory” woman and “give it perfect shape, more beautiful than ever woman born. His masterwork fired him with love”. The first thing that we know about the ivory girl besides what she is made out of, is the shape of her body and how Pygmalion pays special attention to her beauty and her shape. His disgust for her the Propoetides comes from the outward use of them showing their bodies and their no shame, but he doesn’t give any type of caution to the ivory girl and the way he makes her body because he is the first one to see her ‘naked’ body, create her body and be the one to use her body later on.
Not only is the ivory girl, a work that Pygmalion creates for himself but she’s an expensive piece of work. Ivory in that time, around 8 CE, would’ve been an expensive material to have and to make an entire intricate statue out of, especially one that stands and holds the expensive robes that he throws on her, would be too expensive even for royalty. Rachel Bruzzone describes the use of ivory in her chapter of The Classical Journal, ‘Statues, Celibates And Goddesses In Ovid's Metamorphoses 10 And Euripides’, “Ivory was used almost exclusively in images of gods, and the few known ivory statues of mortals seem to represent an attempt to associate the human subject with the divine”. The use of ivory in this case could be to make Pygmalion’s work close to Venus or close to the gods because of how highly he thinks of this woman and the way he dresses her for worship. His use of ivory shows both her worth to him and her worth to others that view her, the gods included.
If the ivory girl is made of expensive material that is only supposed to be used to make idols of the Gods, then Pygmalion is making an idol out of her. By making an idol out of her, he then uses her to make sacrifices to, he sacrifices clothing and jewelry to her, “He decks her limbs with robes and on her fingers sets splendid rings, a necklace around her neck, pearls in her ears, a pendant on her breast” (Ovid 233). He gives her these because he believes that these are the gifts that “girls delight in” but he also thinks that sacrificing these things to her will make her real. He’s waiting on her to give into him and it pushes his delusion about her realness even before he goes to Venus.
Pygmalion is disgusted with the vices and nature of women and with the actions of the Propoetides, but he is doing the same with his ivory statue, he is using all the gifts and offerings to buy her love and making sure that her affection is placed with him before she even becomes real. He created her but he is still willing to buy her love even though he holds the hypocrisy of judging the Propoetides who had men buy their “body charms” (Ovid 232) but because the ivory girl was specifically made for him, by him then she will always be locked into that love with him, affection offerings or not.
T hese affection offering are what makes Pygmalion’s creation of the ivory gift in the artist sense like a work of art, a birthing of a new art medium to pour life into and if this is a creation of art, then we can also compare this to a father and daughter relationship. Pygmalion made her and helped in the power of her ‘birth’ with Venus and therefore makes their relationship an incestuous relationship. But, first if we talk about an artist and their artwork, the ivory girl is bound to Pygmalion forever as a creation from him. Even though, she becomes a real human woman she is never given a name in our version, and we never know about her thoughts or actions besides the fact that she can blush. The blushing of her cheeks is important because it places her in juxtaposition of the Propoetides who have their blush frozen in her cheeks which confirms in the reader’s and Pygmalion’s mind that she is a ‘pure woman’. When really, she is no woman at all she is actually just a figure that now has become animated; She’s still a piece of art. Since she remains as just a piece of art, that makes her ties to Pygmalion forever remaining because she has no real agency. As a work of art, she belongs to the creator both Pygmalion and Venus and all of the outcomes of her including their daughter Paphos, belongs to them as well.
In Versions of Pygmalion, a book by J. Hillis Miller, he describes their relationship, in this description, he uses the name Galatea, which is the name assigned to the ivory girl later on in critical readings about her because the word Gala means milk or white which contributes to her attributes of being “ivory white”, “Pygmalion has himself made Galatea. She is a mirror image of his desire. His relation to her is not love for another, in an attachment always shadowed by the certain death of the other. It is a reciprocity in which the same loves the same”. Pygmalion has made his artwork so that she can be the mirror image of being pure and chaste which he also believes himself to be because he has sworn off the wicked ways of women and their nature. Even believing that the girl “who wished to move — but modesty forbade” would move for him but she wanted to maintain her modesty is an egotistical evaluation of oneself and a convoluted way to think about those who are bound to him.
Now, if we are to talk about the parental relationship between Pygmalion and his creation, then we must acknowledge the ownership that he has over this woman completely. She was made by him in his vision and reflection, shaped by him and then has a sexual tie to him from the moment she is born;“Her eyes to his and saw the world and him” (Ovid 234), Pygmalion here is mentioned as her beginning and her end, while she can see the world, it is full of him and only him. Pygmalion created a slave that is tied to him from all aspects from the beginning of her life with her eyes on him only and then the end of her life with her eyes on him again. While Venus had blessed their union and is the one who helped bring the ivory girl into life
“And golden Venus (for her presence graced Her feast)
knew well the purpose of his prayer;
And, as an omen of her favoring power,
Thrice did the flame burn bright and leap up high” (Ovid 233).
Venus is not the one that the ivory girl serves or now is connected to, it is her creator who has placed himself before her eyes and is her only connection to the outside world that she has been born into. Together Venus and Pygmalion birthed the ivory girl to life as a reward for Pygmalion’s disgust with the Propoetides because Venus wanted everyone to be ashamed of them and learn from their shamelessness. So, she rewards Pygmalion, a most loyal servant, with a woman who will always be tied to modesty and forces a relationship of forced monogamy.
While other critics will celebrate the union of Venus and Pygmalion, like Cary Eliza in their article ‘Galateas Gone Wild: Technology, the feminine, and spatial Divides’ where they say “The act of creation works out for Pygmalion; his belief in and respect for Venus’s power is rewarded. Without that connection to the gods, the myth suggests, we could be condemned to lives of emptiness—sex without love, surface without depth, experience without emotion. Maintain faith, however, and what man creates on earth will be made real, will have moral and spiritual value” (Eliza 125) while it is true that Pygmalion’s creation works out for him because of Venus’ ‘reward’ of making the girl real. Pygmalion chose to be to have a life of emptiness by shunning women, not because of his connection to the Gods, it was just his loyalty to the ruling that Venus holds for relationships that pulls through on his behalf.
Pygmalion’s ‘faith’ is based in greed and the desire to completely own someone. In the book Sex and the Posthuman Condition by Michael Hauskeller he addresses Pygmalion’s need for creation, “Pygmalion is not just a sculptor who one day creates a statue that he then happens to fall in love with (which is how most people will remember the story), but rather somebody who deliberately sets out to create a being that is worthy of being loved by him”. The ivory woman was created to uphold Pygmalion’s standards about women, our text nor Ovid ever say that he changed his view about women or their nature but rather he makes a woman so that she can be what he thinks women are supposed to be to uphold his standards. And Venus confirms that for him when he makes her real. That makes the ownership over the ivory girl so much more detrimental because she was made to be perfect and she must always remain that way.
The story of Pygmalion and the ivory girl is not a story of love or creating love. But rather what happens when one physically molds and conquers another to be what they want them to be. This story is about sexual conquering and Stockholm syndrome from which came the child of Paphos. Pygmalion knew as an artist that when he created his art, that he would have full ownership of it, and he chooses in what way to present it to the rest of the world. From before she is even alive, he begins sexual conduct with her in forms of touching and kisses to fulfil his needs, “With many a touch he tries it-is it flesh Or Ivory? Not ivory still, he’s sure! Kisses he gives and think they are returned; he speaks to it, caresses it…” (Ovid 233). The ivory girl’s body was never her own and never will be her own because of the early sexual exposure that Pygmalion has subjected her to. She is an object for sexual fulfillment and their offspring is now a result of confinement and forced sexual desires. This illegitimacy of this relationship follows them into Pygmalion’s bloodline when we reach the next story of Myrrha and her relationship with her father. When we follow Ovid’s family line, Paphos is the mother of Cinyras who is Myraah’s father, their line of incestuous and taboo relationships will continue in the next tale.
Following just a little bit farther, Venus gets punished by the fates as well for her contribution in their relationship when her lover Adonis, the offspring of Myrrha and her Cinyras, gets gored by a boar and dies. The taboo and wicked nature of Pygmalion and Venus’ union to make his wishes come true, haunt both of them forever. The price of owning one piece of art has cost them so much more.
This story of incestuous possession from an ‘artist’ that created a woman just to capture her forever is something that should haunt readers and caution them. But, Ovid’s depiction of Pygmalion paints him as a creator who just wanted to love a chaste woman instead of the evil, promiscuous women that defied Venus. When in all actuality, Pygmalion is a misogynic monster who wasn’t actually disgusted by women and the attraction to their sin but rather was only disgusted because he didn’t own a woman to control fully thus the making of the ivory girl was created. Their taboo offspring of Paphos has cursed their bloodline and Ovid doesn’t show the true nature of Pygmalion’s desire. The need for sexual unleashing was so great in Pygmalion that he even convinces Venus to relinquish the ivory hold of this woman just for him to have alone thus cursing her as well. The fully selfish nature of Pygmalion makes him a true creator because it makes a true god, especially in our Greek myths because he is a god who is doing things for the benefit of himself.
