Transformation of the Promethean Myth in Byron Percy Bysshe and Mary Shelley

Promethean myth holds a very strong hold upon the literature of the romantic era, a collected era of the rekindling of the ideas and ideals of classical antiquity. Though within each evolving age there is the incorporation of propriety and modernity into the stories and ideal of the old. Though not alone, in their fascination with creation and even the promethean myth, as the forbearers of the Romantics had a grand fascination with the messages of the Greeks, to some degree influencing the relative importance of any attention it has been paid through literary and philosophical history. The promethean myth has become such a common thread that the tradition continues to build in nearly every generation of writers. Within this fascination there are many evolving interpretations of the reality of both, what the myth is and what it means to man and God.

Classical lessons spoke freely and openly to the writers and artists of the romantic period and with those lessons individuals with their own life experience and world-view have rekindled the old, and especially tragic lessons of the bygone ages. The value of such lessons being applied and reapplied to the questions and problems of the day. One particularly moving myth, that of Prometheus and his gift of kindness to mankind, that was rewarded with an eternal damnation inflicted by the gods speaks volumes to the witnesses of more modern human suffering and cruelty. So much so that for many thinkers Prometheus has become the standard bearer for the human relationship with the creator.

The promethean myth burns like white-hot flame in the fore-front of the romantic mind, flickering and dancing as an enlightened spark. The romantic period for many, marking a second Renaissance if you will. If we examine some of the most popular works of Byron, Percy B, and Mary Shelley we begin to see the promethean image as a unifying flame which jumps, inter-connects, and transforms like a raging all-consuming wild fire throughout each of their collective consciousness."

Within a passage of Faust, Goethe expresses this burning and unflagging feeling of both man and the divine as the primary tools for creation through love and associates it with both the human condition with both its' advantages and disadvantages.

Clearly, this is a continuation of the spark of understanding of the promethean myth. The power of the creative spirit is here linked to the gifts of the power given to man by Prometheus. The example set by Prometheus and his creation of man through his own love for his creation is exemplified here:

What you don't feel, you will not grasp by art,

Unless it wells out of your soul

And with sheer pleasure takes control,

Compelling every listener's heart.

But sit - and sit, and patch and knead,

Cook a ragout, reheat your hashes,

Blow at the sparks and try to breed

A fire out of piles of ashes!

Children and apes may think it great,

If that should titillate your gum,

But from heart to heart you will never create.

If from your heart it does not come.

(Goethe 105)

In this passage Goethe expresses the value of the gift, through the kindling of fire, the possessive spirit of creativity and that which you create and the power of knowledge given to man by the creator.

The Gods of the Greek tradition are much more fallible and humanistic than the God of today. Their personalities are characterizations that allow for mistakes, compromises, trickery and deception, all leveled against both man and their fellow Gods. The German writer Kerenyi says that Prometheus:

bearing marks of human existence; [is] one compelled by his own shortcomings to offend against his environment and his companions in growth; who in so doing employs devious, crooked thinking (for in the world of growth the pathways are naturally crooked); inevitably, a wounder and a wounded one. These are among his human characteristics.

Kerenyi 55)

The promethean myth is the Greek creation story, with Prometheus and the other Gods as protagonists against one another. Prometheus was said to have created man, at the charge of his father Zeus. Prometheus as the creator of man has kindness and love for him. The gifts and protection that he gives to man, and especially the way they are obtained through deception are the source of his downfall, and eternal punishment by the Gods.

Prometheus slays the first sacrifice of flesh, and gives the best parts to man. He is then said to have stolen fire from the Gods and offered it to man as both a spiritual force and a life giving force, to separate man from beasts through his ability to manipulate fire. "Prometheus, 'the one with foreknowledge' (pro=before or fore, and manthano=to know) was believed to have been the one who gave fire to mortals."

Wutrich 7) With his gift came the ability of man to worship fully, cook and artificially light the darkness.

Prometheus is also said to have been the creator of woman, Pandora, who holds the key to both destruction and bliss.

He receives punishment first of all for tricking Zeus at the sacrifice; this charge had been laid against him since Theogony. Second, he bears the guilt for creating humans, especially women; this charge is newly laid and reflects the Hellenistic understanding of the myth. Last, he is punished for the theft of fire which, like the trick at the sacrifice, is an ancient part of the story." (Wutrich 50-51)

Though through fragmentation and cultural deviations, Prometheus is connected to and charged with several different variations of the deeds and punishments of Prometheus the just of his association with creation is that he is punished both for his trickery and his loving gifts to man. The promethean myth embodies the clique, the road to hell or in this case eternal damnation is paved with good intentions. Within these tales of the ancients are questions, and some would say even answers to the existence of man, his place in the world and his association and relationship with his creator(s).

The romantic thinkers and their forbearers weave fascinating and compelling arguments, through the literary device that analyze, question and contend the nature of truth, man and creation. In the romantic heart there is a desire to understand how the infallible and omnipotent God of the Christians could allow the fearful realities of life on earth. In doing so they reach back to the stories of the ancients, yearning for a fallible, and human creator who can explain the strife as can be seen in the world of men. Within this searching are issues almost as plentiful as there are differences in the existence of so many individual humans. Prometheus, as a character has been compared to God, Jesus and many mortals over his thousands of years of existence as an idea.

The tripartite character of Prometheus rebel, philanthropist, and creator invites comparison with the character Faust. As I hope to demonstrate over the course of the following chapters, Faust, too, in his rebellion against the Christian God, becomes a new kind of fire-bringer, no longer carrying the spark of fire in a narthex stem, but rather carrying the spark of knowledge, more knowledge than a mortal should have, in his mind.

(Wutrich 37)

He has been written of by hundreds of authors, some of whom are as notable as Goethe, Byron, Percy B. Shelly and Mary Shelley to name just a few.

The interactions and interconnectedness of theses particular contemporary authors also lend a great deal of knowledge to the collective ideals of the romantic era. With each new incarnation of the myth, there began a dialogue between the individual authors but also later scholars associated with the study of English Literature and also the promethean influence upon it. (Byron 10) Through each age and each interpretation the promethean myth engenders its' historical reputation as a living evolving creation of ideas, both modern and ancient. The analogous use of Prometheus and his relationship with man, the world and creation has become a universal literary device, or what some would call an archetype.

With this information in mind, an analysis of the works of Lord Byron, Percy Shelley and Mary Shelley lead a modern reader down a path of understanding of both their individual use of the Prometheus myth in their works and also a greater knowledge and understanding of how the promethean myth has remained, through history a living evolving conceptualization of man's relationship with his world and his creator.

Lord Byron in Manfred speaks of the similarities between the creator (Prometheus) and man, made from clay, just as the legend goes. This passage explained through the work Knight draws on the similarities and kinship between the Prometheus of the myth and the man of his creation.

Manfred is a study of a Faust-like figure who yet appears simultaneously greater and inferior, better and worse than other men; one who is known for 'deeds of good and ill, extreme in both' (II, ii). Manfred feels superior:

For if the beings, of whom I was one

Hating to be so -- cross'd me in my path, felt myself degraded back to them, And was all clay again.

(Knight 240)

Within Manfred is Byron's expression of his feeling of both humanity and superiority. Additionally, he is emulating the compassionate pull of Prometheus to his human brethren. Though he is immortal, or at least superior he feels kinship with those beings who are made from clay.

With this example, and the accompanying resource of an understanding of the language and illusion of the Prometheus myth a reader can clearly see in the works of at least this one Romantic the clear kinship with the analogous illustrative tool of the promethean myth in the literary context. If nothing else this one short passage of Manfred has clearly illustrated the romantic fascination with creation concepts and the role the mortal and immortal, inferior and superior, human and god relate to one another in passion and compassion. The mortal and the immortal challenge their own true nature to find kinship and belief in the goodness and redemptive power of the other.

In a more direct handling of the Prometheus character Lord Byron attempts to assist his readers in a greater understanding of his own work through the verse with the very name of the giant Prometheus. It is clear from the messages of this work that Byron is attempting to get into the mind of the creator, Prometheus. In the first passages of the work the irony of the promethean punishment of eternal mortal suffering is given to the reader as an example of both kinship and empathy the romantic mind showed to Prometheus.

Through his own humanity Prometheus Byron builds for Prometheus a following of human compassion that mirrors his own compassion for his creation. "Titan! To whose immortal eyes/The sufferings of morality,/Seen in their sad reality, / Were not as things that gods despise;/what was thy pity's recompense? / A silent suffering, and intense;/The rock, the vulture and the chain" (Byron 264) Prometheus' kindness and pity upon mortal man, leads him to be forced to embrace the eternal suffering of all that Gods wish to avoid. Byron questions the nature of Prometheus' crimes and in a sense asks the reader to empathize with his eternal predicament.

Thy Godlike crime was to be kind,

To render with thy precepts less

The sum of human wretchedness,

And strengthen Man with his own mind;

Still in thy patient energy,

In the endurance, and repulse

Of thine impenetrable Spirit, mighty lesson we inherit: (Byron 265)

Byron, here compels his reader and all mankind to listen to the wisdom of Prometheus' mistakes and to find empathy and wisdom in his demise. Byron charges that man is not only like Prometheus but that he will suffer a similar fate.

Thou art a symbol and a sign

To Mortals of their fate and force;

Like thee, Man is part divine, troubled stream from a pure source;

And Man in portions can foresee

His own funereal destiny; (265)

Through his own wretched existence on this cruel earth man will wish for and foresee the "Victory" of his own death.

Byron here states a constant theme of the romantic writer, that of the torturous gift of the knowledge of the frailty of his own existence. Not, unlike the Christian creation story, man took knowledge from the tree and was forever more destined to be stricken from the perfection of the garden and live a life in the limbo of the constant seeking of the divine life of liberty that once was his. Through these first two examples there is a clear understanding that the contemporary trials of the human race are the writer's proof of the truth of his analogy. In these works and especially in Manfred one can see that the expressions of loss, constant seeking, the double edged gift of knowledge and the cruelty that man inflicts upon his brother through war, progress and even good intentions are the window of his soul. In these analogies the writer could not help but continue the living evolving progression of the promethean myth.

In the much earlier works the clarity and view of Prometheus himself are the primary perspective of the verse and prose, yet in the later years and particularly the romantic era the literary tool attempts to use the mind of Prometheus as a template for true understanding of the mind of man. Though clearly the mythology was proliferated in ancient times to send messages of morality and responsibility to man it was not until much later in human existence that the messages and focus of the individual as the primary and most important voice was embraced.

In Manfred, the Faust-like and therefore promethean-like god-man holds the central if not only perspective for the piece. Not only does Manfred hold the characteristics of a God and the perspective of the individual, he is also intended to be a representative of a great and knowledgeable modern man. It is through these associations that the personality and character of the author are clearly developed. Even the very idea that modern literary scholars find the most fascinating of topics to be the inner workings of the mind of the author as can be seen through the mind of his or her characters, in fiction is testament to the modern assumption of universal personal perspective.

The analogous use of the personal view juxtaposed with the collective view of responsibility and guilt for the actions of all man can also be seen as the romantic mind's burning desire to reassert the values of the ancients to a selfish and self-serving modern world. The bearers of the gift of knowledge, such as the great writers being discussed here often feel the most profound responsibility to use the double edged and gilded gift of (the) God(s) to better the whole existence of mankind. Through these illustrations one can see the perspective concept as a reciprocal tool for this purpose, yet it can be argued that the superiority that Manfred speaks of feeling is the writer's own self value given up as both a great reality and a fundamental personal fault. In Percy Shelley's work Prometheus Unbound he clearly elevates reform as one of his chief motivations for creativity.

Let this opportunity be conceded to me of acknowledging that I have, what a Scotch philosopher characteristically terms, "a passion for reforming the world:" (Shelley Preface)

One of hundreds of thousands of real life examples of the knowledgeable man feeling the dire responsibility to perpetuate the growth of human knowledge for the betterment of mankind, is the theological works of C.S. Lewis. (Myers 1-248) Interestingly, C.S. Lewis spent much of his later life exploring theology from a Christian perspective and trying to undo some of the digression he felt had occurred through the focus on the neoclassicism of the romantic era. (182-213) A poignant quote by Lewis deals with the concept of perspective and seeking truth through the interpretation of history and myth: "In The Magician's Nephew the authorial voice says, 'What you see and hear depends a good deal on where you are standing [and] what sort of person you are' (Lewis 125)." (Myers 182)

The central idea of individuality is so ingrained in the modern mind that messages of individuality are often assumed posthumously. This being a rather profound change of view, from the collective to the individual personal focus and responsibility, often overlooked by modern students. Any scholar of Greek literature or culture will clearly recognize that this is one profound way in which the cultures that followed have transposed the lessons of the mythology and culture of the ancients. Though all Greek scholars would acknowledge personal or individual responsibility they would also couple it almost universally with the collective responsibility and world-view of the age. (Cairns 161) this juxtaposition of the individual vs. collective perspective is just one example of how the romantics, their forbearers and even those who come after them have aided in the growth and change of the promethean myth. Even the very idea that modern literary scholars find the most fascinating of topics to be the inner workings of the mind of the author

Likewise, Percy Shelley clearly develops the ideals of the promethean myth throughout much of his work. Without question one of his most popular works, Prometheus Unbound overtly alters the promethean ideal through not only individual view but through many other tools. In the preface to Prometheus Unbound Shelley offers a foundational apologetics comment about the fluidity of myth and literature. Given the topic of the evolution of the promethean myth Shelley's statement becomes exceedingly profound.

The Greek tragic writers, in selecting as their subject any portion of their national history or mythology, employed in their treatment of it a certain arbitrary discretion. They by no means conceived themselves bound to adhere to the common interpretation or to imitate in story as in title their rivals and predecessors. (Shelley Preface)

The history of revisionism is clear and evident, regardless of the modern ideal associated with the one truth, that we so desperately seek. Shelley, in his celebration of life, the creative spirit and love Prometheus Unbound has attempted to associate myth and man with the ideas of eternal knowledge and eternal love as the key to freeing oneself from the traps of the human condition.

The very language of the work offers more elation than tragedy, even though the basis of the work is one of the greatest tragedies ever perpetuated through thought and myth. Shelley's self admission of artistic license for the purpose of the betterment of humanity springs the youthful and fresh language out of the tragic and into the modern. Though the content and context of the work is very heavy with meaning, Percy chooses to concentrate the just of its overall spirit as positive and love filled rather than dark and tragic. The dark and tragic details are a reversion to memory of what was once or foreshadowing to a change that will occur in what was once an eternal damnation before it was conquered by eternal love.

No change, no pause, no hope! Yet I endure.

I ask the Earth, have not the mountains felt? _25

I ask yon Heaven, the all-beholding Sun,

Has it not seen? The Sea, in storm or calm,

Heaven's ever-changing Shadow, spread below,

Have its deaf waves not heard my agony?

Ah me! alas, pain, pain ever, for ever! _30 (Shelley Act 1)

Prometheus is asking for an end and is seeking help, foreshadowing change. The profundity of the change from dark sinister double edged and hopeless punishment to a commune with the earth about her ability to change for Prometheus, salvation something he had through years of suffering nearly lost all hope of.

PROMETHEUS:

Venerable mother!

All else who live and suffer take from thee

Some comfort; flowers, and fruits, and happy sounds,

And love, though fleeting; these may not be mine.

But mine own words, I pray, deny me not. _190 (Shelley Act 1)

She answers him with her own woes but still sets out to make that which seems impossible possible again. Through these lyrical words Percy Shelley attempts to revive the hope of humanity that the world is not bound only to suffer for its past mistakes but to ask for help and get it.

PANTHEA:

Peace! peace! A mighty Power, which is as darkness, _510

Is rising out of Earth, and from the sky

Is showered like night, and from within the air

Bursts, like eclipse which had been gathered up

Into the pores of sunlight: the bright visions,

Wherein the singing spirits rode and shone, _515

Gleam like pale meteors through a watery night. (Shelley Act 4)

Shelley, using his gift of knowledge and his burning desire to create elevated the promethean myth the new height through the shedding of the tragic and the elevation of hope.

To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite; _570

To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;

To defy Power, which seems omnipotent;

To love, and bear; to hope till Hope creates

From its own wreck the thing it contemplates;