Synopsis
Cupid and Psyche is often read as a luminous tale: the trials of love, the fall, forgiveness, and final reunion.
This book takes a different path.
The Affection That Outlives the Gods rereads the myth without softening it, and without turning it into a consoling moral lesson. At its centre is not the triumph of ideal love, but a bond marked by desire, woundedness, distance, dependence, and survival.Psyche is not reduced to an innocent victim. Cupid is not absolved as a purely romantic figure. The gods are not merely narrative obstacles, but powers that watch over, discipline, and test whatever remains human within the myth.
In a critical, intense, and accessible style, Calogero Gagliano offers a reading of Cupid and Psyche as the story of an affection that endures not because it is pure, but because it is wounded; not because it is saved, but because it is still capable of lasting.A short essay for readers interested in Greek and Roman mythology, classical myth, literary criticism, symbolic interpretation, and unconventional readings of the great myths of love.
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The Affection That Outlives the Gods (Paperback)
Print on DemandSeller: Grand Eagle Retail, Bensenville, IL, U.S.A.
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Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. Cupid and Psyche begins as a tale, but it never remains within the sweetness it seems to promise.Psyche is so beautiful that men cease to desire her and begin to worship her. No one asks for her hand, no one reaches her, no one accepts the risk of truly encountering her. Her beauty, instead of opening a life before her, separates her from the world. Venus sees in that worshipped mortal a threat to her own cult, and Cupid, sent to punish her, ends by saving her without giving up the privilege of secrecy.From here comes the harshest point of the myth: Psyche is given a palace, the night, a voice, a body that seeks her, but not the face of the one who loves her. The happiness granted to her comes with an unjust condition. She must trust without seeing, love without recognising, inhabit a sweetness that consoles and diminishes her in the same act.This book reads Cupid and Psyche again without turning it into a luminous moral. The lamp, the oil, the knife, the bed, the high place, the jar of sleep and the divine cup become the living sites of a question: what remains of love when desire has already imposed its darkness, when knowledge arrives in trembling hands, when beauty does not save, when the gods' gift does not erase what has happened?The Affection That Outlives the Gods does not tell of love's triumph, but of what remains of love after fault, fear, loss and alteration. Not an intact passion, not a pacified happy ending, but a poorer and more resistant form of endurance, born when no one can any longer pretend to innocence. This item is printed on demand. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9798181663909
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The Affection That Outlives the Gods: Another Reading of the Myth of Cupid and Psyche
Print on DemandSeller: California Books, Miami, FL, U.S.A.
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Condition: New. Print on Demand. Seller Inventory # I-9798181663909
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The Affection That Outlives the Gods (Paperback)
Print on DemandSeller: CitiRetail, Stevenage, United Kingdom
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Paperback. Condition: new. Paperback. Cupid and Psyche begins as a tale, but it never remains within the sweetness it seems to promise.Psyche is so beautiful that men cease to desire her and begin to worship her. No one asks for her hand, no one reaches her, no one accepts the risk of truly encountering her. Her beauty, instead of opening a life before her, separates her from the world. Venus sees in that worshipped mortal a threat to her own cult, and Cupid, sent to punish her, ends by saving her without giving up the privilege of secrecy.From here comes the harshest point of the myth: Psyche is given a palace, the night, a voice, a body that seeks her, but not the face of the one who loves her. The happiness granted to her comes with an unjust condition. She must trust without seeing, love without recognising, inhabit a sweetness that consoles and diminishes her in the same act.This book reads Cupid and Psyche again without turning it into a luminous moral. The lamp, the oil, the knife, the bed, the high place, the jar of sleep and the divine cup become the living sites of a question: what remains of love when desire has already imposed its darkness, when knowledge arrives in trembling hands, when beauty does not save, when the gods' gift does not erase what has happened?The Affection That Outlives the Gods does not tell of love's triumph, but of what remains of love after fault, fear, loss and alteration. Not an intact passion, not a pacified happy ending, but a poorer and more resistant form of endurance, born when no one can any longer pretend to innocence. This item is printed on demand. Shipping may be from our UK warehouse or from our Australian or US warehouses, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9798181663909
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The Affection That Outlives the Gods : Another Reading of the Myth of Cupid and Psyche
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Amazon Digital Services LLC - Kdp Jun 2026, 2026
ISBN 13: 9798181663909
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Seller: AHA-BUCH GmbH, Einbeck, Germany
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Taschenbuch. Condition: Neu. Neuware. Seller Inventory # 9798181663909