Reading Notes: Apuleius's Cupid and Psyche, Part A

Psyche Entering Cupids Gardens

By John William Waterhouse

Apuleius's Golden Ass, as translated into English by Tony Kline (2013)

• Robbers snatch a girl
• girl has a story about being kidnapped and them killing her lover
• old woman tells girl that dreams during the day are untrue and nightmares are the opposite 
• a girl named psyche was praised by everyone because she was so beautiful 
• Venus gets jealous and casts a curse that she can only be seized by a wretched man 
• Psyche sisters ever all eventually married and no one wanted to marry Psyche
• Her father goes to talk to the Gods and has no luck
• Her parents take her to the top of the mountain and leave her there crying
• Zephyr sweeps her up and lays her on a flowering turf
• Psyche is attracted the the Palace and crosses the threshold 
• Voices with no bodies explain that this palace is all her and they answer to her commands
• She then meets her husband but has no idea what he looks like
• He tells her that her sisters are sad about her supposed death and no to answer when they call her name 
• She begins to cry for several days pleading with her husband to let her see her sisters 
• He agree but tells her not to listen when they start asking questions about him
• She meets her sisters and shows them her home
• She gives them some of her fur tone against her husbands wishes
• The sisters become jealous, don't tell their parents she's alive and start to devise a plan against Psyche
• Her husband warns her about her sisters and says to at least ignore thing they are saying about him and questions about him
• Her sisters find out that she has no idea what her husband looks like and tell her a story about how he's a snake and plans on eating her and the child. She confesses to not knowing what he looks like and her sisters say the only way she can escape is if she she kills him while he's asleep and then she can return to her sisters.
• Psyche finds out that he's cupid and he gets angry telling her how foolish he is to disobey his mom's wishes and marry hurt.
• She tries to kill herself but the shepard God tells her to pray to Cupid
• She goes to one of her sisters and explains the story
• the sister is so jealous she pretend that their parents are dead and jumps off a cliff