Our Herp Class

Monday, May 1, 2017

Herps in Society and Culture

Lamia by John Keats

In 1819, John Keats wrote the poem, Lamia. An extremely short synopsis of the poem is as follows; a beautiful snake, who is described as follows,

“She was a gordian shape of dazzling hue,
Vermilion-spotted, golden, green, and blue;
Striped like a zebra, freckled like a pard,
Eyed like a peacock, and all crimson barr’d;	50
And full of silver moons, that, as she breathed…
Some demon’s mistress, or the demon’s self.
Upon her crest she wore a wannish fire
Sprinkled with stars, like Ariadne’s tiar:
Her head was serpent, but ah, bitter-sweet!
She had a woman’s mouth

Lamia then gets a nymph to change her into a full human woman. She then precedes to get a man, Lycius, to fall in love with her. When he asks for marriage she strongly opposes because he wants to invite a philosopher, who could see through her disguise. During their marriage, Apollonius, the philosopher, realizes what Lamia is, he says, “And shall I see thee made a serpent’s prey?” (Keats). At this point, Lamia disappears and the shame of being fooled kills Lycius.

At this point one may be wondering, where is this blog post going? The answer lies within the complex relationship between the snake and the women that was prominent during this time period, and is still relevant today. From Sirens, to succubus, women in literature and pop culture are commonly portrayed as temptresses. This plays into the idea that beauty is temptation. Usually, their main goal is to be the downfall of man. Obviously, the connotation of this portrayal is negative. The bares striking similarities to the typical literary representation of the serpent. Dating back to The Bible, the image of the snake is classically seen as a universal symbol of temptation. During the Romantic era, both of these subjects would have had a negative connotation. In this poem, the way that Keats aligns the female with the image of a snake represents the views of this time. Even by the diction used to described Lamia one can see the connection he draws between the subjects. Even though he is describing a snake, he uses words that would cause the reader to create an image of exotic beauty. In this era, and image like this would be considered dangerous because it is “other”. This reflects the view that snakes are creatures that are part of the ‘original evil’, this poem is a reinforcement of the idea that snakes are inherently evil. In the Romantic era, most people would have been familiar with the story of the original sin, so by using a snake-woman to cause the downfall of Lycius, Keats is warning his audience about the dangers of beauty and temptation.