'Short Stories from Hogwarts of Heroism, Hardship and Dangerous Hobbies' by J.K. Rowling

I started reading this short book in December. It took me a while to get back to reading this one because I knew the Remus Lupin chapter was going to be a heartbreaker. It is. So is the back story of Professor Minerva McGonagall, who lost both of the loves of her life. She's also more badass than we realized.

J.K. Rowling named Minerva McGonagall after the Roman goddess of wisdom + William Topaz McGonagall, remembered for being a terrible Victorian poet. He wrote a terrible poem about the Tay Bridge Disaster, which I knew about from  Scientific Blunders: A Brief History of How Wrong Scientists Can Sometimes Be by Robert M. Youngson. It's a book I have read and enjoyed for many years.

H, H + DH was kind of a sad book, but I enjoyed it because it gave us some more back story of some of our favorite characters. The Sybill Trelawney chapter was a little short, and it didn't have a lot of new information. But I've now read 2 of the 3 Pottermore story collections, and I'm excited to read the third one.

Here is my review of Hogwarts: An Incomplete and Unreliable Guide.

Here is a review from Reading Lark.

I purchased this book on Pottermore and was not obligated in any way to review it.

"Number Nine, The Potteresque," Pt. 1

Peter Thackeray LeBon had been dead since 1830.  The monotony of his eternal punishment was starting to get to him.  He stood before the bathroom mirror, looking into his hollow blue eyes, asking himself for the millionth time how he could have ended up here, slave to that woman--if she was a woman.

“LeBon,” Maman Brigitte called from the bedroom.  “What is taking so long?  Get out here!”
Her voice, deep and booming with its Caribbean accent, sent chills through his body.  He feared her.  And there was no way to escape.

He opened the bathroom door and emerged, wearing nothing but a towel.  Maman Brigitte lay across her enormous feather bed, her gown of black velvet, lace and human bone pulled up and bunched up around her belly, revealing her long, chocolate-brown legs and black panties.

Brigitte sat up and brushed the bleached-blonde locks from her eyes.  She pointed to a pair of black leather pants at the foot of the bed.  “Drop the towel,”she commanded.  “Put those on.”  He obeyed, painfully aware the death-goddess was studying his every move.

“What’s the matter, LeBon?” she asked as he crouched down to kiss the top of her foot.  “Do you not enjoy being my slave?  Raven thought you would really enjoy this, since you loved the slave trade so much in life.”

“That was so long ago,” he said.  Every morning when he awoke, he cursed Raven Templin and wished he had never laid a hand on Raven’s friend Badu.  Badu, it turned out, was a priestess of the goddess Yemaya.  Yemaya, in another form, was none other than Maman Brigitte herself.  He would spend eternity doing whatever Brigitte/Yemaya wished.

Creative Commons image by Africaarianna

Right now, she wanted him to eat her pussy.  Brigitte stared up at the Baroque golden cherubim decorating the ceiling as LeBon worked his way up her calf, up her thigh, and into her panties, the way she'd trained him.  Suddenly, Brigitte was distracted by a scratching noise at the door.

“LeBon, be a dear and see who’s at the door,” Brigitte moaned.

Relieved, he opened the door.  He looked down and saw the raised paw of a large, silver-gray wolf with a white belly. The creature looked at him with curious yellow-green eyes.

“It’s a wolf,” LeBon said.

Maman Brigitte came nearer.  “Theodora!  Well, this is a surprise.  Don’t be a stranger, dear.  Come in.”

The wolf took a few steps back and turned its furry head.   A moment later it turned back to the doorway with a basket between its jaws.  Maman Brigitte took the offering, peering inside to find a green glass bottle stuffed with habanero peppers floating in dark rum.

“Theodora, you didn’t have to.  But I’m glad you did.”  Brigitte offered the bottle to LeBon, who gratefully took a long drink.  The potent mixture of hot peppers and rum burned his throat, but momentarily took him away from his surroundings.  What was left in the bottle he returned to Brigitte, who finished it.  She belched as the wolf stood on its hind legs and transformed into a woman.

Public domain

“Well, bitch,” Brigitte said, “what brings you to my humble abode today?”

“Humble?” Theodora said as she looked around the room.  “Your house is covered in gold.”  Like Brigitte, she had a Caribbean accent.

“I was being polite,” Brigitte said.  She gave LeBon a hard slap to the back of the head.  “What brings you here today, my friend?”

“The Underworld brings me here today, in fact,” Theodora said.  “I’ve heard rumblings, strange mutterings having to do with the Queen.”

Brigitte shook her head.  “I don’t know what kind of crowd you’ve been hanging out with, to have heard something like that.  But you’ve hit upon a truth.  Persephone hasn’t been at all happy lately.  But you know the rules.  As gatekeeper of the Underworld, I’m not supposed to let any mortals down there.  ”

Theodora frowned.  “But Persephone and I have been friends since high school.  I know a good way to cheer her up, if you’ll let me.  Come on now, Maman Brigitte.  There are always exceptions to the rule, aren’t there?”

“I can think of one or two,” Brigitte said.  “I suppose I can allow it.  But only this once, and only if you make a promise to me.  Give me your hand.”

Brigitte reached for Theodora’s hand, cupping her visitor’s honey-brown hand inside her own.  She drew a dagger from her boot and cut a deep line into Theodora’s palm, which began to bleed and dribble down her wrist into the marble floor.  She made a similar slit in her own hand.  The women pressed their palms together in a blood oath.

“What have I sworn to, my goddess?” Theodora asked.

“After you’ve passed back to the world of the living, you will be given one day to return to my dwelling with a larger offering.  No mere bottle of rum and peppers this time.  I want a feast, like the ones my followers used to leave in the graveyards for me in the olden days.”  She pressed a black handkerchief into Theodora’s hand to stop the bleeding.  “I want you to bring your drum.  Play for me, and sing me some of my old-time praises.”

“You’ll have your feast, goddess, I assure you.”

“Good,” Brigitte said.  "Now let’s get you through that gate.”

The women went through Brigitte’s mansion and out the French doors into the garden.  Among the birds of paradise and palm trees stood the stone gate that marked the entrance into the Underworld.
 Brigitte uttered the words only she knew, and the gate swung open.  A cold breeze blew in from the other side.

Theodora got down on her hands and knees to resume her wolf form.  She walked on four legs into the eerie world of the dead, her front paw stinging from the cut.  She reached the river of blood first.
 Had she been human, the ferryman would have asked her for fare to cross.  Since she appeared as an animal, however, the ferryman took no notice of her.  She jumped with a great splash into the red river, inhaling its musky, meaty perfume.  When she reached the far shore, she shook herself, then sat for a moment to lick the blood from her silvery coat.  She walked on, past the fields of unearthly colorless flowers, until she came to the palace of Hecate, Goddess of Death, where Persephone dwelled as Queen of the Dead for six months of every year.  She jumped right into the palace through an open window and headed for the tower where Persephone stayed with her lover, the vampire Jack Damuzi.

Theodora climbed the winding stone stairs to the tower, resuming her human shape as she climbed.  She lifted the brass knocker and knocked on the heavy wooden door.  Two minutes later, the door swung open.  Jack stood there, looking unusually pale even for a vampire, his red-brown eyes streaked with bloody tears.

“I heard the terrible news,” Theodora said sympathetically.  “May I see Seph?”

“Persephone,” Jack called softly into his quarters.  “You have a visitor.”

Jack opened the door wide, and Theodora could see Persephone lying face-down with her head on her pillow, sobbing.  She looked up to see Theodora, but did not stop crying.  Theodora sat beside her and stroked Persephone’s hair to comfort her.  “I’m so sorry,” she whispered.

Jack sniffed the air.  “You’ve been in the river of blood, haven’t you?”  He moved in closer to Theodora, picking up her hand.  “ And you’ve cut yourself, too.  Very recently.  I can smell how the blood is clotting.  It smells old and stale at the surface, but the fresh blood underneath is tempting.
 Just now I sensed that your heart started beating faster.  Am I making you nervous, Theodora?  I’m sorry.  I get overwhelmed when I smell living blood.  Seph, darling, would it bother you terribly if I took one tiny nibble of Theodora’s neck?”

“Yes,” Persephone sobbed.

“This is precisely the problem,” Jack explained sadly.  “First Persephone came down here, and she’s not dead.  Against my better judgement, I fed off of her.  But although there is no blood in the world as delicious as that of a young goddess, Persephone only aroused my appetite for the blood of the living without bedding it back down.  I tried to satiate myself.  I practically sucked Persephone dry, the poor thing.  That was when Hecate made the fateful decision to send me out into the world of the living for three months.”

Theodora nodded.  “I heard through the grapevine you were going to be born.”

“Yes,” Jack said.  “In three days’ time, when the Winter Solstice comes around, a mortal shall give birth to me.  Hecate chose a virgin, appeared to her in a dream and made her pregnant.  Next Hecate will perform an ancient ritual that will kill me here in the Underworld, so that I may be born as that child.”  Here Persephone gave a loud sob.  “In three months’ time I will grow from an infant into the man that you see before you now.  At the Vernal Equinox, Persephone will return to the world of the living, and we shall be reunited.”

“You see, dear?” Theodora said sweetly.  “There’s hope.  You’ll see Jack again.  In three months, you’ll get to be reunited with your true love.  It sounds wonderful.  Can’t you look forward to the reunion?”

Persephone raised her head off the pillow.  “I guess I never thought about it like that,” she said, wiping tears and mascara from her eyes.  She gave Theodora a kiss on the cheek.  “Thank you.  Will you stay with us until . . . after?”

“Of course,” Theodora said.  “That is, if it’s all right with Jack.”

“Fine with me,” shrugged Jack.  “It would be even finer if you let me have just a little bite . . .”

“No,” Theodora and Persephone said in unison.

Hecate with dog. Public domain within the United States

Like A God's Kiss: Erotic Mythological Tales

http://www.amazon.com/Like-Gods-Kiss-Mythological-Selections-ebook/dp/B002NGO4YW/

I Took My Nieces to See 'Maleficent' (Spoilers)

If you're any kind of a Disney fan, I highly recommend you go see Maleficent, starring Elle Fanning and Angelina Jolie. I took my 8- and 10-year-old nieces on Wednesday, and they loved it.

Disney's Sleeping Beauty Castle, Anaheim, CA. Public domain image

I loved it, too. Although Maleficent is the villainous fairy who tries to kill the princess with a spell in the Disney cartoon Sleeping Beauty, she's the heroine of this live-action version (also from Disney). Sleeping Beauty/Aurora herself is...also a heroine! This movie doesn't pit them against each other, it makes them friends.

The villain is Aurora's awful father Stephon. Human Stephon and fairy Maleficent met as children. He showed goodwill at their first meeting when he threw away his iron ring - fairies can't bear the touch of iron. As they grew into teens, they fell in love, but Stephon didn't have an honest or loyal bone in his entire body. Maleficent grew nicely into her role as protector of the moors, while Stephon went off to court and secretly aspired to be king. She was innocent, open, and honest, while he was worldly, greedy, and duplicitous.

The presiding king tried to conquer the moors; Maleficent and her fairies repelled them. The king was wounded and promised that whoever killed Maleficent would be his successor. Slimy Stephon paid his "true love" a visit on the pretense of warning her, but instead drugged her and brutally cut off her wings. He brought the wings to the king as "proof" she was dead.

Stephon, subsequently made king, married and had a daughter, but slowly descended into madness. Maleficent got her bit of revenge by cursing the newborn Aurora to fall into a deep sleep on her 16th birthday when she touched a spinning wheel. (We know this part from the cartoon.) We can't really blame Maleficent for this, because STEPHON CUT OFF HER MAGNIFICENT FRICKING WINGS.

"Sleeping Beauty" by Louis Sussman. Public domain photo by Mutter Erde

Stephon sent baby Aurora off to a cottage in the woods to be raised by three fairies (one of them was played by Imelda Staunton, best known to U.S. audiences as Dolores Umbridge in the Harry Potter movies). These fairies are well-meaning but rather dim-witted. Maleficent looks out for Aurora, and gradually the two women become friends. Inevitably, Aurora finds out about the curse and forsakes the moors for her father's castle. Of course, the curse comes true, although Maleficent regrets it and tried unsuccessfully to lift it. Aurora falls into her enchanted sleep.

Maleficent comes to the rescue, though. Aurora's prince friend is ineffective at lifting the curse, but because Maleficent friendship-love for Aurora is true, Maleficent kisses her friend and breaks the spell.

Then the really happy ending: fairy and wings are reunited, Stephon gets his comeuppance, and the violent old patriarchy is replaced with a peaceful matriarchy under Queen Aurora.

This movie is visually beautiful and well-written. Angelina Jolie's acting in the title role is perfection.

According to Wikipedia, the earliest published account of Sleeping Beauty is Charles Perrault's 1697 version. That article (linked above) doesn't say much about the European folklore that may have inspired it, except that the sleeping princess motif may have been inspired by "tribulations of saintly female martyrs in early Christian hagiography conventions" and the Germanic folk tale of Brynhild. Also called Brunnehilde, Brynhild was placed by Odin in a magical circle of fire, where she slept. The hero Siegfried rescued her and awakened her by removing her Valkyrie armor.

"Hagiography" is simply a fancy Greek loan word that means "holy writing." For an example of a female martyr story, see this post on the feast day of St. Lucia.

"Wotan's Farewell to Brunhilde" by Emilie Kip Baker. Public domain within the U.S. 

So, why a spindle or spinning wheel, of all things, as the center of the curse? If we read SparkNotes' Themes, Motifs, and Symbols page for Sleeping Beauty (the Disney film), we see that the spinning wheel might represent "the unstoppable revolutions of the years," signifying how time inevitably changes things. Clearly one of things time is changing is Aurora - on her 16th birthday, she's transforming from a girl into a woman. This is certainly another example of the Dangerous 16th Birthday trope.

I've read elsewhere - and unfortunately I can't remember where - that the spindle on which Aurora pricks her finger may be a stand-in for another type of "prick." In other words, the thing the king and queen wish to keep her away from is her own awakening sexuality.

If you'll recall from the Mother Night post, the Germanic mother-goddess known variously as Frigga, Frigg, and Freya has a spinning wheel, which was known as the Wheel of Fate. Fate or Fortune seems to be an underlying theme of the Sleeping Beauty legend. Wikipedia will tell you that in some versions, the princess doesn't fall under a curse at all, but falls into an enchanted sleep simply because it's her fate to do so. The three fairies who raise her represent the Fates, who in Germanic mythology are called the Norns.

Public domain image of the three Norns. 1895

The Norns are also collectively called the Weird Sisters (cf. Macbeth, and also Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), the Women Who Write (because they wrote the Book of Destiny), and the Three Mysterious Beings. Their names were Fate, Being, and Necessity; or Become, Becoming, and Shall-Be; or Urth (Mother Earth), Verthandi, and Skuld. Skuld lends her name to "skullduggery," the doings of witches. As depicted above, they lived in a cave containing the root of the world-tree Yggdrasil and the source of the Fountain of Life. (If you're a fan of Marvel movies, you'll be somewhat familiar with Yggdrasil. The image of the tree first shows up in Captain America, I believe.)

It's probably not a coincidence that when a bitter, vengeful Maleficent decides to make herself queen of the moors, her throne is located in a grotto with a waterfall, and a tree grows out of it.

The Fates are also the Triple Goddess: maiden, mother, and crone. This is clearly depicted in Maleficent. The eldest of the three, played by Staunton, wears pink and represents the crone. (Imelda Staunton isn't actually very grandmotherly, in my opinion. She's younger than 60 and rather young-looking for a Caucasian woman of her age. She has good skin.) The fairy in blue who wishes happiness on Aurora is the mother figure, and the green nature-fairy with wild blonde hair is the childlike maiden.

The ancient Greeks pictured the fates as weavers, weaving the thread of life and cutting it at the time of death. What do you make with a spinning wheel? Thread. You spin thread from flax. The Greeks also envisioned the Fates as standing over the cradle of newborns, determining the child's destiny, according to Barbara G. Walker's The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets.

Clearly, the fairy tale of Sleeping Beauty has some roots in very old Indo-European mythology, some of which was common to the ancient Greeks and the Vikings. How cool that we're still adapting and telling this ancient bit of goddess-mythology. How cool that Angelina Jolie makes such a cool goddess figure.

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Another essential book for a film buff's library, this one is packed with information and reviews. Some of the entries are quite extensive. JHR provides all the information you need, including complete cast and production staff. I find JHR's information invaluable. I like to read not only who acted in a movie, but who made it, both top-billed and lesser mortals. -- Ross Adams in DRESS CIRCLE mag.

Adult Film Review: 'Satyr' Starring Jenna Jameson and Asia Carrera

Author's Note: I wrote this movie review in 2008. It originally appeared in the online magazine Lucrezia, which is now defunct. - Erin O'Riordan 

Satyr, directed by Michael Zen in 1997, opens with the following definitions:

     “sa-tyr, n. 1. in Mythology, a woodland deity represented as a man with goat’s legs, ears, and horns.

     2. the very essence of raw sexual desire.”

     Read these two definitions carefully, and it will appear that a word has been left out of the second one.  If a satyr is a man, then shouldn’t he embody the very essence of raw male sexual desire?  The female equivalent of satyr, we are told by Edith Hamilton’s Mythology, is the nymph, a creature that is as beautiful as the satyr is ugly.  In modern English, nymph connotes a young, innocent woman who may be sexually alluring, but isn’t consciously aware of it.  It is a passive kind of sexuality (in contrast to its use in the word nymphomania, a Victorian word for scarily aggressive female sexuality).  This is the paradox of Satyr, a provocative and troubling film: is it reinforcing traditional sex role stereotypes, or subverting them?

     Pablo Picasso understood the particular essence of the satyr myth.  “The Satyr or Faun – half man, half goat, and with a goatish disposition, lustful whenever opportunity presents itself – figures in many of Picasso’s works, often as a substitute for the artist himself,” writes the author of the Spaightwood Galleries catalog of Picasso prints.  Look at many of Picasso’s paintings or ceramic works depicting satyrs, and you will notice the aroused man-beast chasing after a nymph or a mortal woman, who flees in terror.  Indeed, among the Classical satyrs is the god Pan, from whose name derives the word “panic.”  Of course these women panicked at being pursued by satyrs; they were the unwilling victims of unbridled male sexual aggression.  In other words, they were threatened with rape.

Fangspiel (Faun and Nymph) by Franz von Stuck. Public domain image. 

  For this reason, the concept of “satyr” will be problematic for some women (and men) who watch this film.  For some, it may represent a justification or glorification of sexual assault. 

     Director Michael Zen and screenwriter Ravin Touchstone have tried to subvert the satyr myth by opening it to include women as well as men.  Dr. Isabelle Jade, played by Asia Carrera, is herself a satyr, and certainly not a helpless, passive nymph.  Dr. Jade has discovered a way to turn human beings into half-human, half-animals (sort of a porn equivalent of the “mad scientist”  in H. G. Wells’ classic novel The Island of Dr. Moreau).  She sees herself as an amoral superwoman.  In the character’s own words, “We’re more than human, less than gods.  We rut like animals.  No feelings, no emotions.”

     But even as this film gives one woman the ultimate power and control, other women play more traditionally feminine roles.  This is true of Dr. Jade’s servant Sophie (played by Missy), a satyr who acts like a nymph.  She is constantly being “put in her place,” denying her instincts and suppressing her knowledge to serve others.  In one scene, Dr. Jade carries out a sadistic sexual punishment for Sophie after Sophie has spoken up out of turn.  Sophie must wear an anal plug which sprouts hair resembling the mane of a horse.  Thus, she calls to mind both the half-horse centaurs of Classical mythology, and “pony play” erotica (familiar to readers of A. N. Roquelaure; you can also find an extensive list of related websites at http://www.ponyplaylinks.com/). 

     Sophie’s response to this “punishment” is one of pleasure rather than pain, however.  She seems to enjoy playing the bottom in her BDSM relationship with Dr. Jade.  The question of whether Sophie is the victim of an assault or a willing participant in a controlled, pleasurable activity is left to the viewer.

Asia Carrera. Creative Commons image by Tabercil. Cropped. 

     Sophie is not the only female character to experience sexual domination, however.  The film’s heroine is Fawn Deering, played by Jenna Jameson.  Fawn is a naive college student who seeks out Dr. Jade while researching a paper on “animal mythology and human sexuality.”  One of Dr. Jade’s two male companions, Adam (Brad Armstrong), is attracted to Fawn.  He invites her to a party, a bacchanal.  (“Bacchanal” has come to mean a drunken party, but it originally referred to the worship of Bacchus, or Dionysus, the Roman/Greek god of wine and king of all satyrs.)  Reluctantly, Fawn agrees to come.  She almost seems to be drawn there, irresistibly, against her will.

Jenna Jameson. Public domain image by PETA.

      At the bacchanal, Adam offers Fawn a drink which, he assures her, is not alcohol.  She drinks it and loses her memory and her inhibitions.  Within moments, she is agreeing to a threesome with Adam and with Dr. Jade’s other man, Daniel (Mickey G.).  In the morning, Fawn feels ill, thinks she has gotten drunk the night before, and vaguely remembers having sex with Adam, but not Daniel.  This scene reads just like an account of a woman who was given a drug such as Rohypnol or GHB and raped.  Although she seemed to enjoy the experience at the time, Fawn is unhappy with the after-effects the next morning.  Adam encourages her to think of the after-effects as “what happens to everyone when they fall in love.”

     Thus far, the depiction of emotionless, animal-like sexuality that Satyr presents is not an encouraging one.  It suggests that unless you are the alpha female, your sexuality will be used and possibly abused.  Males, meanwhile, seem to be immune from any punishments or consequences.  There is, however, room in this film for genuine caring and honesty to triumph over Dr. Jade’s dark vision of the sexual landscape.  In the end, Satyr redeems itself. 

     The ending, however, may not be enough for some viewers to overcome the negatives it implies.  Some may also be troubled by the ethnic stereotyping – Asia Carrera is costumed to resemble the “Dragon Ladies” played by Anna May Wong in the films of the 1930s, to go along with her ruthless personality.

Anna May Wong, photographed by Carl Van Vechten. Public domain image. 

     Other viewers, however, may find that Satyr simply allows its male and female characters to express a full range of sexual choices, including dominance and submission.  Its characters’ openness to the animal nature of human sexuality could be seen as liberating.  The characters are so close to the animal world, in fact, that they refuse to eat meat.  When Fawn asks for bacon and eggs at breakfast, she is instead served a fig.  Figs are a recurring motif in Satyr.  When we are introduced to Sophie, for example, she is pulling open and sucking at the pulp of a fresh fig while masturbating.  The fig’s insides bear a resemblance to the vagina; thus it has a long association as a symbol for womanhood.  The fig tree as nourisher and sustainer has long been a symbol for the mother-goddess as well.

     Disturbing on some levels, enlightening on others, Satyr is a complex and intriguing work of adult sexual entertainment.  DVD Avenue subscribers can find it under the Straight adult film category and judge for themselves.

(Note: the DVD Avenue website for renting DVDs is no longer in business.) 

Sources

Berkinow, Louise.  “Women, Race and Movies.”  The American Women’s Almanac: An Inspiring and Irreverent Women’s History.  NewYork: Berkeley Books, 1997. 

“Dragon Lady (Stereotype).”  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dragon_Lady_%28stereotype%29.  Accessed July 22, 2008. 

Hamilton, Edith.  Mythology: Timeless Tales of Gods and Heroes.  NewYork: The New American Library (Mentor Books). 

“Pablo Picasso: Satyrs and Fauns.”  http://spaightwoodgalleries.com/Pages/Picasso_Satyrs.html.  Accessed July 22, 2008. 

Walker, Barbara G.  “Fig.”  The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets.  San Francisco: Harper + Row, 1983.

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Beware the Ides of March

Why do we say "Beware the Ides of March" when March 15th is approaching? The short answer is, "Shakespeare." The long answer has to do with the ancient Roman calendar. Let's take a look at this expression and where it came from.

The Romans called the Ides of March Idus Martii or Idus Martiae, says the Wikipedia entry. Before the Julian calendar, March - the month dedicated to the war-god Mars - was the first on the Roman calendar. The ancient Romans practiced a number of religious rites, many of them related to New Year celebrations, around the Ides of March.

"Ides" indicates the 13th day of most months, but the 15th day of March, May, June, and October. This observation was based on the lunar calendar, and in ancient times, the Ides of March would have been the night of the first full moon of the new year.

Since the month belonged to Mars, a military parade would have been part of the celebration, according to a Christian Science Monitor article. The ides of any month was usually used to celebrate the god or goddess of that month. February belonged to Juno Februata, so the goddess of marriage would have been celebrated on the 13th, and this probably contributed to our modern holiday of Valentine's Day on February 14th.

Ancient Roman rituals associated with the Ides of March included the sacrifice of a sheep to the chief Roman god Jupiter, the feast of the new year goddess Anna Perenna, and, in later times, a festival known as Mamuralia in which an old man dressed in animal skins, representing the old year, was symbolically driven out. Also in later antiquity, the period between the Ides of March and the Vernal Equinox was sacred to the goddess Cybele and her lover Attis (a version of the Mother Goddess and the Annually Dying God myth). In his Metamorphoses, the poet Ovid identified Anna Parenna as the sister of Dido, the queen of Carthage who appears in The Aeneid of Virgil.

Historically, the Ides of March became associated with ill omen when Julius Caesar was assassinated on that date in the year 44 C.E. The assassination was written about in ancient times by Plutarch and Suetonius, who both report Caesar had been warned by a soothsayer that he would be harmed no later than the Ides of March. Suetonius identifies the soothsayer as Spurinna, which is an Etruscan name, and the Etruscans were known for using the entrails of sheep for divination.

The historical accounts of the time inspired William Shakespeare as he wrote his play The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. Shakespeare put the words "Beware the Ides of March" in the unnamed soothsayer's mouth.

According to this article, Czar Nicholas II of Russia had a very bad day on March 15, 1917, when he abdicated his throne after his army's defeat by Germany in the First World War. It's interesting to note that the Russian word "czar" is directly related to the Latin word "Caesar." Nicholas II was eventually executed, but not until July 1918.

On his blog Twilight Language (having nothing to do with the Stephenie Meyer book series, alas), learned Fortean researcher Loren Coleman mentions the site on which the soothsayer is said to have made the dire prediction to Caesar is marked by an obelisk. Obelisks, Coleman goes on to say, are linked to ancient Egypt (of course), Free Masonic symbolism, and also "sexual magick." (When "magick" is spelled with a "k" like that, it usually directly or indirectly has something to do with the early 20th century philosophies of Aleister Crowley.)

Unfortunately, the exact connections are not explained in any detail. Maybe the sex magick rituals have to do with the ancient celebrations of Cybele and Attis? Encyclopedia Mythica says, "Along with her consort, the vegetation god Attis, Cybele was worshiped in wild, emotional, bloody, orgiastic, cathartic ceremonies."

This article says initiates into Cybele's cult stood under a wooden grate. A bull was sacrificed on top of the grate, showering the initiate with the blood. (Ew.) Attis was said to have been driven to castrate and kill himself by Cybele's jealousy. Where his blood drops hit the earth, the first violets grew. Cybele's priests, the Gallai, would castrate themselves and afterward assume the social identities of women. Cybele's rituals were actually led by priestesses, though, who had the much less gruesome task of leading ecstatic drumming and dancing.

Turning to my old standby reference book, The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets by Barbara G. Walker, I learn:

"Egyptians knew the obelisk was intended to represent a giant phallus. It was called the benben-stone, or begetter-stone, similar to the Petra, "the rock that begat thee," as the Bible says. Usually the obelisk was regarded as the erection of the earth god Geb in his perpetual eagerness to mate with the Goddess of Heaven."

The "Goddess of Heaven" whose body literally forms the sky is Nut. She looks like this:

http://the-broom-cupboard.blogspot.com/2011/07/facebook-page-for-goddess-nut.html

Consciously or unconsciously, Beyonce seems to be imitating the Egyptian goddess in one of her many outfits for her Mrs. Carter tour. But I digress.

http://drivennetwork.com/blog/driven-network/driven-highlights/beyonces-mrs-carter-sparkles-at-the-stage/

According to Walker, Egyptian pharaohs, who thought of themselves as gods, sometimes claimed descent from Nut. As Ancient History Encyclopedia will tell you, Julius Caesar himself was said to be descended from a Roman goddess, namely Venus. Venus seduced Prince Anchises of Dardania, an ally of the Trojans. They produced Aeneas, the hero of Virgil's Aeneid. Aeneas's descendants founded Rome and the family line Julia, Caesar's family line.

So here again we have god-goddess pairings: Caesar is a descendant of Venus, killed on a day sacred to Venus's lover Mars. The day is also sacred to Anna Parenna, the goddess who is the sister of Dido of Carthage, the lover of Caesar's ancestor Aeneas.

In her entry on Venus, Walker writes, "Venery used to mean hunting; for, like her Eastern counterpart Artemis, Venus was once a Lady of the Animals, and her Horned God - Adonis, both the hunter and the sacrificial stag - became venison, which meant 'Venus's son.'"

I don't think the suggestion was that the Romans ate Julius Caesar literally (ew), but religious Romans may have thought of his murder as a symbolic sacrifice. "Venery" is now used to mean "sexual indulgence," by the way - which I suppose is a different form of "hunting."

Walker's entry on Adonis makes the following associations:

- Adonis was the same god as Anchises, who was castrated after his mating with Venus.

- Adonis was castrated by a priest of Venus in the guise of a wild boar.

- Where Adonis's blood drops hit the earth, red anemones grew.

- The castration myth is symbolic of the reaping of grain at harvest time.

About Attis, Walker writes that:

- The cult of Attis and Cybele was brought over to Rome from Phrygia (modern Turkey) in 204 BCE.

- Cybele's temple was located at what is now Vatican Hill. She was worshiped by Augustus Caesar, of whom Julius Caesar was a great-uncle on his mother's side.

- The "passion" of Attis was celebrated on March 25, exactly nine months before his December 25 birth.

- March 25 was also the day the great goddess Juno was said to have given birth to Mars.

- Attis rises from the dead three days after his sacrificial death, celebrated by the Carnival-like (which is to say, Mardi Gras-like) Hilaria festival.

- Ultimately, the Indo-European cultural roots of the springtime Hilaria festival may be the same as the Hindu festival of Holi.

Ancient Euro-Africo-Asian mythologies: what a tangled web. Fascinating, though.

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#BookReview: The Vampire Diaries, The Return: Midnight (Spoilers)

Previous Vampire Diaries series book reviews on this blog:

The Awakening 
The Return, Book 1: Nightfall
The Return, Book 2: Shadow Souls

Midnight by L.J. Smith
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is the last book in the Vampire Diaries series to be written by L.J. Smith herself - or at least it was until Kindle Worlds opened up the VD franchise to fan fiction writers. You can read here about how LJ Smith, hired by Alloy Entertainment to create the series in 1990 and then fired in 2011, used Kindle Worlds to flesh out her own vision. As I write this review, Smith's two newest "fanfic" entries in the series she created are #1 and #2 on Amazon's Kindle Worlds Young Adult bestsellers list.

I read the previous installment, Shadow Souls, two years ago in March 2012. In that volume, Elena and her friends rescued Stefan from prison in the Dark Dimensions. Stefan had hoped a magical rose would make him human again, but Damon became human instead, and wasn't at all happy about it.

The town of Fell's Church is still under attack from the demonic kitsune (fox spirit) siblings. As the clock counts down to the Last Midnight, the town's possessed children intend to carry out a terrible plot, which kitsune sister Misao hopes will restore her evil powers. But, as Matt, Meredith, and wise crone Miss Flowers discover, the kitsunes are acting as minions for an even greater, even more black-hearted entity. Smith has introduced more Japanese folklore into her tale, which is one of the things I love most about this series. She's kind of like J.K. Rowling's American cousin.

Shrine to Inari no Kami at a Buddhist temple in Tokyo, with many kitsune statues. Public domain image by Ph0kin.

That black-hearted entity is Inari, the Shinto goddess of rice and mistress of all the fox spirits. Encyclopedia Mythica says that Inari is a shape-shifter, sometimes a god and sometimes a goddess. She has a springtime festival and is sometimes associated with the agricultural goddess Uga-no-Mitami and with Hinduism's Lakshmi. In Smith's tale, Inari has the largest starball - a repository of spiritual power - in the Dark Dimensions. Using the kitsune as her messengers, she intends to cause ritualistic destruction.

For further reading on the mythology of Inari:

"Goddess Inari" at Journeying to the Goddess
"Inari and Her Kitsune" at Goddess School 

Miss Flowers plays a more important role in this book than in any of the previous ones, using her benevolent witchcraft to its fullest extent. If you've only watched the TV show, you'll be unfamiliar with Miss Flowers, but you can think of her as the book version of Bonnie's Gran.

Damon, meanwhile, is determined to become a vampire again as quickly as he became human. To do so, he returns to the Dark Dimensions, unwillingly bringing Bonnie McCollough with him. Damon still has very strong feelings for Elena, but at the same time, he's drawn to the very innocent, almost child-like Bonnie.

At first I thought the red-haired woman on the cover was supposed to be Bonnie, who is described as a Scottish-American teen with curly, strawberry blonde hair. She doesn't resemble Kat Graham, the multiracial actress who plays Bonnie Bennett on the TV series - but then again, the TV character Dr. Meredith Fell bears little resemblance to the book series' olive-skinned Latina teen Meredith Sulez. Dr. Fell is played by Torrey DeVitto who, when the Meredith character first appeared in Season 3, was married to Paul Wesley, who plays Stefan. But then AGAIN, book character Tyler Smallwood is not described as Latino, while Michael Trevino who plays TV Tyler Lockwood is Mexican-American. The TV series is more ethnically diverse than the book, which is good. I favor adding diversity over subtracting it.

However, it turns out the woman on the cover isn't Bonnie but Idola, a Guardian of the Celestial Realms (a sort of embassy of heaven that exists in the Dark Dimensions). The Guardians spill some secrets in this volume, including the true revelation of how Elena's parents died. They also explain some of Elena's angelic qualities since she died as a vampire and came back as a specially-gifted human.

Bonnie gets herself into some serious trouble with a craving for a simple sugarplum - but Damon saves her. Stefan and Elena enter the Dark Dimension to join them, and they must work together with those left behind in Fell's Church to keep the Last Midnight from happening.

The story ends on a hopeful note, and it certainly doesn't read like the end to a series. Since I don't want to read the ghostwritten The Hunters books, I'll have to download the Kindle Worlds books and give them a chance. The two books that are currently out (The Vampire Diaries: Evensong: Paradise Lost (Kindle Worlds) and The Vampire Diaries: Evensong: The War of Roses (Kindle Worlds Novella)) are 2/3 of a story arc called Evensong. After she finishes that, the Daily Dot article linked at the top of this blog post says, Smith will write her "endgame," her version of how the series ends. That'll probably be another 3-book arc, at least. Fortunately, the e-books are only $1.99 apiece.

View all my reviews on Goodreads. I purchased this book with my own funds at The Dusty Bookshelf used bookstore in Manhattan, Kansas, and was not obligated in any way to review it. This review represents my own honest opinion.

I haven't been watching the Vampire Diaries TV series very closely for the past two seasons - or the spin-off series The Originals, despite my love of Rebekah - but I did watch on Thursday, May 6. SPOILER ALERT: It ended with Katerina Petrov, a.k.a. Katherine Pierce, apparently dead but unable to enter the afterlife through Bonnie. (Bonnie is the conduit between life and death now that she herself is back from the dead.) Some unseen supernatural force dragged her kicking and screaming backwards out of the church where Bonnie stood - perhaps she was dragged off the hell? Could this really be the end of TV-Katherine? We won't know until the series returns after a short hiatus on March 20th.

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The Fifth Element

This post is a follow-up to yesterday's Vampire Academy book review. It has to do with the elemental magic practiced by Richelle Mead's Moroi - vampires who are living, mortal beings and self-appointed guardians of the earth. I may make occasional reference to the 1997 Luc Besson movie titled The Fifth Element, starring Bruce Willis, Milla Jovovich, and Gary Oldman (which, I'll have you know, I think is a very good movie).

We can learn much of interest about the Classical four elements by referring to Barbara G. Walker's wonderful resource The Woman's Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets.

The Four Elements

Walker's encyclopedia entry on "elements" informs us of the following:

- Naming the four elements as water, fire, earth, and air was common to many ancient civilizations, including the Chinese, Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Hindus, Aztecs, and some other North American indigenous tribes. These four elements were commonly thought to make up everything that exists.

- Ancient Hindus believed the goddess Kali created the four elements. By inscribing symbols to represent them on her necklace of skulls, Kali brought the Sanskrit alphabet into being.

Public domain image by Ambereen21

- Kali is sometimes portrayed as holding one of four objects in each of her four hands: a bowl of blood symbolizing water, a lightning bolt-shaped scepter symbolizing fire, a lotus wheel representing earth, and a sword representing air.

- Kali's four symbols, once adapted by Europeans, evolved into the cup, wand, wheel (pentacle), and sword used on the Tarot deck. These, in turn, became the hearts, clubs, diamonds, and spades of the modern playing card deck.

- Water and earth were feminine, and air and fire were masculine. This is why hearts and diamonds are red (feminine) and clubs and spades are black (masculine) - analogous to the concepts of yin and yang. In Hindu philosophy, the feminine elements were creative/benevolent  and the masculine elements destructive/cruel. However, to the ancient Greeks, the feminine elements were passive and the male elements were active.

- The combination of water and fire - male and female - represented sexual union. Together they made blood, which was red like fire yet tasted like ocean water.

- The "four humors" used by Western medicine are each related to one of the four elements. Blood was air, phlegm was water, yellow bile was fire, and black bile was earth. A predominance of blood in the body led to the sanguine temperament (cheerful), phlegm the phlegmatic (calm, cool, composed, imperturbable), yellow bile the choleric (irritable), and black bile the melancholic (tending toward depression).

Personification of the four temperaments. Title page of 'The Seven Planets' by Adriaen Collaert, 1581. Public domain image. 

 - In Christian iconography, the four Gospel writers (or Four Evangelists) are represented as a bull (ox), lion, serpent (according to other sources, an eagle), and a man or angel. These symbols represent earth, fire, water, and air as well as the Gospels of Luke, Mark, John, and Matthew.

The Four Evangelists depicted in the Book of Kells. Public domain image. 

The Moroi in the Vampire Academy series each specialize in one type of elemental magic in their teen years, similar to reaching puberty. Christian Ozera, for example, has fire magic, and Victor and Natalie Dashkov both specialize in earth magic. Lissa, however, has no specialization. She has some control over all four elements, but her true specialization is the rare fifth element, spirit.

The Fifth Element

According to Walker, the ancient Greeks characterized the fifth element as "ether," which means "heavenly." The gods and goddesses were thought to be made of ether - so I wasn't completely wrong in my movie review when I characterized Lissa as having an "ethereal" quality.

In the Luc Besson movie, the fifth element is both embodied in a person - Leeloo - and also representative of love itself.

Leeloo cosplay, complete with Multipass. Creative Commons image by Christopher Michel

Walker's encyclopedia entry for quintessence describes the substance variously as the blue blood of the gods (also known as ichor), specifically as the menstrual blood of the Goddess, or as the sacred wine or ambrosia consumed by the gods. Walker claims that in Homeric poetry, ichor is described as being made by the honeybees of Aphrodite. "Blue blood" is said to be the reason both the Hindu deity Krishna and the Gnostic creator-god known as the Demiurge were depicted as blue-skinned, and why ancient Celts painted themselves blue in religious ceremonies and in battle. Celts killed in battle hoped to be resurrected like the immortal gods.

Walker goes on to write that in medieval alchemy, quinta essentia or quintessence referred to a blue elixir associated with both bodily resurrection and spiritual illumination. She also writes that quintessence is used to reference the fifth trump suit or Major Arcana of the Tarot deck.

For further evidence, I turned to The Book of Alchemy: Learn the Secrets of the Alchemists to Transform Mind, Body, and Soul by Francis Melville. It says, "Of all the philosophical principles, none is as mysterious and intangible as the quintessence, the fifth essence or element, which is concealed within the four philosophical elements and equates with the secret fire, the spark of divinity within all things."

If Lissa Dragomir's quintessence is the spark of the divine, it certainly explains what our narrator Rose feels when she experiences Lissa's healing: a sense of all the good, wonderful, happy things in the world, a beautiful bliss.

Melville further writes, "The four elements conceal within them a fifth element, known as the quinta essentia, the quintessence, or Azoth. This has the connotation of being the absolute essence of a thing and, as such, many alchemical magisteries (products or medicines) are called quintessences, particularly those that have been distilled, because distillation releases the soul and spirit from matter. Some alchemists call the spirit of wine (distilled brandy) a quintessence, and, indeed, it fulfills the criteria described by Isaac Newton:

"'Quintessence is a thing that is spiritual, penetrating, tinging, and incorruptible, which emerges anew from the four elements when they are bound to each other.'

"Paracelsus considers it to be the extract of the elements, their incorruptible, eternal substratum. Manfred Junius calls it 'The origin and goal of all things.'

"It is often said that the quintessence is not a product of the elements, but one of the three philosophical principles. In fact, it is all three: the trinity is everything. The quintessence is the soul and spirit within all things. It is also the salt that allows it to emerge through the four elements. This reveals it to be nothing less than the secret fire, the spark of eternal light from the first combustion of creation. It is the divinity in all things, the inner sun in which all things find their true identity. Alchemists give it many names: Universal Spirit, Never-failing Source...key of the philosophers, nursery of the world, heavenly substance, Mother of the Waters and, even, Mercurius [identified with the Egyptian wisdom god Thoth, the Greek god Hermes, and the Roman god Mercury].

"The quintessence can be symbolized by the pentagram, the figure that most perfectly divides the circle. It represents the microcosm, the individual containing the whole universe within itself."

If Lissa's spirit is the "extract of the elements," that explains why she and the other spirit-users (Saint Vladimir and Sonya Karp) have weak control over all of the four other elements. By alchemy is very esoteric and every one of its symbols and terms means different things to different alchemists, and now the exact nature and meaning of the fifth element may be murkier than ever.

I'll have to read the rest of the Vampire Academy series to found out if Richelle Mead sheds any more light on it.

Shadow-Kissed Anna

That said, it may be worth noting that St. Vladimir's Dhampir guardian, according to Mead, was called Anna. Walker tells us in her entry on St. Anne (the mother of the Virgin Mary) that Anne/Anna is a name associated with the "grandmother goddess." Analogous names include the Canaanite goddess Anat, the Roman goddess Anna Parenna (Grandmother Time), the Celtic goddess Ana or Anu who made up one third of The Morrigan, Morg-Ana ("invincible Queen Death") in Arthurian legend, and even Angurboda ("hag of the iron wood") the mistress of Loki and the mother of Hel. The pentacle (a pentagram inside a circle, according to modern Wiccan usage) was the symbol common to St. Anne and Morgana, and is the ancient Egyptian symbol for the Underworld.

Shadow-kissed Anna, Ms. Karp, and Lissa make up a kind of trinity. Anna is a legendary figure from long ago, a sort of ancestor or grandmother. She was a guiding light who kept St. Vladimir from giving in to madness. Ms. Karp is like the mother-figure of the trinity, although the madness swallowed her and she became Strigoi. Lissa is the maiden figure whose spirit-power is still largely untested. "Shadow-kissed" means brought back from the land of the dead, so naturally, Anna has an association with the Underworld.

As we know from a long line of myth and literature, there is always a heavy cost to be paid for bringing anyone back to life from the Underworld - a cost that will no doubt have to be paid by Lissa and Rose, since Rose herself is shadow-kissed.

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Movie Opinion: Peter Parker's Aunt May Is a Goddess

Author's Note: This was originally published at The Erotic Woman in June 2007. Its relevance will become clear later today. 

First, a confession: When I was three years old, I carried a Spiderman doll around with me everywhere I went.  When I ate, Spidey had to sit at the table with me.  The little Spidey outfit came off, and when I took a bath, Spiderman had to take one, too.

     I haven’t had much interest in Spiderman since then.  He seemed to fall outside my girly world.  I didn’t plan on seeing the first film, and did so only thanks to the enthusiasm of my comic-book-crazed younger brother.  I was a bit more willing to sit down and watch the second one, if only because of Alfred Molina.  (I’ve had a slight crush on him ever since watching him try to seduce his wife by eating yogurt on the sitcom Ladies’ Man.  Chocolat only sealed the deal.)  To get me to the theater to see Spiderman 3 once again took the intervention of my brother.

     Spiderman 3 was directed by Sam Raimi and written by Sam Raimi, Ivan Raimi and Alvin Sargent.  The plot involves Peter Parker/Spiderman (Tobey Maguire) deciding to ask his girlfriend, Mary Jane Watson (Kirsten Dunst), to marry him.  Naturally, obstacles of the supervillainish variety stand in his way: there’s the thief who killed Parker’s Uncle Ben, Flint Marko (Thomas Haden Church), whose body has somehow become made out of sand; and an alien symbiote that takes the form of a black suit.  The black suit first makes Parker do bad things, then changes hands and makes Parker’s rival Eddie Brock (Topher Grace) do bad things.  Oh, and Parker’s best friend, Harry Osborn (James Franco) sometimes mistakenly believes that Parker killed his father, and tries to kill Parker. 

     Throughout all this chaos, one figure remains the wise, stable moral authority.  She is the archetypal crone, the goddess of wisdom.  That figure is Peter Parker’s Aunt May.

Played by Rosemary Harris, she is (or should be) the face of elderly feminine beauty, with her flawless skin and pretty hazel eyes.   She gives Parker two important clues as his makes his way through the maze of his life.  First, she tells him that if he wants to get married, he has to be willing to put his wife before himself.  Again and again, we watch Parker do stupid, selfish things to his girlfriend Mary Jane.  His plans to propose in a French restaurant come at a woefully bad time.  He kisses another woman in front of her.   He turns down her offer of help in a fit of anger.  Only at the end of the film does he master Aunt May’s lesson of respect for marriage.

     Parker does the same stupid, selfish things to his “best friend” Harry Osborn.  When Osborn loses his memory, Parker withholds the truth.  Later, under the influence of the black suit, which makes him more aggressive, Parker delights in attacking and seriously wounding Osborn.  We watch as Aunt May’s truth about marriage stretches to include friendship:  to be a friend, Parker must learn to put his friend first.

     When Parker reports (wrongly) that the man who killed Aunt May’s husband Ben has been killed by Spiderman, he expects Aunt May to be happy, or at least to feel relieved.  She doesn’t.  Instead, she dispenses her second clue to the maze: revenge is destructive.  “Spiderman doesn’t kill,” she says.  Power is to be used to protect the innocent, not to punish the guilty. 

      With these insights, Aunt May Parker fits either of these definitions of the crone:

     “ As the crone, the woman represents the Goddess of wisdom and prophecy . . . [and] contribute[s] invaluable insight and the perspective of age.” (Naomi R. Goldenberg, Changing of the Gods)

     “ . . . The modern female elder is often a beautiful, savvy woman who uses the knowledge she has gained through the years, and the inherent spiritual wisdom of interrelatedness that continues to grow throughout the years, to impart values that support and encourage the growth of others and the preservation of life.” (Joan Borysenko, A Woman’s Book of Life)

     That’s a strikingly powerful female image for a movie aimed at adolescent boys.  Now, to be fair, the message of friendship, not revenge, is also repeated by the film’s male elder, Osborn’s man-servant Bernard (John Paxton).  And in the voice-over narration in one of the final scenes, Parker states that Osborn, not Aunt May, taught him which moral values to uphold.  Parker is wrong.  Aunt May is the film’s preacher, its priestess, its crone-goddess of wisdom.

     Another message of Spiderman 3 is that stereotypical male behavior is wrong.  The black suit  turns Parker into a walking male stereotype.  It makes him use the extra power it gives him to bully ever other male who crosses his path.  Whenever a strange woman crosses his path, he does a smarmy, repellent kind of mating dance for her.  He blatantly uses his flirtations with other women to hurt Mary Jane’s feelings.  And in the midst of all his aggressive and sexual energy, Parker shoves Mary Jane to the ground.  The audience’s sympathy resides with Mary Jane; throughout none of this has Parker been presented as anything but a jerk.  Spiderman 3's moral path is clearly a feminine one.  The right thing for Parker to do is to behave according to the rules of the goddess, Aunt May.

     Although it was written by three men and aimed at adolescent males, there is more to Spiderman 3 than Kirsten Dunst playing the damsel in distress while the male characters get all the good lines.  The film places value on female elder wisdom, respect for marriage, and friendship.   

     There are only two things that I would have done differently, had I been one of the film’s writers.  First, I would have given speaking roles to some of the African-American actresses in the film.  Several of these actresses are noticeable, especially in the flirty-black-suit-Parker scenes.  But their roles are simply that: to be noticed.   To be used as human props, rather than individuals.  This disturbing media trend should have ended a long time ago.

     Second, I would have written in more male nudity.  Sure, we get to see the well-built James Franco in his underwear.  But is the underwear really necessary?  And the scene with Peter Parker in the shower could have used a floor-to-ceiling tracking shot.  Tobey Maguire’s not the most traditionally pretty guy ever to grace the screen in a superhero suit, and that’s what I like about him.  He’s like one of the real-guy guys you see in the pages of Sweet Action*.  Surely someone could have convinced Tobey Maguire to bare all for his art.

     My childhood Spidey would take off his clothes for me.

Full sources of works cited:

Goldenberg, Naomi R.  Changing of the Gods: Feminism and the End of Traditional Religions.  Boston: Beacon Press, 1979.  Page 98.

*An erotic magazine for women, now defunct. Currently, the most popular uses of the name Sweet Action seem to refer to a craft beer, an ice cream shop, or a comedy podcast. So don't confuse the one thing with any of those others. 

Borysenko, Joan.  A Woman’s Book of Life: The Biology, Psychology, and Spirituality of the Feminine Life Cycle.  New York: Riverhead Books, 1996.  Page 7.