allusions (niobe)(poo-bah)

Niobe

mournful woman; from Niobe, whose children were slain by Apollo and Artemis because of her bragging; the gods pitied her and turned her into a rock that was always wet from weeping

nirvana

This Sanskrit word means “going out,” lie a light. Buddhists believe that in this doctrine of release, a state of perfect bliss is attained in life through the negation of all desires and the extinction of the self. Nirvana is union with the Buddha, an ideal condition of harmony.

noah and the flood

In Genesis, when God decided to punish the wicked of the world with a terrific flood, he chose Noah, a good man, to build an ark. Noah, his family, and pairs of the animals of the world lived on an ark during the 40 days and 40 nights of the deluge, while everyone and everything else perished. After the ark came to rest on the top of Mt. Ararat, Noah, his wife, his sons and their wives, and the animals emerged to repopulate Earth.

Odyssey

Ninth-century B.C. epic poem, attributed to Homer, which recounts the story of the ten-year-long homeward

journey of Odysseus and his men after the Trojan War. The Odyssey is a source of our knowledge of many of the modern

Greek myths and legends, as well as the basis for many modern works. The most outstanding of these is James Joyce’s

Ulysses. More recently, the movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? was based loosely on the Odyssey.

oedipus

In Greek mythology, Oedipus was the son of Laius and Jocasta. In response to an oracle, Oedipus was

abandoned at birth and raised as the son of Polybus and Merope, king and queen of Corinth. When grown, Oedipus learned

of the prophecy that foretold that he would kill his father and marry his mother – two of the worst taboos in human

civilization. In an attempt to avoid fulfilling the prophecy, he left his adopted land, Corinth, and fled to Thebes, his

actual birthplace. En route, he encountered – and in his pride and ignorance slew – Laius, the king of Thebes. He also

answered the riddle of the sphinx, saving Thebes from paying the annual tribute of its best youth to the monster. As a

reward, he was made king of Thebes and he married Jocasta, the queen and his mother, thus fulfilling the prophecy and

continuing the curse of the House of Atreus. Freud based his well-known theory of the “Coedipus Complex” on this myth.

olympian

majestic in manner, superior to mundane affairs; any participant in the ancient or modern Olympic games;

named after 12 gods that were supposed to reside on Mt. Olympus.

original sin/the “fall”

the idea that all men are innately sinful as a result of Adam and Eve's fall from the state of

innocence. When they ate of the forbidden fruit, they were cast out of the Biblical Garden of Eden; a post-biblical

expression for the doctrine of Adam's transgression and mankind's consequential inheritance of a sinful nature because

he ate the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge.

paean

a song of joy; a ritual epithet of Apollo the healer. In Homeric poems, an independent god of healing named Paean

or Paeon, who took care of Hades when the latter was wounded.

pandora

In Greek mythology, she was the first woman, comparable to eve in biblical allusion. Like Eve, Pandora, whose

name means “all gifts,” was given the power to bring about the ruin of mankind. Zeus gave her a closed box filled with all

the evils of the world and warned her not to open it. Her curiosity got the better of her, and when she opened the box,

all the evils flew out and they have continued to harm human beings ever since. Today, Pandora’s Box refers to a gift that

turns out to be a curse. It also refers to the unanticipated consequences if one’s actions, as in “opening a can of worms.”

parnassus

Mountain was sacred to arts and literature; any center of poetic or artistic activity; poetry or poets

collectively, a common title for selection of poetry; named after the hero of Mt. Parnassus, the son of Poseidon and a

Nymph. He founded the oracle of Python, which was later occupied by Apollo.

pegasus

Poetic inspiration; named after a winged horse which sprang from the blood of Medusa at her death; a stamp of

his hoof caused Hippocrene, the fountain of the Muses, to issue poetic inspiration from Mount Helicon.

persephone

(Roman name: Proserpine) In Greek and Roman mythology she was the goddess of fertility and queen of the

underworld. The daughter of Zeus and Demeter (Ceres), she was kidnapped by Pluto (Hades). Her mother grieved so

deeply that all earthly crops died and perpetual winter threatened. A bargain was struck: Persephone would spend half

the year with Hades – hence autumn and winter- and return to her mother half the year, allowing the revival of crops

during spring and summer. The myth of Persephone is the classical explanation for the seasons.

pharisees

In Mathew, these were members of an ancient Jewish sect that emphasized strict observance of the Law.

Self-righteous and separatist, they refused contact with any not of their kind. Consequently, the term Pharisees

developed a negative connotation, and is usually interpreted to mean hypocrites.

philistines

These traditional enemies of the Israelites fought against Samson, David, and other major Jewish heroes. In

contemporary usage the term connotes an ignorant, crude, and rude person lacking in culture and artistic appreciation and

characterized by materialistic values.

phoenix

this mythical bird lives for 500 years, burned to death, and then rose from its own ashes to begin life anew. For

this reason, the phoenix frequently symbolizes death and resurrection, or eternal life.

the piper must be paid

refers to the legend of the Pied Piper of Hamelin, a cautionary tale, if there ever was one. A

wandering piper dressed in pied (colorfully patched) clothing has been employed by the town elders of Hamelin to rid the

village of rats. He does so by playing a musical pipe to lure the rats with a song into a local river, where they all drown.

When the elders refuse to pay him, the Pied Piper abducts all of the children in the village as punishment, leading them

from the village and into a cave by playing his pipe. The children never return. The lesson: pay your debts or face the

consequences.

plutocracy

a government by the wealthy; named after Pluton, the "Rich Man," a ritual tile of Hades. He was originally

the god of the fields because the ground was the source of all wealth, ores and jewels.

pollyanna

a person characterized by impermissible optimism and a tendency to find good in everything, a foolishly or

blindly optimistic person; from Eleanor Porter's heroine, Pollyanna Whittier, in the book POLLYANNA

pantius pilate

The Roman governor before whom Jesus was tried. When he could not convince the mobs to release

Jesus, he washed his hands, symbolically cleansing himself of what was to follow, and turned Jesus over for crucifixion.

In contemporary usage a Pontius Pilate is one who betrays his own morale convictions and submits to the pressure of

others, “washing his hands of the matter.”

pooh-bah

a pompous, ostentatious official, especially one who, holding many offices, fulfills none of them, a person who

holds high office ; after Pooh-Bah Lord-High-Everything-Else, character in THE MIKADO, a musical by Gilbert and

Sullivan