Demeter and Persephone

Shelby Adams
Interpretation Essay
Myth2
19 September 2008

Demeter and Persephone

Taken from your only known surroundings-taken to a place you have never been, with a man you do not know! Scary at first…but would temptation get the best of you? Could you turn out to like it? The story of Demeter and Persephone explains how the seasons came to be. The cold winters and the fresh spring, but that is only the big picture. The deeper part of the story represents loss and temptation. Not just the loss of Demeter’s daughter, but the loss of Persephone’s innocence and presence of temptation of something new and exciting. The three levels of interpretation are natural, social, and psychological. These levels are important to understand so you get all the details about the myth, so you know the myth better and not just the general view.
Demeter is the corn goddess and the mother of Persephone. She provides food and nourishment for everyone. She cares about her daughter more than anything and is known as the “good mother.” When Hades takes Persephone, Demeter has a great feeling of loss and sadness. They were very close with each other and had the special bond between mother and daughter. This could somewhat represent, in the social view, marriage. Being a mother, she wanted to be with her daughter all the time and care for her, but Hades takes that away.
Before Hades kidnaps Persephone, she represents youth, spring and virginity. She is innocent and inexperienced to the bad things in the world. When she is taken, she is very afraid at first but then gives in to the temptation in the underworld. She eats pomegranate seeds, knowing that if she eats them, she will have to return to the underworld with Hades again. So she is changed and has lost her innocence. When Persephone is taken, Demeter is lonely and sad, which is how winter and fall came to be. When Persephone is in the underworld, Demeter does not grow anything on earth. But when Persephone is back, it is spring and summer again and everything is growing and beautiful.
To everyone else, a pomegranate is just a yummy fruit, yet in the story of Demeter and Persephone, it is what holds Persephone to the underworld. She was trapped in the underworld for months and she knew she could not eat anything while she was there or else she would have to keep coming back forever. But, she let temptation get the best of her, she ate six of them, representing the six months out of the year she is with Hades and Demeter is alone. The pomegranate seeds represent her sin and desire and how giving in to bad things come with consequences.
So now we know the reason of the seasons. When Demeter is sad, it is cold and gloomy outside, no growth. But when she is happy, she is with her daughter and it is sunny and nice outside. The story is a lot deeper than that though…it represents the bond between mother and daughter and also the shame of losing your innocence. It shows how easy it is to give in to your temptation and desires and the consequences that come from them.