Bulfinch’s Mythology · Chapter
Sappho explained
This chapter introduces Sappho, a poetess of early Greek literature, known for her passionate love for the youth Phaon.
What happens
This chapter introduces Sappho, a poetess of early Greek literature, known for her passionate love for the youth Phaon. Unrequited, she leaps from the promontory of Leucadia into the sea, a 'Lover's-leap' believed to cure love. The chapter references Byron's 'Childe Harold' and suggests further reading in the Spectator and Moore's works.
Themes in this chapter
Love and Transformation
Sappho's passionate love for Phaon and her leap symbolize love's transformative and destructive power.
Mortality and Immortality
Sappho's leap represents mortal despair, while her verse seeks immortal fame, as questioned by Byron.
Characters to notice
- Sappho
Sappho is the central figure, a poetess who leaps from Leucadia due to unrequited love for Phaon.
Key passages
“The story of Sappho commonly alluded to is that she was passionately in love with a beautiful youth named Phaon, and failing to obtain a return of affection she threw herself from the promontory of Leucadia into the sea, under a superstition that those who should take that 'Lover's-leap' would, if not destroyed, be cured of their love.”
Sappho, deeply in love with Phaon, jumped from Leucadia's cliff into the sea because he did not love her back, believing the leap would either kill her or cure her love.
Summarizes the core myth of Sappho's unrequited love and her fatal leap.
“Dark Sappho! could not verse immortal save That breast imbued with such immortal fire?”
Byron laments that even Sappho's immortal poetry could not save her from the intensity of her own passion.
Byron's reflection on the limits of art against personal suffering.