The Orpheus legend in literature, music, and the visual arts: Four twentieth century works

From ancient Greek sculpture to experimental musical forms of the twentieth century, Orpheus has been the subject of well over one hundred works of art. The ancient legend of Orpheus comprises a variety of elements contained in diverse sources. Orpheus is shaman, musician, devoted husband, founder of homosexuality, oracle.; For centuries the element of the Orpheus legend which most interested artists and authors was his journey to Hades. In medieval allegories, Orpheus became at first a metaphor of Christ's death and resurrection. Later he became the essence of the courtly lover. Renaissance authors stressed the civilizing power of Orpheus' music. Baroque composers and painters celebrated conjugal love in operas and paintings based upon Orpheus' journey to Hades. Romantic poets referred to Orpheus as the model lover. Symbolists shattered the romantic image of Orpheus, representing him as an androgynous figure, an embodiment of their synaesthetic ideal.; Twentieth century artists have translated Orpheus' death and resurrection into the immortality of the artist in his works which live on after his death. For Paul Klee, Ein Garten f ur Orpheus offered a refuge for cultural synthesis in the midst of economic and political chaos and the rise to power of the Nazis in Germany.; Ossip Zadkine identified with Orpheus, the musician, seeking to become one with his instrument as Zadkine considered himself one with his sculptures. In each successive work, Orpheus' lyre became more a part of his body until at last in the 1956, bronze Orphee, the musician and lyre were one figure.; Jean Cocteau created an allegory of the contemporary poet obsessed with his own death and his search for immortality. His 1950 film Orph{dollar}acute{lcub}e{rcub}{dollar}e asserted his philosophy that the artist is a scribe for a higher power which controls his creativity, therefore his destiny.; Igor Stravinsky, George Balanchine, and Isamu Noguchi created the neoclassical ballet Orph{dollar}acute{lcub}e{rcub}{dollar}e which premiered in 1948. The ballet represented the final element of the Orpheus legend--the oracle of the singing head and the creation of the constellation Lyra.