"For Apollo, possession is a conquest"- pg. 145. Possession of something or someone is a common theme in Calasso's work. This is most often shown through the act of rape. One such instance was mentioned in my previous blog; Apollo turning into a wolf and raping a woman. Transformation also seems to be common during these scenes of rape. It solidifies the fact that the gods and mortals are very different.
Rape is the second stage of the relationship between god and mortal, according to recent lecture. The first is conviality: a wonderful friendship between the divine and mortals. Once the Axis Mundi (the tree that connected our world with the divine) fell down, the connection was broken. It eventually led to the third stage, Indifference, in which there is no relationship between the two sides.
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