Narcissus
Variations on a Theme
Narcissus, the beautiful youth loved by girls and boys alike, who, while out hunting one day, stooped to drink from a pool of clear water and saw for the first time his own reflection. And fell in love with it…he bent down to touch the smooth cheeks, to kiss the inviting lips, only to see the image disappear in a watery blur. Wracked with frustrated desire, in despair he faded away in a benumbed stupor and died. Those who came to look for him found only a flower with a yellow centre and white petals, bending towards the pool.
At his birth, the prophetess, when asked whether Narcissus would live long, said, “He will…if he does not come to know himself.” The tale is told by Ovid in his ‘Metamorphoses’. He sums up Narcissus’s dilemma thus: “Unwittingly, he desired himself, and was himself the object of his own approval, at once seeking and sought, himself kindling the flame with which he burned.”
‘Narcissus’ comes from the Greek word narcosis, a state of numbness, stupor, sleep….
I'll will wait for a while :) But a great gallery again, my complments.