\documentstyle[marc,11pt,palatino,doublespace]{article}
\parindent=0.3in
\setstretch{2.0}
\begin{document}
{\setstretch{1.0}
\hfill
\begin{tabular}{l}
Marc Horowitz \\
21.512 \\
April 30, 1992
\end{tabular}}

\begin{center}
\Large\bf A Structural Analysis of ``Meleager and the Boar''
\end{center}

In the Greek myth ``Meleager and the Boar'', there does not seem to be
any basic underlying structure throughout the whole myth.  However,
there are many examples of elements of structure recurring two or
three times during the myth.

At the begining of the myth, the king, Oeneus, forgets to give the
proper sacrifice to one of the gods, Artemis.  As punishment, she
sends down a boar to ravage Oeneus's kingdom.  Later in the story,
after Meleager has killed the boar, he angers his uncles by trying to
give the spoils of the kill to Atalanta, a woman.  This angers them,
and they took the head and hide from her.  At the end of the story,
Althaea is angry at Meleager for killing her brothers.  In revenge,
she takes the brand which the Fates have tied to his life, and throws
it into the fire.  These are all examples of a situation where someone
in a lower class angers someone who is superior to them.  This results
in the inferior individual taking some sort of punishment from the
superior individual.  The message here is clear; do not fight
authority.

A general theme which does recur many times in the myth is family
relationships.  One example of this is family antagonism.  Meleager
and his uncles disagree on what do to with the trophies from killing
the boar.  Althaea is forced to choose between her brothers and her
son.  In both cases, this antagonism leads to ruin.  Meleager kills
his uncles in a fit of rage.  Althaea eventually chooses to kill her
son, but the motherlove in her is so strong, that she eventually takes
her own life.  The obvious conclusion is that a family is expected to
stick together.  Anything else is unacceptable, and will be the
family's downfall.  There is one other incident which may be an
example of family against each other, but I lack the background to
tell for sure.  After Atalanta shoots the boar with her arrow,
Ancaeus, who is also from Arcadia, tries to delive the death blow to
the boar, rather than letting Atalanta, who struck the first blow, do
so.  Ancaeus never delivers this blow, as he is gored and killed.

In the myth, love and women always lead to death.  Meleager falls in
love with Atalanta when he first sees her.  Through a long chain of
events, this results in his death.  Althaea, out of love for her
brothers, killed her son, then out of love for her son, killed
herself.  The boar's killer, Atalanta, was a woman.  Artemis, who was
the cause of the boar and all the problems it brought, was a goddess,
not a god.  The Fates were women.  The conclusion (one which might not
be too popular in 1992) is that women are to be scorned, as they will
always lead to death.

If there is one theme in all Greek literature which occurs over and
over again, it is that you cannot trick Fate.  When the Fates come to
Althaea when Meleager was a newborn, they tied his life to a brand in
the fire.  Althaea removed it from the fire, and hid it to protect her
son.  Of course, in the end, she was his undoing.

There were several features of the myth which seem like they should
have some structural significance, but I am not sure what they are.

Hair is referred to several times in the myth.  We are given a
detailed description of the way Atalanta does her hair.  Castor and
Polydeuces are riding snow-white horses.  After the boar is first
shot, we are told that ``at last his bristles were stained with
blood.''  The spoil of the kill over which Meleager and his uncles
fight is the hide of the boar.  There are too many references to hair
for this to be a cooincidence.  The only similarity I can see is that
all references to hair are in a context of fighting.  This explanation
seems to be missing something.

When Althaea is about to throw the brand into the fire, ``[f]our times
she reached forward to place the brand in the fire, and four times she
drew back her hand.''  The only other place a number is used in the
play is during the battle.  At the beginning, the boar attacked the
hunters, killed three, and nearly killed the fourth by escaping into a
tree.  This situation is the inverse of Althaea's.  The fourth,
Nestor, is saved, not killed.  Nestor saves himself by climbing into a
tree, where Althaea kills her son by burning a wooden brand.

``Meleager and the boar'' has a rich structural character.  There are
many different themes which one can find if the myth is read closely
enough, all of which seem to make sense given my knowledge of Greek
society.

\end{document}
