SCAPEGOAT · She is accustomed to taking the mantle of 'I am to blame' in confrontations
of all kinds. She encourages the blame on herself to save others having to take it themselves ·

JUVENILE · She is of juvenile foolishness and naivety ·

LOYAL · Though displays lapses in judgment where another's trust is involved, she always
means to do well by a person she considers close ·

TURBULENT · An emotional rollercoaster of unpredictability on a good day. She still
experiences extreme transitions of mood depending on environment and situation, sometimes
in a matter of seconds ·

REGRET · Perhaps her most significant attribute of her character, Pandora's agony of what she unleashed
onto the world causes her to spiral through episodes of intense self loathing and hatred. Her knowledge
of the consequences of her actions haunt her, and thus, she is at times unable to cope with what
she has done to the world. She loathes her existence, she loathes herself for being manipulated by
the gods, and as a result, she too, a victim of suffering, now sees herself
as the bane of man kinds existence ·

Throughout the creation of existence, balance within time and life itself has
always played a crucial part in the development of the living. Amongst these forces is
virtue, which unfortunately has to be balanced out by evil. Zeus, driven by anger and
hostility, wanted to take revenge against mankind after Prometheus manipulated the
gods, and stole fire from the heavens. Humanity, in this time, lived in a world that was
without grief, without turmoil, without hardship and without death. It was a perfect
world, men did not know of suffering and pain. Pandora was created by a greater power,
to balance out the goodness and righteousness that roamed the living, with suffering,
death and hardship. She was brought into existence in the form of a maiden - the first
mortal woman, where Zeus orchestrated her path so that she was to wreak havoc
upon humanity's paradise. Pandora, oblivious, of the path Zeus had laid out for her,
happened upon a jar within the forest. Created to be curious by the gods, Pandora could
not suppress her desire for knowledge of the contents within the jar, and she let her
curiosity get the better of her. Without hesitating, she opened the jar, and immediately
upon release, all the known evils flew out of the jar. It was then revealed that the jar
had contained all the evils, disease and tragedy that the man kind had never known
of. Darkness and suffering began to plague man kind, evil seeping into the earth,
eradicating the purity of the paradise man had once known. In terror of the chaos
erupting around her, Pandora frantically tried to close the jar to prevent further evil
from escaping into the world. However, she was too late, all the evil had escaped and
thus laid waste to world of the mortals.

These evils and more plagued the world, ruining the earth and destroying the purity
and essence of paradise for man kind. All that remained trapped within the jar, was
the blessing and gift of Hope. Pandora's actions consequently allowing for evil to spread
into paradise; staining the world and ultimately defining the human condition of suffering
and hardship. Her creation was to break the sanctity of human life and condemn the
mortal world to cope with turmoil and tragedy after having never been exposed to such
evil. Created by Zeus out of vengeance, Pandora's sole purpose was to perform a
seemingly innocent act, which consequently results in negatively impacting the world
as it was known, her actions cause a permanent change to humanity. She introduced
a balance of good to bad in man kind, by unleashing darkness and evil into the originally
pure ideal world; her actions led to the loss of humanity's paradise. Pandora's existence
itself is extremely important, she is responsible for introducing evil into the world,
which would ultimately define the human condition of suffering. Subsequently, Pandora
is made to be held responsible for the humanity's pain and loss of paradise, and
she is demonised by men; she is the condemned to be the bane of man's existence.

The jar's design is fairly plain, with little or no remarkable external attractiveness of the piece.
Its significance at a glance may be unclear, and it is easy for one to assume that it a simple, ordinary jar,
but to Pandora, it is of far deeper importance. The jar of great comfort, confidence and security.
With it, she feels a fuller sense of self and more stable. There is only one item that remains secure
within the jar, and that is Hope. Out of the jar, scattering in all directions, were the
contents of death, disease, evil and turmoil, consequently; all the troubles of mankind.

Hera's gift of curiosity had worked and one day, unable to take it any more, she decided to have
just a brief look inside the jar. As a result of her curiosity, Pandora had released all the wickedness
and malevolence that Zeus had locked into the jar. She was just a mere pawn in a game played by
the gods. In that jar Zeus had hidden all everything that would plague man forever:

Hesiod's Pandora:
" ... as the price of fire I will give them an e v i l, and all men shall fondle this, their evil,
close to their h e a r t s, and take delight in it. "
- Z e u s

Hesiod says that Pandora's action of opening the jar is also regarded as symbolising a gender evil
of female curiosity. In Hesiod's account, Pandora is created as punishment for Prometheus
by Zeus, Pandora was created in order to perform the action of releasing suffering and hardship onto
the world, so that Zeus could have revenge against mankind for Prometheus's theft.

The desire of learning what is inside implies the violation of what is forbidden, and is paid at a
high price.
Work and Days is a poem about morality, and Hesiod is concerned with almost all the moral issues of
the world: law, justice and injustice, religion, peace and war.
Hesiod details how men suffer because of Pandora and her actions of opening and unleashing
the contents of the jar. The myth of Pandora in both Theogony and Work and Days demonstrates one
man's perspective of women; Hesiod. The evil brought and personified by Pandora is nothing but
hardship, thus; Hesiod constructs women to be perceived as concepts of evil.

Pandora is an inevitable evil that Zeus is responsible for; she is also the one who reserves for men
an antidote against evils. Hope remains inside the jar, while all the evils are scattered.
The figure of Pandora (and all members of the female gender) epitomise the primordial concept of
evil and its creation. Zeus creates, through Pandora, a precise kind of evil, a deceptive one,
both attractive and appealing on the outside, resembling something innocent and precious;
a caste, shy girl, that consequently harbours bad things inside, Zeus creates this sheer deception.
Pandora actions released both sickness, tragedy, death and turmoil into the lives of men.
She introduced the distinction between humans and gods, that is mortality.
Jealously, pride and competition drive Zeus to send Pandora to mankind.
She is a symbol of the power struggles between males and the desire to dominate over females.
Pandora's beauty is a mere pawn in the struggle for male dominance.

The Myth of Pandora and Contemporary Society:
· Female beauty does not equal power ·
Female beauty means control and subjugation of the female body, control by men and society's
imposed standards and perceptions of how females should look, act and behave.
As the myth of Pandora implies, female beauty leaves little freedom for men.
It is a story about the curse Zeus created in order to punish men; the curse is a beautiful but
deceitful maiden, fuelled by her own gifted curiosity.

It would be easy to slip away in this darkness.
It is so tempting to let go, I know I could just stay here.
I have released all this hell on to the earth, all this darkness.

There is a life behind the veil - I can feel it yearning to be known..
A feather light touch against heavy black velvet.
And yet I am hesitant to try pulling the curtain away.

Hope.. the one thing that remains in the jar.

Zeus brought me to release violence and sorrow onto the world.
But the world knows peace, and they know love.

Hope, though fragmented and seemingly small against the new agonies released onto the world -
it is still there. Here, to be cradled and nursed.

There is still hope.


* This thought page is written to present Pandora in a more innocent light, compared to the way Hesiod has presented her in his writings. By putting in a 'thoughts' section to the
blog, it gives life to the character. Now, Pandora is given a thought process, emotions, feelings -
she is now given more depth. The thoughts process was put in so that the character becomes a
more life like, she is giving her emotive response to a situation that has occurred, and therefore the
reader begins to learn how Pandora thinks and feels during the current time.
The thought section is, in a sense, a 'Journal' for my character, Pandora.
Ultimately I put this section in, in order to put in the element of characterisation, this section
contributes to the character profile that I have created for Pandora.

I found her.

In the gloom of the dusk, I found her alone, hidden away in the tall grasses of the forest.
She had been curled around herself, growing into the life of her new marriage.
She sang so sweetly.

Ah yes! There it is - there is the jar.

She is so close.

I could have had her do it at that very moment.

It was so hard to refrain- to hold back and savor the excitement and how beautifully
everything was going to fall into place.

Everything was fool proof and the insects of this forest are painfully predictable.
I could hardly keep from writhing in the ecstasy of the thrill.

My possession, crafted by the gods, my cherished little slave...

Mankind will suffer.

Open the jar, Pandora.

Open the jar.

One wonders if I enjoy the torment for I lasted until the crack of dawn before my schemes were set
in motion...


- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


Can you hear them?

The anguished cries of mothers cradling the broken bodies of their dead children...

...or the scream of a father who lost the child he dreamed of.

War.
Famine.
Pestilence
Death


During this gorgeous night, mortal's wails are haunting.

Beautiful, really.

Actions do have consequences.


* This writing is how I'd imagine Zeus to be thinking in relation to Pandora opening
the jar and unleashing what was trapped inside on to the world. Up until this point, mankind did
not know of suffering, hardship and pain. Zeus, fuelled by his desire for revenge after Prometheus
stole fire from the gods, creates Pandora so that she can punish mankind. So I constructed these
two passages to emphasis Zeus's control and dominance over the mortals, as well as his cruelty.