Away From Phallocentrism: How Sappho Rewrites Desire in her Fragments
By Braden Chu (University of Toronto)
Sappho was a musician. Her poetry is lyric, that is, composed to be sung to the lyre. She addresses her lyre in one of her poems (fr. 118) and frequently mentions music, songs and singing. Ancient vase painters depict her with her instrument. [...] All Sappho’s music is lost. (Anne Carson ix)
Lyric itself is fragmentary. Lyric does not assert a thesis, a grand narrative, or a greater purpose; that is the intention of the epic, the essay, or the novel. Rather, the lyric poem is dedicated to that which is decidedly fragmentary; lyric relies on the fleeting nature of its subject matter — emotions and subjectivities — as its object of allure. Present day forms of lyric like the pop song often literally feature fragmentary elements, such as unfinished sentences and repeated words, and they still focus on subject matter that is antithetical to the larger, grander ideas of essays and novels. Present day fragments also frequently talk about the crush. Petty, “less significant” forms of desire have always existed and been depicted in literature, of course, but the terminology of the crush grants it a certain visibility that allows us to reread and reanalyze fragmentary love poetry in ways that were not prioritized in the past. Pop music, in the present day, has certainly been written off as frivolous and unworthy of serious attention.
α. ΕΡΩΣ · DESIRE
When talking about the connection between Sappho and modern pop music, Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Curiosity” comes to mind. This subgenre of pop music, I would argue, is not love poetry but rather crush poetry; the liminal stage between encounter and love — the crush — is prioritized and, for the duration of a song, it becomes more important, more immediate, and more tangible than love. Usually we assume that a crush is transitory, that it’s meant to be a stepping-stone on the journey to love, but the crush-poem makes a crush seem like it can last forever — it makes something eternal out of something ephemeral.
It's not up to you, you know, it's up to me, but
curiosity
will never let me go
(Jepsen “Curiosity” 0:38-0:46)
Curiosity implies a sort of lack — to be curious is to not know, to not have; Carson also says that “the Greek word eros denotes ‘want,’ ‘lack,’ ‘desire for that which is missing.’” (Carson Eros the Bittersweet 10). Curiosity, similarly, relies on lack as the foundation of its meaning. Later on Carson says that “jealousy is a dance in which everyone moves, for it is the instability of the emotional situation that preys upon a jealous lover’s mind” (Carson 14). Curiosity, too, functions with a sort of emotional dynamism — for lack and instability are intimately connected; the burden of the curious admirer is that they must contend with their own thoughts, their own emotions, without the answer of requited love; without resolution, there is no stillness — only the constant back and forth of anxiety.
This is what we talk about when we talk about the “butterflies” that a crush gives us. Not only is the instability of curiosity a result of being in a state of unknowing, it is the lack of an answer that fuels the curiosity. As Narcissus gazes into the water and as he recognizes the ego, his emotional state is stabilized, and the dynamism and lack from which curiosity stems is washed away. There is a perfection in the symmetry of his desire, requited by himself: “unwittingly, he desires himself; he praises, and is himself what he praises, and while he seeks, is sought; equally he kindles love and burns with love” (Ovid Metamorphoses 3.425-6). For the curious admirer, on the other hand, there is no symmetry, and they cannot receive an answer and still remain curious; curiosity necessitates a sort of incompletion or fragmentation in order to be maintained.
“It’s not up to you, you know, it’s up to me” (Jepsen 0:38): here Jepsen touches on that intuition of asymmetry; it is implied that the speaker holds the power to initiate contact, to answer her desire — but she chooses not to, and instead pursues perpetual curiosity, or eternal lack, and so “curiosity / will never let [her] go.” You might call this sort of interaction a parasocial relationship; in fact, for Sarah Iles Johnston, parasocial interaction is a key concept in understanding ancient Greek religion: “we should extend this observation to figures of belief whom we usually call ‘gods,’ ‘heroes,’ ‘angels,’ ‘saints,’ and so on” (Johnston 89). Parasociality is also essential in the development of the crush; Fragment 31 is first and foremost an illustration of parasociality:
He seems to me equal to gods that man
whoever he is who opposite you
sits and listens close
to your sweet speaking
and lovely laughing—oh it
puts the heart in my chest on wings
for when I look at you, even a moment, no speaking
is left in me
(Sappho fr. 31)
Like Jepsen’s “Curiosity,” Fragment 31 illustrates parasociality as an internal, imagined interaction between the speaker and their object of desire. The interactions take place entirely in their own minds — their objects of desire never reply but still, they have the power to affect the speakers in profound ways: for Sappho, “cold sweat holds me and shaking / grips me all, greener than grass / I am and dead—or almost / I seem to me” (fr. 31), while Jepsen begs: “so don’t break me tonight / this is crazy love / and you know I’m gonna follow you home / through the rain / ‘cause I need your love / yes, I need your love” (Jepsen 2:34-2:45). Jepsen never describes this feeling itself as love, however; love is always the object of need.
The ancient Greek word for need — δέομαι (deomai) — is the same verb that is used to express the idea of lack — δέω (deō); the difference between the two verbs is merely one of voice (i.e. “I need” is expressed in the passive voice, while “I lack” is expressed in the active) (LSJ). This fundamental connection between necessity and lack is what lies at the centre of the lyrical crush poem. This need that is defined by absence transforms the conception of lack as nothingness into an idea of lack as fullness; absence is generative, dynamic, and is the source of parasociality that constructs the crush in the speaker’s mind. On Fragment 31, Carson says:
The word 'jealousy' comes from Greek zēlos meaning 'zeal' or 'fervent pursuit.' It is a hot and corrosive spiritual motion arising in fear and fed on resentment. The jealous lover fears that his beloved prefers someone else, and resents any relationship between the beloved and another. This is an emotion concerned with placement and displacement. The jealous lover covets a particular place in the beloved's affection and is full of anxiety that another will take it. [...] No such permutations jeopardize Sappho in fragment 31. Indeed, her case is the reverse. Were she to change places with the man who listens closely, it seems likely she would be entirely destroyed. She does not covet the man's place nor fear usurpation of her own. She directs no resentment at him. She is simply amazed at his intrepidity. This man's role in the poetic structure reflects that of jealousy within Sappho's feelings. Neither is named. It is the beloved's beauty that affects Sappho; the man's presence is somehow necessary to delineation of that emotional event—it remains to be seen how. (Carson, Eros the Bittersweet 14)
I think Carson is right to say that this poem isn’t about jealousy; the speaker, I think, is actually relieved that she can’t directly access her beloved — the parasociality between them is a safety net for her. If even observing the conversation as a third party means that “fire is racing under skin [...] and cold sweat holds me and shaking grips me all,” you can only imagine what would happen if she could interact with the beloved unobstructed. The man simply denotes lack; his role as separator of lover and beloved is crucial in establishing that space of lack which gives rise to curiosity and the crush.
The man, additionally, is not mentioned beyond the first line; in fact, he is as distant and as unknowable as the gods — “ἴσος θέοισιν,” “equal to the gods”. The man, in his lofty divine position, makes space between the speaker and the beloved that is required for curiosity and crush to flourish; he is simultaneously out of the picture and the main subject, and this juxtaposition is the exact thing that gives lack its desire-generating power. Lack is both emptiness and bounty, impossibility and opportunity, because having a crush means contending with the impossibility of love and desiring regardless.
β. ΠΑΡΘΕΝΙΑ · VIRGINITY
Lack can take many forms; virginity, under a phallocentric understanding of sexuality, is conceived of as a lack of the phallus. A phallocentric system of eroticism necessitates that the vulva is emptiness, and that the phallus is fulfillment. The vulva thus calls in or invites the phallus — a cisheteronormative phallocentric model of eroticism presumes that the most meaningful act of eroticism is the insertion of the penis into the vagina, that the phallus and the vulva mutually desire unification, and that eroticism cannot take place otherwise.
As the phallus and the vulva are thought to go hand in hand, so too are lack and resolution, and with this norm it’s hard to think of lack as an end in and of itself. In the phallocentric view, lack is always a transitory state between encounter and resolution, the crush is always a transitory state that precedes love, and virginity is always a transitory state that precedes penetration. Sappho mentions virginity in two of her poems; one of them is Fragment 114:
virginity
virginity
where are you gone leaving me behind?
no longer will I come to you
no longer will I come
(Sappho, fr. 114)
Sappho laments the absence of virginity, and it is possible that this fragment refers to the arrival of puberty and the departure of girlhood; you can definitely look at it as a longing for an innocent childhood that came before adolescence. However, I want to suggest a deeper understanding of virginity; what does it mean to lack virginity, when, under a phallocentric model, virginity itself signifies lack? At first it seems nonsensical to long for nothing; for the phallocentric model virginity is the terra incognita — phallocentrism as an extension of patriarchal power sees the vulva as something to be conquered; violence and subjugation are the underlying foundations of a patriarchal understanding of eroticism. Fragment 114, though, encourages us to investigate a new conception of virginity apart from the phallocentric status quo. Ovid’s Metamorphoses, as well, features a scene that similarly rethinks virginity:
“Straightway [Zeus] put on the features and dress of Diana and said: “Dear maid, best loved of all my followers, where hast thou been hunting to-day?” The maiden [Callisto] arose from her grassy couch and said: “Hail thou, my goddess, greater far than Jove, I say, though he himself should hear.” Jove laughed to hear her, rejoicing to be prized more highly than himself; and he kissed her lips, not modestly, nor as a maiden kisses. When she began to tell him in what woods her hunt had been, he broke in upon her story with an embrace, and by this outrage betrayed himself.”
(Ovid, Metamorphoses 2.425-433)
Oliver says that:
“the relationship between Callisto and Diana constitutes an instance of what Traub would call “femme-femme eroticism” and what, as such takes on a marginal position in cultures where phallic penetration and masculine sovereignty are the central concerns of normative sexual discourse. But those who received the Callisto myth for hundreds of years saw something strongly homoerotic in it. [...] It is important to acknowledge that non-tribadic female homoeroticism has a presence in Roman literature, albeit an often “apparitional” one, and that tribadism was not the only model by means of which Roman writers represented intimate relationships between women.” (Oliver, 307)
So, in suggesting that there is a difference between the kiss that Zeus gives Callisto and what would be a kiss “as a maiden” does, Ovid opens up the possibility for a model of eroticism that is totally different from the phallocentric model that Zeus operates on, one that is founded not on the penetrative, patriarchal paradigm but rather one that sees virginity as a rich site of “femme-femme eroticism,” distinct from penetrative discourse.
So, returning to Sappho, when she cries out “παρθενία, παρθενία” (“virginity, virginity”), it’s really a double entendre. While the loss of virginity, in the phallocentric gaze, is inherent to — even one and the same as — the process of growing up and the incorporation of the cisgender female body into the phallocentric order, for Sappho it is also something to be missed, to be yearned for in its own right. Under a phallocentric framework virginity here is a figure of lack — the lack of the phallus. But in the context of a non-phallocentric femme-femme system of erotics, virginity becomes the object of desire the thing that is separated from the self by lack. The loss of virginity is the loss of the speaker’s experience of non-phallocentric, nonpenetrative, nonpatriarchal eroticism. Fragment 44AA suggests a similar construction of virginity:
]
for goldhaired Phoibos whom Koos’ daughter bore
after she mingled with Kronos’ highnamed son.
But Artemis swore the great oath of the gods:
By your head! forever virgin shall I be
] untamed on solitary mountains
] Come, nod yes to this for my sake!
Virgin deershooter wild one the gods
called her as her name.
] Eros comes nowhere near her
(Sappho, fr. 44AA)
A “forever virgin” challenges the phallocentric idea that virginity must be a transitory state that is always followed by penetrative intercourse. Artemis here displays a palpable desire for virginity that usurps the penetrative desire that is ordained by the phallocentric norm. When Sappho says that “Eros comes nowhere near her,” it is another double entendre. Artemis’ abstinence makes her womb barren; it is in a state of perpetual infertility — an eternal lack that does not really make sense because, for the phallocentric mind the vulva’s purpose, as the signifier of lack, is to be fulfilled by the phallus.
In another sense, however, Eros stays away from Artemis because she has displaced him; in declaring her desire for virginity, Artemis makes virginity into something that is not barren or lacking, but plentiful — when Artemis requests that the gods approve of her decision, it is not only for “[her] sake” but also for her “χάρι[ς]” — for her delight. Virginity is no longer the embodiment of lack, but rather an object of desire that becomes the thing that will fulfill the lack. It is this model of eroticism that threatens the dominion of phallocentric Eros and recentres the virginal as the primary locus of erotic intercourse.
CONCLUSION
Desire is a central tenet of the Sapphic corpus, but it rethinks desire in a way that fundamentally challenges the ordinances of a phallocentric, penetrative status quo. While a phallocentric mode of eroticism posits that lack is a transitory state before love and before penetration, Sappho takes lack and spins an understanding of it that recentres it as an end per se. We can see how Sappho touches on concepts such as the crush, the parasocial, and the virginal in ways that stand apart from normative phallocentric discourse. “I like to think that, the more I stand out of the way, the more Sappho shows through” (Carson x). As Sappho’s poetry is studied more and more, phallocentrism falls apart, because, more often than not, we are really imposing our own phallocentric bias on her work; we’ve assumed that phallocentric eros is the only eros that exists. When we stand out of the way we start to understand a system of erotics that prioritizes the parasocial, the virginal, and the ephemeral.
Bibliography:
Carson, Anne, translator. If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho. Knopf Canada, 2003.
Carson, Anne. (2014). Eros the Bittersweet : An Essay (Course Book). Princeton University Press,. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781400857951
Jepsen, Carly Rae. “Curiosity.” Apple Music. https://music.apple.com/ca/album/curiosity/500815357?i=500815363.
Johnston, Sarah Iles. The Story of Myth. Harvard University Press, 2018. De Gruyter. Accessed 20 December 2023.
Oliver, Jay H. “‘Oscula Iungit Nec Moderata Satis Nec Sic A Virgine Danda’: Ovid's Callisto Episode, Female Homoeroticism, And The Study Of Ancient Sexuality.” The American Journal of Philology, vol. 136, no. 2, 2015, pp. 281-312. JSTOR, https://www.jstor.org/stable/24562759. Accessed 25 June 2023.
Ovid. Metamorphoses, Volume I: Books 1-8. Translated by Frank Justus Miller. Revised by G. P. Goold. Loeb Classical Library 42. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1916.
“δέω,” Henry George Liddell. Robert Scott. A Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1940.
“χάρις,” Henry George Liddell. Robert Scott. A Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford. Clarendon Press. 1940.
Braden Chu graduated from the University of Toronto in 2024, where he majored in English and Classical Civilization, along with a minor in Ancient Greek. During his time as an undergraduate student, he focused on Queer and Transgender theory as they pertain to Ancient Greece and Medieval Literature, and also fostered a great love for authors like Jane Austen, Geoffrey Chaucer, Marie de France, Chrétien de Troyes, Lucian, and of course, Sappho. Outside of academics, Braden is a drag artist and loves to knit.