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| (Mars and Venus, Source:Top of Art) |
Long ago, on Mount Olympus, Vulcan was in his shop, creating the most magnificent weapons and armor in all the world. Many of the gods entered Vulcan's shop to view the prized weapons, but none would look him in the eye. After a few days of the gods acting strangely in his shop, he called for Mercury, the messenger god.
Moments later, Mercury arrived at Vulcan's shop. Mercury was acting the same as all of the other gods. He wouldn't make eye contact with Vulcan and he would try to keep the conversation short. He was very uncomfortable in Vulcan's presence. Vulcan grew angry with this and demanded Mercury to tell him why everybody was acting so strange.
"Well... You see... There have been some rumors going around..." stammered Mercury. Vulcan just stared. "There have been whispers that Mars has been sneaking around with your wife, Venus..." Vulcan was outraged. He started throwing everything in his shop. Mercury had to hold him back before he destroyed the entire shop. "Wait! It is only a rumor! We have no proof that they have been seeing each other!"
"Proof... I'll get proof," growled Vulcan. He started rummaging through his shop and found what he needed. He cleared the space on his work bench and went to work. Mercury stayed with Vulcan to make sure that Vulcan wouldn't destroy his shop anymore. He waited in the corner and messed with some of the trinkets in the shop. Vulcan worked for four days straight. He had created the most magnificent net that Mercury had ever seen. His creation was wonderfully fashioned. It did not look like a net at all which made perfect to hang over the bed without anybody being able to recognize what it was. It was created to fall at the slightest movement.
Mercury took the net into his hands and looked at it in awe. "It's wonderful! It doesn't even look like a net!" Vulcan told Mercury how the net worked and how he would set it up. He and Mercury went to Vulcan's home and set the net above the bed and they hid in the next room. Vulcan was anxiously waiting for the 'culprits' to strike. He paced the room for what felt like hours. Mercury grew nervous watching Vulcan. He didn't know what to expect if the rumors proved to be true.
They waited for hours when they heard a scream. They ran out and saw the net covering Mars and Venus. Vulcan was furious. He started toward Mars and Mars went running. Because Vulcan could not run, he set his dogs on Mars and they chased Mars for miles. They only stopped when they heard Vulcan whistle for them. They had ran Mars out of town. Vulcan and the others could see that Mars hadn't stopped. Chuckling to himself, Mercury asked, "I wonder when he's going to stop running?" Vulcan laughed like crazy.
Eventually, Mars came back to Mount Olympus. He and the other gods now knew not to mess with Vulcan's wife. The other gods laughed like crazy whenever they saw Mars. It would be a long time before they would let it go.
Bibliography:
Story: "Mars and Venus", Ovid's Metamorphoses, translated by Tony Kline (2000).
I just wanted to point something out about how the nature of a character directs the plot of your story: Mars is a very confrontational character in mythology, being the god of war. I'm not sure how I felt about him being run "out of town" by Vulcan. I think he would have perhaps tried to fight Vulcan, or started an argument for how Venus didn't love Vulcan as much as Mars. I just wanted to mention that because I'm a big fan of Mars/Ares stories. Was there a reason you wanted to portray him the way that you did?
ReplyDeleteJust a great twist in that last line of the second to last paragraph in the story! haha. The fact that Vulcan just simply laughed and wondered when Mars would come back to town made me laugh. I would not have had that jocular of a spirit if my husband were cheating on me. I guess the rest of the town knew not to mess with Vulcan’s wife after they watched him chase Mars out of town while shouting profanities.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed the story! I think it was well written. I wish the story was longer so I could see what happened to Venus. Perhaps she knows not to cheat on her husband now as well. I don't like that only Mars was made the bad guy when Venus was at fault as well. But it was still enjoyable, good job!
ReplyDeleteI liked your story. I read the original for this unit so it was fun to read your retelling. I really liked your ending and how Mars was run out of town. I thought that was a fun twist to add to the story. Even though the story length was a bit short and I wish I could have read more the original story itself wasn't very long. Overall I think you did a very good job.
ReplyDeleteFinally I get to read a storytelling about a story that I have also read. While I don't really think it matters where you put your author's note in this case, I thought it was cool that you decided to put it at the beginning of the story. It is a nice change of pace from everyone else, and it gives me all the background information I need to know what is happening in the story.
ReplyDeleteThere are a couple little grammar things you can fix. For example, there are some commas missing (e.g. He and Mercury went to Vulcan's home and set the net above the bed (comma) and they hid in the next room.). Also, much like the example sentence I added, a couple of your sentences were a bit wordy. There are just too many ands for me to handle. But seriously, the story looks great! Good job!
Heather, I thought you did a great job at describing your thought-process in the Author’s Note section. Also, putting the Author’s Note section first is excellent because I might have been lost reading the actual story. As I read through your description of the story, it sounded so familiar. Then I realized that I hadn’t read the story myself, but I had read another person’s rendition of the story a few weeks ago. I hoped that would not skew my opinion of your story, which hopefully it didn’t!
ReplyDeleteHolistically, the way you laid out your paragraphs helped transition the reader from each scene. The first paragraph gave an overview and almost a preface to the actual story. The dialogue you created for Mercury made me feel his emotion as he talked.
In the first part of the dialogue, you wrote this sentence: "There have been whispers that Mars has been sneaking around with your wife, Venus..." It made it seem like Vulcan had multiple wives. If he did, I would suggest writing that in the Author’s Note section.
Great job!
I really liked the way you told the story, Heather. With the way gods usually are in mythology, i.e., angry, vengeful, etc., I thought your story made a lot more sense with Vulcan getting angry rather than laughing like in the original. The writing was clear and easy to read, and the characters were well-defined. I also really like the layout of your blog!
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that I would not have been as level-headed about my spouse having an affair as Vulcan was in the original story. However, I believe such affairs were common among the Greek and Roman gods. Zeus had numerous affairs with human and non-human women and sired many illegitimate, demi-god children. That being said, I really enjoyed your retelling of this Roman myth. It certainly has a much more realistic reaction by a character that literally caught his wife cheating on him but it still kept the humor of the original story at the end. So his reaction was more realistic without being an overreaction (which, admittedly, is also a common way people react to these situations). Although he was angry with Venus and Mars, other than scaring the latter out of town for a while, Vulcan did not lash out at his wife or continually pursue Mars to punish him. Overall, your story was easy to read, engaging, and entertaining.
ReplyDeleteHi Heather! This was a really great story overall. I really liked that you changed the outcome of this love triangle. I have always had disdain for the original story as well. It was great to see Vulcan have the upper hand in this story. I have always hated how he did not get any justice after finding out that his wife was having an affair with Mars. You did a great job of making Vulcan a more competent character. His net actually serving a useful purpose was a great touch as well. It was great to see him catch Mars and embarrass him in the process. Vulcan having hounds chase Mars was another great addition since he has his physical disabilities. You did a great job of formatting your story into smaller paragraphs; it helped create a smooth flow from paragraph to paragraph. I can not wait to read more of your stories!
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