The exception to the theme is the title story, The Monster in the Maze. Eventually, Zeus takes pity on him and turns him into a grasshopper. Poor Tithonus gradually shrivels up with age. Unfortunately, she forgets to ask for eternal youth as well. In The Grasshopper Husband, Eos, the dawn goddess, falls in love with the handsome human Tithonus, and begs Zeus to grant him immortality. Sometimes, the gods themselves are tricked. He doesn’t bargain on his beloved daughter being turned to gold, too. When, in The Golden King and the Asses’ Ears, greedy King Midas is offered anything he wants from the god Dionysus, he asks that everything he touches be turned to gold. Interaction with the gods is always tricky. Arachne, in The Web Spinner, is unwise enough to boast that her weaving is better than the goddess Athene’s, and, in revenge, the goddess turns her into a spider, spinning for all eternity. In other tales, it is hubris, that is, setting oneself above the gods, which brings about the metamorphosis. The only way she can escape is when the Earth goddess turns her into a bay tree. For example, The Girl who Grew into a Bay Tree concerns the nymph Daphne who is pursued by the god Apollo. Shape-changing in Greek mythology is an occupational hazard for a human attracting a god or goddess’s attention. Lucy Coats’ third collection of Greek myths has metamorphosis as its main theme. Review by Elizabeth Hawksley Minna McNulty Greeks, Beasts and Heroes: The Monster in the Maze
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