Motif
secret message as vehicle of transgressive desire
secret_message_as_vehicle_of_transgressive_desire
A motif of the Sacred Love and Longing family, within the sub-family Forbidden and Transgressive Love. Every row below is a tagged passage; each rests on a quote in its source text.
1 occurrences
1 traditions
roman
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The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Books VIII-XV EXPLANATION. / EXPLANATION. / EXPLANATION. / EXPLANATION.; lines 3413-3483 confidence: high
Byblis resolves to let the addressee see her passion; she writes on clean wax tablets with an iron pen, repeatedly hesitating, correcting, scratching out, and changing what she has written.
Byblis encodes her request in wax tablets, seals them, sends them secretly through a trusted servant, and the recipient’s partial reading triggers the rejection.
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