Article December 29, 2003 Issue

Life–transforming JOURNEYS

By Margaret Rogers

Recently I saw my niece perform in a high-school production of Mary Zimmerman's adaptation of Ovid's Metamorphoses. It was surprisingly moving to hear these students in togas and spandex retelling ancient myths about the journey from enslaving material desires to larger, more unselfish views of life.

There was King Midas, for instance, whose lust for gold turned his daughter into a lifeless statue. His only hope to restore her was to journey to the ends of the earth to find a certain pool in which to wash his hands. Then there was Ceyx, the happily married man who left the ease of home to go to sea. If he didn't go, he feared, he would turn into a "domesticated, diminished lap dog."

As classmates in the audience giggled at some of the most poignant moments, I wondered to what extent 21st-century teenagers could grasp the meaning of these journeys. But the actors' sincerity persuaded me that the universal truth of lives transformed through hard experience is recognized not only across cultures and eras, but across generations as well.