Perfectionism (psychology)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Trimming grass to an exact length

Perfectionism, in psychology, is a broad personality trait characterized by a person's concern with striving for flawlessness and perfection and is accompanied by critical self-evaluations and concerns regarding others' evaluations. It is best conceptualized as a multidimensional and multilayered personality characteristic, and initially some psychologists thought that there were many positive and negative aspects. Perfectionism drives people to be concerned with achieving unattainable ideals or unrealistic goals that often lead to many forms of adjustment problems such as depression, anxiety, OCD, OCPD and low self-esteem. These adjustment problems often lead to suicidal thoughts and tendencies and influence or invite other psychological, physical, social, and further achievement problems in children, adolescents, and adults. Although perfectionist sights can reduce stress, anxiety, and panic, recent data, compiled by British psychologists Thomas Curran and Andrew Hill, show that perfectionistic tendencies are on the rise among recent generations of young people.

Definition

Stanley Kubrick, an American filmmaker, was both famous and notorious about his perfectionism while making movies.

Perfectionists strain compulsively and unceasingly toward unattainable goals. They measure their self-worth by productivity and accomplishment that some tendencies even lead to distraction from other areas of life. Perfectionists pressure themselves to achieve unrealistic goals that inevitably lead to disappointment. If the sole focus pertains to everything that needs to be fixed in order to be considered perfect, then it's hard to know when they will truly be happy with themselves. Perfectionists especially, tend to be harsh critics of themselves, their work, and when they fail to meet their expectations.

Normal vs. neurotic

D. E. Hamachek in 1978 argued for two contrasting types of perfectionism, classifying people as tending towards normal perfectionism or neurotic perfectionism. Normal perfectionists are more inclined to pursue perfection without compromising their self-esteem, and derive pleasure from their efforts. Neurotic perfectionists are prone to strive for unrealistic goals and feel dissatisfied when they cannot reach them. Hamachek offers several strategies that have been proven useful in helping people change from maladaptive towards healthier behavior. Contemporary research supports the idea that these two basic aspects of perfectionistic behavior, as well as other dimensions such as "nonperfectionism", can be differentiated. They have been labeled differently, and are sometimes referred to as positive striving and maladaptive evaluation concerns, active and passive perfectionism, positive and negative perfectionism, and adaptive and maladaptive perfectionism. Although there is a general perfectionism that affects all realms of life, some researchers contend that levels of perfectionism are significantly different across different domains (i.e. work, academic, sport, interpersonal relationships, home life).

However, it is debated whether perfectionism can be adaptive and has positive aspects. In fact, recent research suggests that what is termed "adaptive perfectionism" is associated with suicidal thinking, depression, eating disorders, poor health and early mortality. Some researchers argue that, certainly, a construct that causes people to think more about suicide, and places them at risk for depression, eating disorders, poor health, and early mortality is far from one that is adaptive. In fact, there is no empirical support for the assertion that a healthy form of perfectionism exists. Instead, what has been termed adaptive perfectionism has little relation to perfectionism and has more to do with striving for excellence. A relentless striving for unreasonably high expectations that are rarely achieved and an avoidance of imperfection at all costs is what distinguishes perfectionism from excellencism. Perfectionism therefore extends beyond adaptive strivings and is not a synonym for excellence or conscientiousness. Numerous researchers advise against using the term "adaptive perfectionism" as it is inappropriate for a personality trait.

There is some literature that supports the usage of adaptive perfectionism when used in comparison with maladaptive perfectionism. Differences were found when these two dimensions of perfectionism were paired with the Big Five personality traits. For example, adaptive perfectionism was found to predict openness, conscientiousness, and extraversion. While maladaptive perfectionism was found to predict neuroticism.

Strivings vs. concerns

J. Stoeber and K. Otto suggested in a narrative review that perfectionism consists of two main dimensions: perfectionistic strivings and perfectionistic concerns. Perfectionistic strivings are associated with positive aspects of perfectionism; perfectionistic concerns are associated with negative aspects (see below).

• Healthy perfectionists score high in perfectionistic strivings and low in perfectionistic concerns.
• Unhealthy perfectionists score high in both strivings and concerns.
• Non-perfectionists show low levels of perfectionistic strivings.

Prompted by earlier research providing empirical evidence that perfectionism could be associated with positive aspects (specifically perfectionistic strivings), they challenged the widespread belief that perfectionism is only detrimental through a non-empirical narrative review. They claimed that people with high levels of perfectionistic strivings and low levels of perfectionist concerns demonstrated more self-esteem, agreeableness, academic success and social interaction. This type of perfectionist also showed fewer psychological and somatic issues typically associated with perfectionism, namely depression, anxiety and maladaptive coping styles. However, empirical meta-analytic reviews have failed to replicate these claims.

The Comprehensive Model of Perfectionistic Behaviour

The Comprehensive Model of Perfectionism (CMPB) operationalizes perfectionism as a multilevel and multidimensional personality style that contains a trait level, a self-presentational level, and a cognitive level.

The stable, dispositional, trait-like level of this model includes self-oriented perfectionism and socially prescribed perfectionism, as well as other-oriented perfectionism. Self-oriented perfectionism is characterized by requiring perfection from oneself, while socially prescribed perfectionism refers to the need to obtain acceptance by fulfilling actual or perceived expectations imposed by others. In contrast, other-oriented perfectionists direct their perfectionism towards external sources and are preoccupied with expecting perfection from others.

The second component of the Comprehensive Model of Perfectionism contains the interpersonal expression of perfection through impression management and self-monitoring. This relational component reflects the need to appear, rather than be, perfect via the promotion of perfection and the concealment of imperfection. Like the perfectionism traits, these components are also multifaceted. One of its facets, perfectionistic self-promotion, refers to the expression of perfectionism by actively presenting a flawless, though often false, image of oneself. Another interpersonal facet, nondisplay of imperfection, is the expression of perfectionism through concealment of attributes or behaviours that may be deemed as imperfect, such as making mistakes in front of others. Similarly, nondisclosure of imperfection is also associated with concealment of self-aspects, but focuses on avoiding verbal disclosure of imperfections, such as not revealing personal information that may be judged negatively or admitting failures. All three facets are used as an (alleged) protection from feelings of low self-worth and possible rejection.

The self-relational/intrapersonal component of the CMPB refers to ruminative, perfectionistic thinking and is characterized by cognitive processes concerning the need for perfection, as well as self-recriminations and a focus on the discrepancy between one's actual and ideal self. This component therefore entails the information-processing related to perfectionism. These three components of the Comprehensive Model of Perfectionism are independent but interrelated, and can be present in individuals in heterogeneous, idiosyncratic patterns with different combinations.

The Perfectionism Social Disconnection Model

The Perfectionism Social Disconnection Model (PSDM) is a dynamic-relational model describing perfectionism and its consequences in an interpersonal context. This model asserts that perfectionism, via an interpersonal style characterized by aloofness and inauthenticity, leads to the social disconnection and rejection perfectionists aim to avoid. According to the PSDM, perfectionism develops in an early interpersonal context through asynchrony between child and caregiver, when there is a lack of attunement ("fit") between the temperament of the child and caregiver responses, leading to unfulfilled needs for belonging, acceptance, and self-esteem. This creates a relational schema of others as critical, and rejecting, and an internal model of oneself as defective which makes perfectionists highly sensitive to the potential for judgment and rejection in interpersonal encounters. Consequently, according to the PSDM, perfectionism serves an interpersonal purpose and the person relies on it as a means of fulfilling the needs for belonging and self-esteem. In an attempt to gain a sense of acceptance and connection while avoiding possible judgment and rejection, these individuals aim to be or appear flawless. Paradoxically, this often rigid, aloof, and self-concealing relational style increases the potential for alienation and rejection and can lead to social disconnection. In this way, the very behaviours that perfectionists consider as purportedly fulfilling unmet relational needs exert a detrimental influence on interpersonal encounters, so the alleged solution to social disconnection actually generates it. The PSDM also provides a link between perfectionism and its maladaptive consequences since the estrangement from oneself and others generated by perfectionism is associated with a number of adverse outcomes, such as interpersonal difficulties, depression, and suicide risk.

Measurement

Multidimensional perfectionism scale (MPS)

Randy O. Frost et al. (1990) developed a multidimensional perfectionism scale (now known as the "Frost Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale", FMPS) with six dimensions:

1. Concern over making mistakes
2. High personal standards (striving for excellence)
3. The perception of high parental expectations
4. The perception of high parental criticism
5. The doubting of the quality of one's actions, and
6. A preference for order and organization.

Hewitt & Flett (1991) devised another "multidimensional perfectionism scale", a 45-item measure that rates three aspects of perfectionistic self-presentation:

1. Self-oriented perfectionism
2. Other-oriented perfectionism, and
3. Socially prescribed perfectionism.

Self-oriented perfectionism refers to having unrealistic expectations and standards for oneself that lead to perfectionistic motivation. Other-oriented perfectionism is having unrealistic expectations and standards for others that in turn pressure them to have perfectionistic motivations of their own. Socially prescribed perfectionism is characterized by developing perfectionistic motivations due actual or perceived high expectations of significant others. Parents who push their children to be successful in certain endeavors (such as athletics or academics) provide an example of what often causes this type of perfectionism, as the children feel that they must meet their parents' lofty expectations.

A similarity has been pointed out among Frost's distinction between setting high standards for oneself and the level of concern over making mistakes in performance (the two most important dimensions of the FMPS) and Hewitt & Flett's distinction between self-oriented versus socially prescribed perfectionism.

Perfectionistic Self-Presentation Scale (PSPS)

Hewitt et al. (2003) developed the Perfectionistic Self-Presentation Scale (PSPS), a 27-item self-report measure assessing the three interpersonal, expressive components of the Comprehensive Model of Perfectionism. It includes three subscales pertaining to perfectionistic self-presentation, i.e., to the need to appear flawless:

1. Perfectionistic self-promotion

2. Nonsdisplay of imperfection

3. Nondisclosure of imperfection

The PSPS measures the expression (the process) of the trait of perfectionism and is directly linked to the perfectionism traits, particularly self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism. Additionally, the dimensions of the PSPS correlate with measures of psychological distress, such as anxiety symptoms, indicating that perfectionistic self-presentation is a maladaptive, defensive tendency.

Perfectionism Cognitions Inventory (PCI)

The Perfectionism Cognitions Inventory (PCI) developed by Flett, Hewitt, Blankstein, and Gray (1998) is a 25-item inventory measuring the self-relational, cognitive component of perfectionism in the form of automatic thoughts about attaining perfection. It includes statements about perfectionism-themed cognitions, such as references to social comparison and awareness of being imperfect and failing to attain high expectations. Rather than emphasizing trait-like statements, the PCI is characterized by state-like statements, focusing on the varying situational and temporal contexts that can lead to different perfectionistic thoughts.

The PCI is associated with the presence of negative automatic thoughts and scoring high on this measure has been linked to a high degree of self-criticism, self-blame and failure perseveration.

Almost perfect scale-revised (APS-R)

Slaney and his colleagues (1996) developed the Almost Perfect Scale-Revised (APS-R). People are classified based on their scores for three measures:

1. High Standards
2. Order, and
3. Discrepancy

Discrepancy refers to the belief that personal high standards are not being met, which is the defining negative aspect of perfectionism. Those with high scores in what the APS-R considers maladaptive perfectionism typically yield the highest social stress and anxiety scores, reflecting their feelings of inadequacy and low self-esteem. However, whether high standards as measured by APS-R actually assess perfectionism is debatable.

In general, the APS-R is a relatively easy instrument to administer, and can be used to identify perfectionist adolescents as well as adults, though it has yet to be proven useful for children. Two other forms of the APS-R measure perfectionism directed towards intimate partners (Dyadic Almost Perfect Scale) and perceived perfectionism from one's family (Family Almost Perfect Scale).

The validity of the APS-R has been challenged. Namely, some researchers maintain that high standards are not necessarily perfectionistic standards. For instance, it has been shown that when the APS-R is re-worded to reflect more perfectionistic terms, outcomes differ in comparison to the original wording of this scale. Specifically, only the reworded, more perfectionistic scale is associated with maladjustment, such as depression and anxiety, while only the original scale is related to adaptive outcomes. This suggests that what is labelled as "adaptive perfectionism" in the original APS-R may simply reflect high standards. Moreover, a number of researchers view the relevance of discrepancy to the perfectionism literature as suspect given the number of negative mood terms included. Including negative mood terms in items, such as the discrepancy subscale, greatly increases the likelihood for discovering a relation between perfectionism and neuroticism which may be simply due to wording rather than a perfectionism-neuroticism link.

Physical appearance perfectionism scale (PAPS)

The Physical Appearance Perfectionism Scale (PAPS) explains a particular type of perfectionism: the desire for a perfect physical appearance. The PAPS is a multidimensional assessment of physical appearance perfectionism that provides the most insight when the sub-scales are evaluated separately.

In general, the PAPS allows researchers to determine participants' body image and self-conceptions of their looks, which is critical in present times when so much attention is paid to attractiveness and obtaining the ideal appearance. The two sub-scales it uses to assess appearance concerns are:

1. Worry About Imperfection, and
2. Hope For Perfection.

Those that obtain high "Worry About Imperfection" scores are usually greatly concerned with attaining perfection, physical appearance, and body control behavior. They also demonstrate low positive self-perceptions of their appearance, whereas those scoring highly on "Hope for Perfection" yielded high positive self-perceptions. Hope For Perfection also corresponded with impression management behaviors and striving for ambitious goals.

In summary, Worry About Imperfection relates to negative aspects of appearance perfectionism, while Hope For Perfection relates to positive aspects. One limitation of using the PAPS is the lack of psychological literature evaluating its validity.

Psychological implications

Perfectionists tend to dissociate themselves from their flaws or what they believe are flaws (such as negative emotions) and can become hypocritical and hypercritical of others, seeking the illusion of virtue to hide their own vices.

Researchers have begun to investigate the role of perfectionism in various mental disorders such as depression, anxiety, eating disorders and personality disorders, as well as suicide. Each disorder is associated with varying levels of the three subscales on the Multidimensional Perfectionism Scale. For instance, socially prescribed perfectionism in young women has been associated with greater body-image dissatisfaction and avoidance of social situations that focus on weight and physical appearance.

The relationship that exists between perfectionistic tendencies and methods of coping with stress has also been examined in some detail. Those who displayed tendencies associated with perfectionism, such as rumination over past events or fixation on mistakes, tended to utilize more passive or avoidance coping. They also tended to utilize self-criticism as a coping method. This is consistent with theories that conceptualize self-criticism as a central element of perfectionism.

Consequences

Perfectionism can be damaging. It can take the form of procrastination when used to postpone tasks and self-deprecation when used to excuse poor performance or to seek sympathy and affirmation from other people. These, together or separate, are self-handicapping strategies perfectionists may use to protect their sense of self-competence. In general, perfectionists feel constant pressure to meet their high expectations, which creates cognitive dissonance when expectations cannot be met. Perfectionism has been associated with numerous other psychological and physiological complications. Moreover, perfectionism may result in alienation and social disconnection via certain rigid interpersonal patterns common to perfectionistic individuals.

Suicide

In 2017, suicide was the second most common cause of overall mortality among adolescents in the United States. Men were 3.54 times more likely to commit suicide than women and white males accounted for 69.67 percent of suicide. Men ages 45–85 were 20 percent more likely to commit suicide than adolescents and young adults. The numbers vary annually as suicide is underreported.

Perfectionism is increasingly considered to be a risk factor for suicide. The tendency of perfectionists to have excessively high expectations of self and to be self-critical when their efforts do not meet the expectations they have established, combined with their tendency to present a public image of flawlessness increases their risk of suicidal ideation while decreasing the likelihood of seeking help when it is needed. Perfectionism is one of many suicide predictors that affect individuals negatively via pressure to fulfill other- or self-generated high expectations, feeling incapable of living up to them, and social disconnection.

Importantly, the relation between suicidality and perfectionism depends on the particular perfectionism dimensions. Perfectionistic strivings are associated with suicidal ideation while perfectionistic concerns are predictive of both suicidal ideation and attempting suicide. Additionally, socially prescribed perfectionism, a type of perfectionistic concern, was found to be associated with both baseline and long-term suicidal ideation. This implies that perfectionistic concerns, such as socially prescribed perfectionism, are related to more pernicious outcomes in the context of suicide.

Anorexia nervosa

Perfectionism has been linked with anorexia nervosa in research for decades. Researchers in 1949 described the behavior of the average anorexic person as being "rigid" and "hyperconscious", observing also a tendency to "neatness, meticulosity, and a mulish stubbornness not amenable to reason [which] make her a rank perfectionist". Perfectionism is an enduring characteristic in the biographies of anorexics. It is present before the onset of the eating disorder, generally in childhood, during the illness, and also, after remission. The incessant striving for thinness among anorexics is itself a manifestation of this personality style, of an insistence upon meeting unattainably high standards of performance.

Because of its chronicity, those with eating disorders also display perfectionistic tendencies in other domains of life than dieting and weight control. Over-achievement at school, for example, has been observed among anorexics, as a result of their overly industrious behavior.

The level of perfectionism was found to have an influence on individual's long-term recovery of anorexia. Those who scored a lower range of perfectionism were able to have a faster recovery rate than patients who scored high in perfectionism.

General applications

Perfectionism often shows up in performance at work or school, neatness and aesthetics, organization, writing, speaking, physical appearance, and health and personal cleanliness. In the workplace, perfectionism is often marked by low productivity and missed deadlines as people lose time and energy by paying attention to irrelevant details of their tasks, ranging from major projects to mundane daily activities. This can lead to depression, social alienation, and a greater risk of workplace "accidents". Adderholdt-Elliot (1989) describes five characteristics of perfectionist students and teachers which contribute to underachievement: procrastination, fear of failure, an "all-or-nothing" mindset, paralyzed perfectionism, and workaholism.

According to C. Allen, in intimate relationships, unrealistic expectations can cause significant dissatisfaction for both partners. Greenspon lists behaviors, thoughts, and feelings that typically characterize perfectionism. Perfectionists will not be content with their work until it meets their standards, which can make perfectionists less efficient in finishing projects, and they therefore will struggle to meet deadlines.

In a different occupational context, athletes may develop perfectionist tendencies. Optimal physical and mental performance is critical for professional athletes, which are aspects that closely relate to perfectionism. Although perfectionist athletes strive to succeed, they can be limited by their intense fear of failure and therefore not exert themselves fully or feel overly personally responsible for a loss. Because their success is frequently measured by a score or statistics, perfectionist athletes may feel excessive pressure to succeed.

Medical complications

Perfectionism is a risk factor for obsessive–compulsive disorder, obsessive–compulsive personality disorder, eating disorders, social anxiety, body dysmorphic disorder, workaholism, self harm and suicide, substance abuse, and clinical depression as well as physical problems like heart disease. In addition, studies have found that people with perfectionism have a higher mortality rate than those without perfectionism. A possible reason for this is the additional stress and worry that accompanies the irrational belief that everything should be perfect.

Therapists attempt to tackle the negative thinking that surrounds perfectionism, in particular the "all-or-nothing" thinking in which the client believes that an achievement is either perfect or useless. They encourage clients to set realistic goals and to face their fear of failure.

Since perfectionism is a self-esteem issue based on emotional convictions about what one must do to be acceptable as a person, negative thinking is most successfully addressed in the context of a recovery process which directly addresses these convictions.

Impact on psychological treatment

A number of studies suggest that perfectionism can limit the effectiveness of psychotherapy. Namely, perfectionism impedes treatment success across seeking, maintaining, and ultimately benefiting from help. Unfavourable attitudes and negative beliefs towards seeking help present a barrier to treatment among perfectionists. When they do attend treatment, perfectionists, especially those high in perfectionistic self-presentation, are more likely to experience initial clinical interviews as anxiety-provoking and appraise their performance as inadequate. Perfectionism can also affect treatment adherence. For example, a study demonstrated that other-oriented perfectionism is associated with treatment attrition. Further, treatment effectiveness may be compromised by perfectionists' tendency to present an image of flawlessness and avoid self-disclosures because of an excessive sensitivity to judgment and rejection. Most importantly, treatment success may be negatively impacted due to the interpersonal disconnection prevalent among perfectionists which is associated with a failure to develop or strengthen a positive therapeutic alliance.

Narcissism

According to Arnold Cooper, narcissism can be considered as a self-perceived form of perfectionism – "an insistence on perfection in the idealized self-object and the limitless power of the grandiose self. These are rooted in traumatic injuries to the grandiose self." In support, research suggests some forms of perfectionism are associated with grandiose narcissism while others are associated with vulnerable narcissism. Similar to perfectionism, narcissism, particularly in its vulnerable form, is associated with a contingent self-worth and a need for validation. Narcissists often are pseudo-perfectionists and require being the center of attention and create situations where they will receive attention. This attempt at being perfect is cohesive with the narcissist's grandiose self-image. Behind such perfectionism, self psychology would see earlier traumatic injuries to the grandiose self.

Vulnerable narcissism is mostly covert and is characterized by a need for other people's recognition (e.g., validation or admiration) and a sense of self-worth that is contingent upon this recognition. If a perceived state of perfection is not attained and recognition is not forthcoming or doubtful, this can result in a lowered self-worth, social withdrawal and avoidance behaviours as the individual fear that he or she will lose validation and admiration.

Personality traits

Perfectionism is one of Raymond Cattell's 16 Personality Factors. According to this construct, people who are organized, compulsive, self-disciplined, socially precise, exacting will power, controlled, and self-sentimental are perfectionists. In the Big Five personality traits, perfectionism is an extreme manifestation of conscientiousness and can provoke increasing neuroticism as the perfectionist's expectations are not met.

Perfectionistic concerns are more similar to neuroticism while perfectionistic strivings are more similar to conscientiousness.

Children and adolescents

The prevalence of perfectionism is high in children and adolescents, with estimates ranging from 25% to 30%. Similar to adults, perfectionism in young people is a core vulnerability factor for a variety of negative outcomes, such as depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, and obsessive-compulsive disorder. In order to measure the two trait components of self-oriented and socially prescribed perfectionism in this age group, the widely used Child-Adolescent Perfectionism Scale (CAPS) can be useful.

Treatments

Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT)

Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) has been shown to successfully help perfectionists in reducing social anxiety, public self-consciousness, obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) behaviors, and perfectionism. By using this approach, a person can begin to recognize their irrational thinking and find an alternative way to approach situations.

Psychodynamic/interpersonal therapy (PI)

Consistent with the development and expression of perfectionism within an interpersonal context, this treatment focuses on the dynamic-relational basis of perfectionism. Rather than targeting perfectionistic behaviour directly and aiming merely for symptom reduction, dynamic-relational therapy is characterized by a focus on the maladaptive relational patterns and interpersonal dynamics underlying and maintaining perfectionism. According to research by Hewitt et al. (2015), this form of treatment is associated with long-lasting reductions in both perfectionism and associated distress.

Exposure and response prevention (ERP)

Exposure and response prevention (ERP) is also employed by psychologists in the treatment of obsessive-compulsive symptoms, including perfectionism. This form of therapy is premised on encouraging individuals to stop their perfectionistic behavior in tasks that they would normally pursue toward perfection. Over time, anxiety may decrease as the person finds that there are no major consequences of completing particular tasks imperfectly.

Acceptance-based behavior therapy (ABBT)

Acceptance-based behavior therapy (ABBT) was demonstrated to have a major contribution to treat perfectionism from increasing awareness, increasing acceptance, and living a meaningful life. These practices were shown to help reduce anxiety, depression, and social phobia. This approach has been shown to be effective six months post to the therapy.

Pandora

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Pandora by John William Waterhouse, 1896

In Greek mythology, Pandora (Greek: Πανδώρα, derived from πᾶν, pān, i.e. "all" and δῶρον, dōron, i.e. "gift", thus "the all-endowed", "all-gifted" or "all-giving") was the first human woman created by Hephaestus on the instructions of Zeus. As Hesiod related it, each god cooperated by giving her unique gifts. Her other name—inscribed against her figure on a white-ground kylix in the British Museum—is Anesidora (Ancient Greek: Ἀνησιδώρα), "she who sends up gifts" (up implying "from below" within the earth).

The Pandora myth is a kind of theodicy, addressing the question of why there is evil in the world, according to which, Pandora opened a jar (pithos) (commonly referred to as "Pandora's box") releasing all the evils of humanity. It has been argued that Hesiod's interpretation of Pandora's story went on to influence both Jewish and Christian theology and so perpetuated her bad reputation into the Renaissance. Later poets, dramatists, painters and sculptors made her their subject.

Hesiod

Hesiod, both in his Theogony (briefly, without naming Pandora outright, line 570) and in Works and Days, gives the earliest version of the Pandora story.

Theogony

The Pandora myth first appeared in lines 560–612 of Hesiod's poem in epic meter, the Theogony (c. 8th–7th centuries BC), without ever giving the woman a name. After humans received the stolen gift of fire from Prometheus, an angry Zeus decides to give humanity a punishing gift to compensate for the boon they had been given. He commands Hephaestus to mold from earth the first woman, a "beautiful evil" whose descendants would torment the human race. After Hephaestus does so, Athena dresses her in a silvery gown, an embroidered veil, garlands and an ornate crown of silver. This woman goes unnamed in the Theogony, but is presumably Pandora, whose myth Hesiod revisited in Works and Days. When she first appears before gods and mortals, "wonder seized them" as they looked upon her. But she was "sheer guile, not to be withstood by men." Hesiod elaborates (590–93):

For from her is the race of women and female kind: of her is the deadly race and tribe of women who live amongst mortal men to their great trouble, no helpmeets in hateful poverty, but only in wealth.

Hesiod goes on to lament that men who try to avoid the evil of women by avoiding marriage will fare no better (604–7):

[He] reaches deadly old age without anyone to tend his years, and though he at least has no lack of livelihood while he lives, yet, when he is dead, his kinsfolk divide his possessions amongst them.

Hesiod concedes that occasionally a man finds a good wife, but still (609) "evil contends with good."

Works and Days

Pandora holding a pithos, with Hermes, and a seated Prometheus, Prometheus, Mercury, and Pandora, 1814, by Josef Abel

The more famous version of the Pandora myth comes from another of Hesiod's poems, Works and Days. In this version of the myth (lines 60–105), Hesiod expands upon her origin and moreover widens the scope of the misery she inflicts on humanity. As before, she is created by Hephaestus, but now more gods contribute to her completion (63–82): Athena taught her needlework and weaving (63–4); Aphrodite "shed grace upon her head and cruel longing and cares that weary the limbs" (65–6); Hermes gave her "a shameless mind and a deceitful nature" (67–8); Hermes also gave her the power of speech, putting in her "lies and crafty words" (77–80); Athena then clothed her (72); next Persuasion and the Charites adorned her with necklaces and other finery (72–4); the Horae adorned her with a garland crown (75). Finally, Hermes gives this woman a name: "Pandora [i.e. "All-Gift"], because all they who dwelt on Olympus gave each a gift, a plague to men who eat bread" (81–2).

In this retelling of her story, Pandora's deceitful feminine nature becomes the least of humanity's worries. For she brings with her a jar (which, due to textual corruption in the sixteenth century, came to be called a box) containing "countless plagues" (100). Prometheus had (fearing further reprisals) warned his brother Epimetheus not to accept any gifts from Zeus. But Epimetheus did not listen; he accepted Pandora, who promptly scattered the contents of her jar. As a result, Hesiod tells us, the earth and sea are "full of evils" (101). One item, however, did not escape the jar (96–9):

Only Hope remained there in an unbreakable home within under the rim of the great jar, and did not fly out at the door; for ere that, the lid of the jar stopped her, by the will of Aegis-holding Zeus who gathers the clouds.

Hesiod does not say why hope (elpis) remained in the jar. Hesiod closes with a moral (105): there is "no way to escape the will of Zeus."

Hesiod also outlines how the end of man's Golden Age (an all-male society of immortals who were reverent to the gods, worked hard, and ate from abundant groves of fruit) was brought on by Prometheus. When he stole Fire from Mt. Olympus and gave it to mortal man, Zeus punished the technologically advanced society by creating a woman. Thus, Pandora was created and given the jar (mistranslated as 'box') which releases all evils upon man.

Archaic and Classic Greek literature seem to make little further mention of Pandora, but mythographers later filled in minor details or added postscripts to Hesiod's account. For example, the Bibliotheca and Hyginus each make explicit what might be latent in the Hesiodic text: Epimetheus married Pandora. They each add that the couple had a daughter, Pyrrha, who married Deucalion and survived the deluge with him. However, the Hesiodic Catalogue of Women, fragment #5, had made a "Pandora" one of the daughters of Deucalion, and the mother of Graecus by Zeus. In the 15th-century AD an attempt was made to conjoin pagan and scriptural narrative by the monk Annio da Viterbo, who claimed to have found an account by the ancient Chaldean historian Berossus in which "Pandora" was named as a daughter-in-law of Noah in the alternative Flood narrative.

Pithos into "box"

Main article: Pandora's box

 

A pithos from Crete, c. 675 BC (Louvre Museum)

The mistranslation of pithos, a large storage jar, as "box" is usually attributed to the sixteenth century humanist Erasmus of Rotterdam when he translated Hesiod's tale of Pandora into Latin. Hesiod's pithos refers to a large storage jar, often half-buried in the ground, used for wine, oil or grain. It can also refer to a funerary jar. Erasmus, however, translated pithos into the Latin word pyxis, meaning "box". The phrase "Pandora's box" has endured ever since.

Difficulties of interpretation

Historic interpretations of the Pandora figure are rich enough to have offered Dora and Erwin Panofsky scope for monographic treatment. M. L. West writes that the story of Pandora and her jar is from a pre-Hesiodic myth, and that this explains the confusion and problems with Hesiod's version and its inconclusiveness. He writes that in earlier myths, Pandora was married to Prometheus, and cites the ancient Hesiodic Catalogue of Women as preserving this older tradition, and that the jar may have at one point contained only good things for humanity. He also writes that it may have been that Epimetheus and Pandora and their roles were transposed in the pre-Hesiodic myths, a "mythic inversion". He remarks that there is a curious correlation between Pandora being made out of earth in Hesiod's story, to what is in the Bibliotheca that Prometheus created man from water and earth. Hesiod's myth of Pandora's jar, then, could be an amalgam of many variant early myths.

The meaning of Pandora's name, according to the myth provided in Works and Days, is "all-gifted". However, according to others, Pandora more properly means "all-giving". Certain vase paintings dated to the 5th century BC likewise indicate that the pre-Hesiodic myth of the goddess Pandora endured for centuries after the time of Hesiod. An alternative name for Pandora attested on a white-ground kylix (ca. 460 BC) is Anesidora, which similarly means "she who sends up gifts." This vase painting clearly depicts Hephaestus and Athena putting the finishing touches on the first woman, as in the Theogony. Written above this figure (a convention in Greek vase painting) is the name Anesidora. More commonly, however, the epithet anesidora is applied to Gaea or Demeter. In view of such evidence, William E. Phipps has pointed out, "Classics scholars suggest that Hesiod reversed the meaning of the name of an earth goddess called Pandora (all-giving) or Anesidora (one-who-sends-up-gifts). Vase paintings and literary texts give evidence of Pandora as a mother earth figure who was worshipped by some Greeks. The main English commentary on Works and Days states that Hesiod shows no awareness [of this]."

Hermes carrying Pandora down from Mount Olympus, a medal based on a design by John Flaxman

Jane Ellen Harrison also turned to the repertory of vase-painters to shed light on aspects of myth that were left unaddressed or disguised in literature. On a fifth-century amphora in the Ashmolean Museum (her fig.71) the half-figure of Pandora emerges from the ground, her arms upraised in the epiphany gesture, to greet Epimetheus. A winged ker with a fillet hovers overhead: "Pandora rises from the earth; she is the Earth, giver of all gifts," Harrison observes. Over time this "all-giving" goddess somehow devolved into an "all-gifted" mortal woman. A.H. Smith, however, noted that in Hesiod's account Athena and the Seasons brought wreaths of grass and spring flowers to Pandora, indicating that Hesiod was conscious of Pandora's original "all-giving" function. For Harrison, therefore, Hesiod's story provides "evidence of a shift from matriarchy to patriarchy in Greek culture. As the life-bringing goddess Pandora is eclipsed, the death-bringing human Pandora arises." Thus, Harrison concludes "in the patriarchal mythology of Hesiod her great figure is strangely changed and diminished. She is no longer Earth-Born, but the creature, the handiwork of Olympian Zeus." (Harrison 1922:284). Robert Graves, quoting Harrison, asserts of the Hesiodic episode that "Pandora is not a genuine myth, but an anti-feminist fable, probably of his own invention." H.J. Rose wrote that the myth of Pandora is decidedly more illiberal than that of epic in that it makes Pandora the origin of all of Man's woes with her being the exemplification of the bad wife.

The Hesiodic myth did not, however, completely obliterate the memory of the all-giving goddess Pandora. A scholium to line 971 of Aristophanes' The Birds mentions a cult "to Pandora, the earth, because she bestows all things necessary for life". And in fifth-century Athens, Pandora made a prominent appearance in what, at first, appears an unexpected context, in a marble relief or bronze appliqués as a frieze along the base of the Athena Parthenos, the culminating experience on the Acropolis. Jeffrey M. Hurwit has interpreted her presence there as an "anti-Athena." Both were motherless, and reinforced via opposite means the civic ideologies of patriarchy and the "highly gendered social and political realities of fifth-century Athens"—Athena by rising above her sex to defend it, and Pandora by embodying the need for it. Meanwhile, Pausanias (i.24.7) merely noted the subject and moved on.

Artistic representations

Hammer-wielding workmen appear through a doorway, while in the foreground Hephaestus broods on the as yet unanimated figure of "Pandora" in the painting by John D. Batten, The Creation of Pandora, 1913, tempera on fresco, 128 x 168cm, Reading University

Images of Pandora began to appear on Greek pottery as early as the 5th century BC, although identification of the scene represented is sometimes ambiguous. An independent tradition that does not square with any of the Classical literary sources is in the visual repertory of Attic red-figure vase-painters, which sometimes supplements, sometimes ignores, the written testimony; in these representations the upper part of Pandora is visible rising from the earth, "a chthonic goddess like Gaia herself." Sometimes, but not always, she is labeled Pandora. In some cases the figure of Pandora emerging from the earth is surrounded by figures carrying hammers in what has been suggested as a scene from a satyr play by Sophocles, Pandora, or The Hammerers, of which only fragments remain. But there have also been alternative interpretations of such scenes.

In the late Pre-Raphaelite painting by John D. Batten, hammer-wielding workmen appear through a doorway, while in the foreground Hephaestus broods on the as yet unanimated figure of "Pandora". There were also earlier English paintings of the newly created Pandora as surrounded by the heavenly gods presenting gifts, a scene also depicted on ancient Greek pottery. In one case it was part of a decorative scheme painted on the ceiling at Petworth House by Louis Laguerre in about 1720. William Etty's Pandora Crowned by the Seasons of a century later is similarly presented as an apotheosis taking place among the clouds.

In between these two had come James Barry's huge Birth of Pandora, on which he laboured for over a decade at the turn of the nineteenth century. Well before that he was working on the design, which was intended to reflect his theoretical writings on the interdependence between history painting and the way it should reflect the ideal state. An early drawing, only preserved now in the print made of it by Luigi Schiavonetti, follows the account of Hesiod and shows Pandora being adorned by the Graces and the Hours while the gods look on. Its ideological purpose, however, was to demonstrate an equal society unified by the harmonious function of those within it. But in the actual painting which followed much later, a subordinated Pandora is surrounded by gift-bearing gods and Minerva stands near her, demonstrating the feminine arts proper to her passive role. The shift is back to the culture of blame whenever she steps outside it.

In the individual representations of Pandora that were to follow, her idealisation is as a dangerous type of beauty, generally naked or semi-naked. She is only differentiated from other paintings or statues of such females by being given the attribute of a jar or, increasingly in the 19th century, a straight-sided box. As well as the many European paintings of her from this period, there are examples in sculptures by Henri-Joseph Ruxthiel (1819), John Gibson (1856), Pierre Loison (1861, see above) and Chauncy Bradley Ives (1871).

Pandora's relationship to Eve

Jean Cousin, painting on panel, Eva Prima Pandora (Eve the first Pandora), 1550

There is an additional reason why Pandora should appear nude, in that it was a theological commonplace going back to the early Church Fathers that the Classical myth of Pandora made her a type of Eve. Each is the first woman in the world; and each is a central character in a story of transition from an original state of plenty and ease to one of suffering and death, a transition which is brought about as a punishment for transgression of divine law.

It has been argued that it was as a result of the Hellenisation of Western Asia that the misogyny in Hesiod's account of Pandora began openly to influence both Jewish and then Christian interpretations of scripture. The doctrinal bias against women so initiated then continued into Renaissance times. Bishop Jean Olivier's long Latin poem Pandora drew on the Classical account as well as the Biblical to demonstrate that woman is the means of drawing men to sin. Originally appearing in 1541 and republished thereafter, it was soon followed by two separate French translations in 1542 and 1548. At the same period appeared a 5-act tragedy by the Protestant theologian Leonhard Culmann (1498-1568) titled Ein schön weltlich Spiel von der schönen Pandora (1544), similarly drawing on Hesiod in order to teach conventional Christian morality.

The equation of the two also occurs in the 1550 allegorical painting by Jean Cousin the Elder, Eva Prima Pandora (Eve the first Pandora), in which a naked woman reclines in a grotto. Her right elbow rests on a skull, indicating the bringing of death, and she holds an apple branch in that hand – both attributes of Eve. Her left arm is wreathed by a snake (another reference to the temptation of Eve) and that hand rests on an unstopped jar, Pandora's attribute. Above hangs the sign from which the painting gains its name and beneath it is a closed jar, perhaps the counterpart of the other in Olympus, containing blessings.

Nicolas Régnier: Allegory of Vanity—Pandora, c. 1626

In Juan de Horozco's Spanish emblem book, Emblemas morales (1589), a motive is given for Pandora's action. Accompanying an illustration of her opening the lid of an urn from which demons and angels emerge is a commentary that condemns "female curiosity and the desire to learn by which the very first woman was deceived". In the succeeding century that desire to learn was equated with the female demand to share the male prerogative of education. In Nicolas Regnier's painting "The Allegory of Vanity" (1626), subtitled "Pandora", it is typified by her curiosity about the contents of the urn that she has just unstopped and is compared to the other attributes of vanity surrounding her (fine clothes, jewellery, a pot of gold coins). Again, Pietro Paolini's lively Pandora of about 1632 seems more aware of the effect that her pearls and fashionable headgear is making than of the evils escaping from the jar she holds. There is a social message carried by these paintings too, for education, no less than expensive adornment, is only available to those who can afford it.

But an alternative interpretation of Pandora's curiosity makes it merely an extension of childish innocence. This comes out in portrayals of Pandora as a young girl, as in Walter Crane's "Little Pandora" spilling buttons while encumbered by the doll she is carrying, in Arthur Rackham's book illustration and Frederick Stuart Church's etching of an adolescent girl taken aback by the contents of the ornamental box she has opened. The same innocence informs Odilon Redon's 1910/12 clothed figure carrying a box and merging into a landscape suffused with light, and even more the 1914 version of a naked Pandora surrounded by flowers, a primaeval Eve in the Garden of Eden. Such innocence, "naked and without alarm" in the words of an earlier French poet, portrays Pandora more as victim of a conflict outside her comprehension than as temptress.

Between Eve and Pygmalion

Early dramatic treatments of the story of Pandora are works of musical theatre. La Estatua de Prometeo (1670) by Pedro Calderón de la Barca is made an allegory in which devotion to learning is contrasted with the active life. Prometheus moulds a clay statue of Minerva, the goddess of wisdom to whom he is devoted, and gives it life from a stolen sunbeam. This initiates a debate among the gods whether a creation outside their own work is justified; his devotion is in the end rewarded with permission to marry his statue. In this work, Pandora, the statue in question, plays only a passive role in the competition between Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus (signifying the active life), and between the gods and men.

Pandora, Odilon Redon's c. 1914 oil painting depicting Pandora as an innocent Eve

Another point to note about Calderón's musical drama is that the theme of a statue married by her creator is more suggestive of the story of Pygmalion. The latter is also typical of Voltaire's ultimately unproduced opera Pandore (1740). There too the creator of a statue animates it with stolen fire, but then the plot is complicated when Jupiter also falls in love with this new creation but is prevented by Destiny from consummating it. In revenge the god sends Destiny to tempt this new Eve into opening a box full of curses as a punishment for Earth's revolt against Heaven.

If Pandora appears suspended between the roles of Eve and of Pygmalion's creation in Voltaire's work, in Charles-Pierre Colardeau's erotic poem Les Hommes de Prométhée (1774) she is presented equally as a love-object and in addition as an unfallen Eve:

Not ever had the painter's jealous veil

Shrouded the fair Pandora's charms:

Innocence was naked and without alarm.

Having been fashioned from clay and given the quality of "naïve grace combined with feeling", she is set to wander through an enchanted landscape. There she encounters the first man, the prior creation of Prometheus, and warmly responds to his embrace. At the end the couple quit their marriage couch and survey their surroundings "As sovereigns of the world, kings of the universe".

One other musical work with much the same theme was Aumale de Corsenville's one-act verse melodrama Pandore, which had an overture and incidental music by Franz Ignaz Beck. There Prometheus, having already stolen fire from heaven, creates a perfect female, "artless in nature, of limpid innocence", for which he anticipates divine vengeance. However, his patron Minerva descends to announce that the gods have gifted Pandora with other qualities and that she will become the future model and mother of humanity. The work was performed on 2 July 1789, on the very eve of the French Revolution, and was soon forgotten in the course of the events that followed.

19th century drama

Over the course of the 19th century, the story of Pandora was interpreted in radically different ways by four dramatic authors in four countries. In two of these she was presented as the bride of Epimetheus; in the two others she was the wife of Prometheus. The earliest of these works was the lyrical dramatic fragment by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, written between 1807 and 1808. Though it bears the title Pandora, what exists of the play revolves round Epimetheus' longing for the return of the wife who has abandoned him and has yet to arrive. A biographer has argued that it is a philosophical transformation of Goethe's passion in old age for a teenaged girl.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's The Masque of Pandora dates from 1876. It begins with her creation, her refusal by Prometheus and acceptance by Epimetheus. Then in the latter's house an "oaken chest, Carven with figures and embossed with gold" attracts her curiosity. After she eventually gives in to temptation and opens it, she collapses in despair and a storm destroys the garden outside. When Epimetheus returns, she begs him to kill her but he accepts joint responsibility. The work was twice used as the basis for operas by Alfred Cellier in 1881 and by Eleanor Everest Freer in 1933. Iconographical elements from the masque also figure in Walter Crane's large watercolour of Pandora of 1885. She is pictured as sprawled over a carved wooden chest on which are embossed golden designs of the three fates who figure as a chorus in Longfellow's scene 3. Outside the palace, a high wind is bending the trees. But on the front of the chest, a medallion showing the serpent wound about the tree of knowledge recalls the old interpretation of Pandora as a type of Eve.

In England the high drama of the incident was travestied in James Robinson Planché's Olympic Revels or Prometheus and Pandora (1831), the first of the Victorian burlesques. It is a costume drama peppered with comic banter and songs during which the gods betroth Pandora to a disappointed Prometheus with "only one little box" for dowry. When she opens it, Jupiter descends to curse her and Prometheus, but Hope emerges from the box and negotiates their pardon.

At the other end of the century, Gabriel Fauré's ambitious opera Prométhée (1900) had a cast of hundreds, a huge orchestra and an outdoor amphitheatre for stage. It was based in part on the Prometheus Bound of Aeschylus but was rewritten so as to give the character of Pandore an equal part with his. This necessitated her falling "as if dead" on hearing the judgement against Prométhée in Act 1; a funeral procession bearing her body at the start of Act 2, after which she revives to mourn the carrying out of Prométhée's sentence; while in Act 3 she disobeys Prométhée by accepting a box, supposedly filled with blessings for mankind, and makes the tragedy complete.

The pattern during the 19th century had only repeated that of the nearly three millennia before it. The ancient myth of Pandora never settled into one accepted version, was never agreed to have a single interpretation. It was used as a vehicle to illustrate the prevailing ideologies or artistic fashions of the time and eventually became so worn a coinage that it grew confused with other, sometimes later, stories. Best known in the end for a single metaphorical attribute, the box with which she was not even endowed until the 16th century, depictions of Pandora have been further confused with other holders of receptacles – with one of the trials of Psyche, with Sophonisba about to drink poison or Artemisia with the ashes of her husband. Nevertheless, her very polyvalence has been in the end the guarantor of her cultural survival.

Pandora's box

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Lawrence Alma-Tadema's water-colour of an ambivalent Pandora, 1881

 

A pithos from Crete, c. 675 BC. Louvre

Pandora's box is an artifact in Greek mythology connected with the myth of Pandora in Hesiod's c. 700 B.C. poem Works and Days. Hesiod related that curiosity led her to open a container left in the care of her husband, thus releasing curses upon mankind. Later depictions of the story have been varied, with some literary and artistic treatments focusing more on the contents than on Pandora herself.

The container mentioned in the original account was actually a large storage jar, but the word was later mistranslated. In modern times an idiom has grown from the story meaning "Any source of great and unexpected troubles", or alternatively "A present which seems valuable but which in reality is a curse".

In mythology

Main article: Pandora

According to Hesiod, when Prometheus stole fire from heaven, Zeus, the king of the gods, took vengeance by presenting Pandora to Prometheus' brother Epimetheus. Pandora opened a jar left in her care containing sickness, death and many other unspecified evils which were then released into the world. Though she hastened to close the container, only one thing was left behind – usually translated as Hope, though it could also have the pessimistic meaning of "deceptive expectation".

From this story has grown the idiom "to open a Pandora's box", meaning to do or start something that will cause many unforeseen problems. A modern, more colloquial equivalent is "to open a can of worms".

An Attic pyxis, 440–430 BC. British Museum

Etymology of the "box"

The word translated as "box" was actually a large jar (πίθος pithos) in Greek. Pithoi were used for storage of wine, oil, grain or other provisions, or, ritually, as a container for a human body for burying, from which it was believed souls escaped and necessarily returned. Many scholars see a close analogy between Pandora herself, who was made from clay, and the clay jar which dispenses evils.

The mistranslation of pithos is usually attributed to the 16th-century humanist Erasmus who, in his Latin account of the story of Pandora, changed the Greek pithos to pyxis, meaning "box". The context in which the story appeared was Erasmus' collection of proverbs, the Adagia (1508), in illustration of the Latin saying Malo accepto stultus sapit (from experiencing trouble a fool is made wise). In his version the box is opened by Epimetheus, whose name means 'Afterthought' – or as Hesiod comments, "he whom mistakes made wise".

There were alternative accounts of jars or urns containing blessings and evils bestowed upon humanity in Greek myth, of which a very early account is related in Homer's Iliad:

On the floor of Jove's palace there stand two urns, the one filled with evil gifts, and the other with good ones. He for whom Jove the lord of thunder mixes the gifts he sends, will meet now with good and now with evil fortune; but he to whom Jove sends none but evil gifts will be pointed at by the finger of scorn, the hand of famine will pursue him to the ends of the world, and he will go up and down the face of the earth, respected neither by gods nor men.

In a major departure from Hesiod, the 6th-century BC Greek elegiac poet Theognis of Megara states that

Hope is the only good god remaining among mankind;
the others have left and gone to Olympus.
Trust, a mighty god has gone, Restraint has gone from men,
and the Graces, my friend, have abandoned the earth.
Men's judicial oaths are no longer to be trusted, nor does anyone
revere the immortal gods; the race of pious men has perished and
men no longer recognize the rules of conduct or acts of piety.

Giulio Bonasone's 16th century engraving of Epimetheus opening the fatal jar

The poem seems to hint at a myth in which the jar contained blessings rather than evils. It is confirmed in the new era by an Aesopic fable recorded by Babrius, in which the gods send the jar containing blessings to humans. Rather than a named female, it was a generic "foolish man" (ἀκρατὴς ἄνθρωπος) who opened the jar out of curiosity and let them escape. Once the lid was replaced, only hope remained, "promising that she will bestow on each of us the good things that have gone away." This aetiological version is numbered 312 in the Perry Index.

In the Renaissance, the story of the jar was revisited by two immensely influential writers, Andrea Alciato in his Emblemata (1534) and the Neo-Latin poet Gabriele Faerno in his collection of a hundred fables (Fabulum Centum, 1563). Alciato only alluded to the story while depicting the goddess Hope seated on a jar in which, she declares, "I alone stayed behind at home when evils fluttered all around, as the revered muse of the old poet [Hesiod] has told you". Faerno's short poem also addressed the origin of hope but in this case it is the remainder of the "universal blessings" (bona universa) that have escaped: "Of all good things that mortals lack,/Hope in the soul alone stays back."

An idea of the nature of the blessings lost is given in a Renaissance engraving by Giulio Bonasone, where the culprit is Pandora's husband, Epimetheus. He is shown holding the lid of a large storage jar from which female representations of the Roman virtues are flying up into the air. They are identified by their names in Latin: security (salus), harmony (concordia), fairness (aequitas), mercy (clementia), freedom (libertas), happiness (felicitas), peace (pax), worth (virtus) and joy (laetitia). Hope (spes) is delayed on the lip and holds aloft the flower that is her attribute.

Difficulties of interpretation

In Hesiodic scholarship, the interpretive crux has endured: Is the hope imprisoned within a jar full of evils to be considered a benefit for humanity, or a further curse? A number of mythology textbooks echo the sentiments of M. L. West: "[Hope's retention in the jar] is comforting, and we are to be thankful for this antidote to our present ills." Some scholars such as Mark Griffith, however, take the opposite view: "[Hope] seems to be a blessing withheld from men so that their life should be the more dreary and depressing." The interpretation hangs on two related questions: First, how is elpis to be rendered, the Greek word usually translated as "hope"? Second, does the jar preserve elpis for men, or keep it away from men?

As with most ancient Greek words, elpis can be translated in a number of ways. A number of scholars prefer the neutral translation of "expectation". Classical authors use the word elpis to mean "expectation of bad", as well as "expectation of good". Statistical analysis demonstrates that the latter sense appears five times more than the former in all of extant ancient Greek literature. Others hold the minority view that elpis should be rendered "expectation of evil" (vel sim).

The answer to the first question largely depends on the answer to the second one: should the jar be interpreted as a prison, or a pantry? The jar certainly serves as a prison for the evils that Pandora released – they only affect humanity once outside the jar. Some have argued that logic dictates, therefore, that the jar acts as a prison for elpis as well, withholding it from the human race. If elpis means expectant hope, then the myth's tone is pessimistic: All the evils in the world were scattered from Pandora's jar, while the one potentially mitigating force, hope, remains locked securely inside. A less pessimistic interpretation understands the myth to say: countless evils fled Pandora's jar and plague human existence; the hope that humanity might be able to master these evils remains imprisoned inside the jar. Life is not hopeless, but human beings are hopelessly human.

It is also argued that hope was simply one of the evils in the jar, the false kind of hope, and was no good for humanity, since, later in the poem, Hesiod writes that hope is empty (498) and no good (500) and makes humanity lazy by taking away their industriousness, making them prone to evil.

In Human, All Too Human, philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche argued that "Zeus did not want man to throw his life away, no matter how much the other evils might torment him, but rather to go on letting himself be tormented anew. To that end, he gives man hope. In truth, it is the most evil of evils because it prolongs man's torment."

An objection to the "hope is good/the jar is a prison" interpretation counters that, if the jar is full of evils, then what is expectant hope – a blessing – doing among them? This objection leads some to render elpis as the expectation of evil, which would make the myth's tone somewhat optimistic: although mankind is troubled by all the evils in the world, at least it is spared the continual expectation of evil, which would make life unbearable.

The optimistic reading of the myth is expressed by M. L. West. Elpis takes the more common meaning of expectant hope. And while the jar served as a prison for the evils that escaped, it thereafter serves as a residence for Hope. West explains, "It would be absurd to represent either the presence of ills by their confinement in a jar or the presence of hope by its escape from one." Hope is thus preserved as a benefit for humans.

Fixing the blame

Neither Alciato nor Faerno had named who was responsible for opening the jar beyond saying it was a "mortal". During the Renaissance it is the name of Epimetheus that is mentioned as often as not, as in the engraving by Bonasone noticed above and the mention of Pandora's partner in a rondeau that Isaac de Benserade took it on himself to insert into his light-hearted version of the Metamorphoses (1676) - although Ovid had not in fact written about it himself.

Pandora seated with her husband Epimetheus, who has just opened her jar of curses; an etching by Sébastien Le Clerc (1676)

In a jar an odious treasure is
Shut by the gods' wish:
A gift that's not everyday,
The owner's Pandora alone;
And her eyes, this in hand,
Command the best in the land
As she flits near and far;
Prettiness can't stay
Shut in a jar.
Someone took her eye, he took
A look at what pleased her so
And out came the grief and woe
We won't ever be rid of,
For heaven had hidden
That in the jar.

The etching by Sébastien Le Clerc that accompanied the poem in the book shows Pandora and Epimetheus seated on either side of a jar from which clouds of smoke emerge, carrying up the escaping evils. The lid of the jar is quite plainly in Epimetheus' hand. Paolo Farinati, an earlier Venetian artist, was also responsible for a print which laid the blame on Epimetheus, depicting him as lifting the lid from the jar that Pandora is holding. Out of it boils a cloud which carries up a man and a dragon; between them they support a scroll reading "sero nimirum sapere caepit" (finding out too late), in reference to the meaning of Epimetheus' name in Greek.

An Allegory of Les Sciences qui Éclairent l'esprit de l'homme (The Sciences that Illuminate the Human Spirit, 1557), an etching ascribed to Marco Angelo del Moro

Another Venetian print, ascribed to Marco Angelo del Moro (active 1565 – 1586), is much more enigmatic. Usually titled "Pandora's Box, or The Sciences that Illuminate the Human Spirit", it portrays a woman in antique dress opening an ornate coffer from which spill books, manuscripts, snakes and bats. By Pandora's side is a woman carrying a burning brand, while a horned figure flees in the opposite direction. Above is a curved vault painted with signs of the zodiac to which the sun-god Apollo is pointing, while opposite him another figure falls through the stars. Commentators ascribe different meanings to these symbols as contradictory as the contents of the chest. In one reading, the hand Pandora holds up to her face makes her the figure of Ignorance. Alternatively her eyes are protected because she is dazzled and the snakes crawling from the chest are ancient symbols of wisdom. Apollo, seated above, points to Aquarius, the zodiacal sign of January/February, which marks the "Ascent of the Sun" from the trough of winter. The falling figure opposite him may be identified either as Lucifer or as night fleeing before the dawn; in either case, the darkness of ignorance is about to be dispelled. The question remains whether the box thus opened will in the end be recognised as a blessing; whether the ambiguous nature of knowledge is either to help or to hurt.

In later centuries the emphasis in art has generally been on the person of Pandora. With few exceptions, the box has appeared merely as her attribute. René Magritte's street scene of 1951, however, one of the few modern paintings to carry the title "Pandora's Box", is as enigmatic as were the Renaissance allegorical prints.

Theatre

In the first half of the 18th-century, three French plays were produced with the title "Pandora's Box" (La Boîte – or Boëte – de Pandore). In each of these, the main interest is in the social and human effects of the evils released from the box and in only one of them does Pandora figure as a character. The 1721 play by Alain René Lesage appeared as part of the longer La Fausse Foire. It was a one-act prose drama of 24 scenes in the commedia dell'arte style. At its opening, Mercury has been sent in the guise of Harlequin to check whether the box given by Jupiter to the animated statue Pandora has been opened. He proceeds to stir up disruption in her formerly happy village, unleashing ambition, competition, greed, envy, jealousy, hatred, injustice, treachery and ill-health. Amid the social breakdown, Pierrot falls out with the bride he was about to marry at the start of the play and she becomes engaged instead to a social upstart.

The play by Philippe Poisson (1682-1743) was a one-act verse comedy first produced in 1729. There Mercury visits the realm of Pluto to interview the ills shortly to be unleashed on mankind. The characters Old Age, Migraine, Destitution, Hatred, Envy, Paralysis, Quinsy, Fever and Transport (emotional instability) report their effects to him. They are preceded by Love, who argues that he deserves to figure among them as a bringer of social disruption. The later play of 1743 was written by Pierre Brumoy and subtitled "curiosity punished" (la curiosité punie). The three-act satirical verse comedy is set in the home of Epimetheus and the six children recently created by Prometheus. Mercury comes on a visit, bringing the fatal box with him. In it are the evils soon to subvert the innocence of the new creations. Firstly seven flatterers: the Genius of Honours, of Pleasures, Riches, Gaming (pack of cards in hand), Taste, Fashion (dressed as Harlequin) and False Knowledge. These are followed by seven bringers of evil: envy, remorse, avarice, poverty, scorn, ignorance and inconstancy. The corrupted children are rejected by Prometheus but Hope arrives at the end to bring a reconciliation.

It is evident from these plays that, in France at least, blame had shifted from Pandora to the trickster god who contrives and enjoys mankind's subversion. Although physical ills are among the plagues that visit humanity, greater emphasis is given to the disruptive passions which destroy the possibility of harmonious living.

Poetry

Dante Gabriel Rossetti's painting of Pandora holding the box, 1871

Two poems in English dealing with Pandora's opening of the box are in the form of monologues, although Frank Sayers preferred the term monodrama for his recitation with lyrical interludes, written in 1790. In this Pandora is descending from Heaven after being endowed with gifts by the gods and therefore feels empowered to open the casket she carries, releasing strife, care, pride, hatred and despair. Only the voice of Hope is left to comfort her at the end. In the poem by Samuel Phelps Leland (1839-1910), Pandora has already arrived in the household of Epimetheus and feels equally confident that she is privileged to satisfy her curiosity, but with a worse result. Shutting the lid too early, she thus "let loose all curses on mankind/ Without a hope to mitigate their pain". This is the dilemma expressed in the sonnet that Dante Gabriel Rossetti wrote to accompany his oil painting of 1869–71. The gifts with which Pandora has been endowed and that made her desirable are ultimately subverted, "the good things turned to ill…Nor canst thou know/ If Hope still pent there be alive or dead." In his painting Rossetti underlines the point as a fiery halo streams upward from the opening casket on which is inscribed the motto NESCITUR IGNESCITUR (unknown it burns).

While the speakers of the verse monologues are characters hurt by their own simplicity, Rossetti's painting of the red-robed Pandora, with her expressive gaze and elongated hands about the jewelled casket, is a more ambiguous figure. So too is the girl in Lawrence Alma-Tadema's watercolour of Pandora (see above), as the comments of some of its interpreters indicate. Sideways against a seascape, red-haired and naked, she gazes down at the urn lifted towards her "with a look of animal curiosity", according to one contemporary reviewer, or else "lost in contemplation of some treasure from the deep" according to another account. A moulded sphinx on the unopened lid of the urn is turned in her direction. In the iconography of the time, such a figure is usually associated with the femme fatale, but in this case, the crown of hyacinths about her head identifies Pandora as an innocent Greek maiden. Nevertheless, the presence of the sphinx at which she gazes with such curiosity suggests a personality on the cusp, on the verge of gaining some harmful knowledge that will henceforth negate her uncomplicated qualities. The name of Pandora already tells her future.