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Article: Paciurea's Chimeras.(Dimitrie Paciurea)
- Article from:
- Apollo
- Article date:
- October 1, 2003
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2003 Apollo Magazine Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Striking her wings with the dragon tail, as she leaps and flies, and spits fire from her nostrils, comes the green-eyed chimera, wheeling, yelping..."I incite to perilous voyages and great enterprises. With my paws I have chiselled architectural wonders...I look for new scents, larger flowers, untried pleasures. If anywhere I catch sight of a man contented and wise in spirit, I fall upon him and strangle him."(1)
A malevolent, pleasure-seeking, she-creature, Gustave Flaubert's chimera is also endowed with the divine spark of creativity. This elevates her above the beast in the Iliad: 'a foaming monster the Khimaira/of ghastly and inhuman origin/her forepart ...