"Good night is right," Melanippe said when she read Part One. "I can't believe you wrote this mess."
I asked her, hurt, how so; I thought it not half bad, considering.
"Because," she cried. "It's a lie! It's false! It's full of holes! I didn't write any of it; you did, every word. And you make out that I'm all emancipated1 and no hang-ups and immortal2 and stuff, and that's crazy. Content my ass3! Content is a death-word in my book; if I were Medusa and I asked Perseus if he was happy to spend eternity4 with me and he said he was content, I'd spit in his eye! Okay, you got the Amazon business pretty straight, but I'm amazed at your picture of me: you know very well I'm not immortal except in that special way I told you about: the 'Melanippe-self' way. I'm on the verge5 of my Full Moon, and I feel every lunar month of it: just in the time it's taken you to write these pages I've gained ten kilos and aged6 five 'years.' That very first night in Tiryns, I told you how my nurse Hippolyta in Corinth told me that my mother was a crazy Amazon deaf-mute who killed herself when I was born, and my father a hero on a white horse who'd left her on the stable roof one night. Why pussyfoot around about it? I not only look young enough to be your daughter; just possibly I am your daughter, and if that doesn't bother me, it shouldn't bother you. I never held a grudge8 against you; I took it for granted you didn't know you'd made my mother pregnant. Even when I learned (from you) that she'd been the hottest prospect9 in Amazonia until you raped10 her, and I decided11 that that was what drove her crazy and made her kill herself, I excused you. But I don't fool myself about my reasons: I'd heard a lot about you in Argolis; I admire heroes and had never met one; I was disgusted with Stheneboeia, and I wanted out of Tiryns. I don't mean anything vulgar like screwing my way to the top (I never let Stheneboeia sleep with me); I really did fall for you, in a hurry. I honor and respect you, as you know. I even love you; you're the gentlest, sweetest lover I ever had, if not the most passionate12, and the difference in our ages doesn't matter to me at all except when it takes the edge off your enthusiasm because you've done everything once already. Like getting married and having a family and building a house and buying furniture and stuff. If you want to know the truth, I think we're bogged13 down more than immortalized: you scribble14 scribble scribble all day, morning noon and night, and honestly, I believe it must be the greatest thing in the world to be a mythic hero and be immortalized in the story of your life and so forth15 -- I really do appreciate that -- but I love activity, you know? Philono? was more your type -- I mean that perfectly16 kindly17. She liked books and myths and needlework and all; I'm used to an active life, and we never do anything! I'd sort of hoped we'd go down to Lycia after you'd got yourself together, not that I'm eager to be a queen, but just so we'd be doing stuff. It drives me crackers18 that we've got this winged horse right here to take us anywhere in the world, and all we do is spin around the saltmarsh after mealtimes -- then back to your scribbling19 scribbling while I make dinner and twiddle my thumbs. I hate to say this, but I guess I'd be happier with less of a hero and more of a regular man. I don't mean that sarcastically20. I'm tired of Amazoning; I'm tired of being a demigod's girlfriend, too, if it means hanging around this cottage till I die. But I'm also tired of bopping about with different lovers; what I want is a plain ordinary groovy husband and ten children, nine of them boys. Call me a cop-out if you want to; I ought to find some swinging young Gargarensian M.D. or lawyer next mating season who'll think I'm the greatest thing that ever happened to him, instead of just the recentest, you know? I might not love him as much, but I bet I'd be happier. I don't want to be around when my hippomanes doesn't work for you any more, Bellerophon; either you'll leave me like the rest or we'll both sit around wishing we were dead. You thought that that Pattern Polyeidus gave you for your Second Flood predicted three women, but by my count I'm the fourth: Sibyl, my mother, Philono?, and me, right? But you said yourself that everything comes in fives in the Betterophoniad, so maybe you ought to start looking for that next one and get on with your career. Maybe this Chimera21 has turned into a pretty girl again, like Medusa in the Perseid. You should check and see if she's It, and if she isn't, kill her for real this time and see if that gets you where you want to go. Anyhow I know I'm not It for you, and you know it too, only you don't want to admit it. You're not getting any younger; neither am I: lots of Amazons look younger than they are because we don't count years, and it's the distinctions people acknowledge and condition themselves to look for that usually show, in my opinion. But the more I think about it, the more I'm sure that tonight's full moon is going to end my First Quarter, and you'll think I've aged fourteen years in one night. Will you still say I'm 'frisky22 and lean and tight' and so forth? I get tired too, you know; dead tired; sometimes I feel Last Quarter! Maybe I shouldn't go on like this; I know it's getting near my period, and that always makes me blue and a little bitchy. But I swear, this isn't immortality23: it's suspended animation24. Which brings me back to your story: despite all those clever things you have me say in it, the truth is I know zero about writing; but if I were to find this washed up on the beach and read it through, just as a plain story, I'd sure be pissed off that you never tell what happened to Polyeidus and Philono? and Anteia and your mother and your kids, especially that ring business when you left home; and you don't say what the rest of Sibyl's letter said, or clear up that episode with the Chimera -- whether she was real in the first place and whether she's back again -- or explain all that fudging about your brother's death, et cetera. You even call it 'Part One,' but I don't see any Part Two. There are nice things in it, sure, a lot of nice things, once you get past that heavy beginning and move along; but if your immortality depends on this piece of writing, you're a dead pigeon."
A bad night. I couldn't speak to explain the difference between lies and myth, which I was but beginning to comprehend myself; how the latter could be so much realer and more important than particular men that perhaps I must cease to be the hero of my own, cease even to exist, cease somehow even to have existed. In fact I couldn't speak at all. Melanippe either, having spoken. Sadly and fiercely we made love: Medusa winked25 down at us; Pegasus snorted; my darling came as never in her life, sure sign of her passage. Me too. She slept; by full-moon light I wrote Part Two; just before dawn, as Perseus and company sank over Asia Minor26, we gently made love again; she gave me the last of her First-Quarter hippomanes, an enormous stash27, and bade me go kill Chimera for real.
"Are you sure you're not Polyeidus?" I asked her, and she responded: "Are you sure you're Bellerophon?"
Heh. I wrapped up in the prophet's Pattern the story thus far -- which if less than Perseid-perfect was anyhow clear, straightforward28, and uncorrupted at that time -- hauled up on sleepy Pegasus, slipped him his quid of hip7, winged west.
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1
emancipated
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| adj.被解放的，不受约束的v.解放某人（尤指摆脱政治、法律或社会的束缚）( emancipate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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ass
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| n.驴；傻瓜，蠢笨的人 | |
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eternity
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| n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷 | |
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verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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hip
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| n.臀部，髋；屋脊 | |
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grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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raped
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| v.以暴力夺取，强夺( rape的过去式和过去分词 )；强奸 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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bogged
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| adj.陷于泥沼的v.（使）陷入泥沼， （使）陷入困境( bog的过去式和过去分词 )；妨碍，阻碍 | |
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scribble
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| v.潦草地书写，乱写，滥写；n.潦草的写法，潦草写成的东西，杂文 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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crackers
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| adj.精神错乱的，癫狂的n.爆竹( cracker的名词复数 )；薄脆饼干；（认为）十分愉快的事；迷人的姑娘 | |
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scribbling
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| n.乱涂[写]胡[乱]写的文章[作品]v.潦草的书写( scribble的现在分词 )；乱画；草草地写；匆匆记下 | |
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sarcastically
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| adv.挖苦地，讽刺地 | |
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chimera
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| n.神话怪物；梦幻 | |
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frisky
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| adj.活泼的，欢闹的；n.活泼，闹着玩；adv.活泼地，闹着玩地 | |
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immortality
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| n.不死，不朽 | |
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animation
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| n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作 | |
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winked
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| v.使眼色( wink的过去式和过去分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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stash
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| v.藏或贮存于一秘密处所；n.隐藏处 | |
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straightforward
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| adj.正直的，坦率的；易懂的，简单的 | |
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