On The Poetics and Politics of Voice

Memory appears by name in a number of poetic texts, but in its most important manifestations, it goes under the divine name,"Mnemosyne”.

Familiar from Hesiod’s Theogony and present in Orphic hymns where she is celebrated as the possibility of a continuous meditation between nous and psyche, "Mnemosyne", the personification of memory, daughter of heaven (Uranos)and earth (Gaia), is also (by Zeus) the mother of the nine Muses.

The hope for a reconciliation between the Titanic and Olympian orders, this goddess is the ground of poetic inspiration, as we learn when Hesiod's bard goes to great lengths to thank her daughters for their gifts of song and knowledge of the past.

Adapted from a Text By Jan Mieszkowski