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Tithonus and Aurora: the price of immortality
The myth of Tithonus and Aurora (Eos for the Greeks) tells of the love between the goddess of dawn and a mortal Trojan prince. Eos, in love, asked Zeus to grant Tithonus immortality, but forgot to ask also for eternal youth. Thus Tithonus became immortal, but continued to age, becoming increasingly decrepit, reduced to a miserable wreck who begged in vain for death. Eos, disgusted, locked him in a room. In later versions, he was transformed into a cicada, whose song at dawn is his eternal lament. The myth was revisited by the English poet Alfred Tennyson in his celebrated dramatic monologue "Tithonus", which reflects on the paradox of immortality without youth, where death becomes a gift and eternity a curse.
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