Poetics of Colours (Red/Green) as Related to Fire Imagery in Depicting Loki, Prometheus and Satan

(University of Helsinki, Finland)

Abstract: In a literary text, the poetics of elements combined with colour imagery applied to their description plays a crucial role in revealing the omniscient nature of characters. Among four elements (e.g., fire, air, earth and water) fire in particular is the one which possesses a unique capacity to create and destroy in an instant. Such equivocality is lying within its very nature. The article investigates how the semantics of the colours red and green, which are used to depict the rebellious spirit of Prometheus, Satan and Loki, accentuates their ambiguous nature within Greek, Christian and Norse mythological discourse. In order to fulfill its objectives this work resorts its analysis to original sources, such as the Bible, the Eddas and Greek tragedies. In the first part of this article theoretical premises are considered. The second one gives examples from literary text to illustrate each step of the analysis.

Key words: Prometheus, Satan, Loki, poetics of colour, fire, myth