A similar case can be encountered in the interlude Pan and Syrinx in book 1. Syrinx “called on the nymphs of the stream to transform her” to escape from Pan and when he caught her “instead of a fair nymph’s body, he found himself clutching some marsh reeds.” But she didn’t escape completely, because Pan made a pipe with her. After all the running the episode finishes dishearteningly with the phrase “stayed in his hands.” It is very difficult to find examples of women doing something actively to avoid their fate. In -Sémele’s sister- was just rearing her nephew secretly until...
A similar case can be encountered in the interlude Pan and Syrinx in book 1. Syrinx “called on the nymphs of the stream to transform her” to escape from Pan and when he caught her “instead of a fair nymph’s body, he found himself clutching some marsh reeds.” But she didn’t escape completely, because Pan made a pipe with her. After all the running the episode finishes dishearteningly with the phrase “stayed in his hands.”
It is very difficult to find examples of women doing something actively to avoid their fate. In -Sémele’s sister- was just rearing her nephew secretly until she handed him onto the nymphs of Nysa but this had no effect in Semele’s fate. The case that present more decision among all the victims is the one of Procne and Philomela, being also a special case that presents a psychological metamorphoses: Procne turned into a revengeful monster that boiled her own son and gives him to his husband -who has raped her sister Philomela and cut her tongue- as a meal.
All the analyzed examples have in common the silence of women. Turned into a bear Callisto cannot speak or even show her emotions: “To prevent her appealing for pity by prayers or words of entreaty, her powers of speech were wrested away, and her hoarse throat only emitted an angry, menacing, terror-inspiring grow. […] Continual groaning testified to her inner anguish”.” Daphne is also somehow trapped in his new form “he (Apollo) pressed his lips to the wood, but the wood still shrank from his kisses,” and Sémele was ‘set ablaze.’ Metamorphoses are full of silent women, including Io transformed into a cow “When she opened her mouth to complain […] all that emerged was a hideous lowing” and the chatty nymph Echo who can just repeat words and never again express herself.
