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Charite (The Hostage)
The old hag is an unnamed older woman who works for the thieves who sack Milo and who kidnap Lucius and Charite. The old hag tells the longest story-within-a-story in the entire work: the story of Cupid and Psyche. The story of Cupid and Psyche involves Psyche getting into trouble through her own curiosity, then having to go through a long and arduous series of trials before finally reaching a happy ending. In many ways, the journey that Psyche goes through resembles the journey that Lucius himself goes through, and so the old hag symbolizes the power that stories have and how they can help people better understand their own lives.
Old Hag Quotes in The Golden Ass
The The Golden Ass quotes below are all either spoken by Old Hag or refer to Old Hag. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 4
Quotes
In a certain city there lived a king and queen who had daughters three in number and illustrious in beauty. Though the two born first were quite gratifying enough to look at, praise and publicity on a mortal scale were held to be adequate for them. But the youngest girl’s gorgeousness was so extraordinary, so remarkable that the poverty of human speech prevented any proper description or even encomium.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 5
Quotes
But the instant the lamp elucidated the secrets of the bed to which she brought it, she saw the sweetest beast, the gentlest wild thing in the world, Cupid himself, that gorgeous god, at gorgeous rest.
But from the time you were a toddler, you weren’t properly socialized.
Get the entire The Golden Ass LitChart as a printable PDF.
Old Hag Quotes in The Golden Ass
The The Golden Ass quotes below are all either spoken by Old Hag or refer to Old Hag. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
).
Book 4
Quotes
In a certain city there lived a king and queen who had daughters three in number and illustrious in beauty. Though the two born first were quite gratifying enough to look at, praise and publicity on a mortal scale were held to be adequate for them. But the youngest girl’s gorgeousness was so extraordinary, so remarkable that the poverty of human speech prevented any proper description or even encomium.
Related Characters:
Related Symbols:
Page Number and Citation:
Explanation and Analysis:
Book 5
Quotes
But the instant the lamp elucidated the secrets of the bed to which she brought it, she saw the sweetest beast, the gentlest wild thing in the world, Cupid himself, that gorgeous god, at gorgeous rest.
But from the time you were a toddler, you weren’t properly socialized.
