ABSTRACT
Pericles' adventure in the court of Antiochus is presented in such a way as to draw our attention to the bizarre perversion informing courtship rituals with the paternal figure cast as a rival lover. Pericles is required by the virgin goddess Diana to offer sacrifice at her temple in Ephesus. Metamorphosis – and not any individual self-mastery of forbidden desire – is thus the external mechanism whereby disordered sexuality turned loose is eventually sublimated. Metamorphosis does not affect the patriarchal discourse of female subordination. It enacts palingenesis, but the very process of redemption thus enacted still occurs under the aegis of patriarchy. Pericles begins with the only de facto incestuous relationship in Shakespeare's canon. The young and untested Pericles arrives in Antioch and is enraptured by the sight of the king's daughter. The link between riddles and incest dates back to ancient times. Incest has long been associated with the unspeakable solution to a perfect enigma.
