Elysium

[13] Eustathius of Thessalonica[14] associated the word Elysion (Ἠλύσιον) with ἀλυουσας alyousas (itself from the verb ἀλύω alyō, "to be deeply stirred from joy")[15] or from ἀλύτως alytōs, synonymous of ἀφθάρτως (ἄφθαρτος, "incorruptible"),[16] referring to souls' life in this place.

No snow is there, nor heavy storm, nor ever rain, but ever does Ocean send up blasts of the shrill-blowing West Wind that they may give cooling to men.The Greek poet Hesiod refers to the "Isles of the Blest" in his didactic poem Works and Days.

In his book Greek Religion, Walter Burkert notes the connection with the motif of far-off Dilmun: "Thus Achilles is transported to the White Isle and becomes the Ruler of the Black Sea, and Diomedes becomes the divine lord of an Adriatic island".

[11] And they live untouched by sorrow in the islands of the blessed along the shore of deep-swirling Ocean, happy heroes for whom the grain-giving earth bears honey-sweet fruit flourishing thrice a year, far from the deathless gods, and Cronos rules over themWriting in the 5th century BCE, Pindar's Odes describes the reward waiting for those living a righteous life: The good receive a life free from toil, not scraping with the strength of their arms the earth, nor the water of the sea, for the sake of a poor sustenance.

Those who have persevered three times, on either side, to keep their souls free from all wrongdoing, follow Zeus' road to the end, to the tower of Cronus, where ocean breezes blow around the island of the blessed, and flowers of gold are blazing, some from splendid trees on land, while water nurtures others.

With these wreaths and garlands of flowers they entwine their hands according to the righteous counsels of Rhadamanthys, whom the great father, the husband of Rhea whose throne is above all others, keeps close beside him as his partnerIn Virgil's Aeneid, Aeneas, like Heracles and Odysseus before him, travels to the underworld.

In groves we live, and lie on mossy beds, By crystal streams, that murmur thro' the meads: But pass yon easy hill, and thence descend; The path conducts you to your journey's end."

In the Greek historian Plutarch's Life of Sertorius, Elysium is described as: These are two in number, separated by a very narrow strait; they are ten thousand furlongs distant from Africa, and are called the Islands of the Blest.

They enjoy moderate rains at long intervals, and winds which for the most part are soft and precipitate dews, so that the islands not only have a rich soil which is excellent for plowing and planting, but also produce a natural fruit that is plentiful and wholesome enough to feed, without toil or trouble, a leisured folk.

Diodorus, in his first book, suggested that the Elysian fields which were much celebrated in ancient Greek poetry, corresponded to the beautiful plains in the neighborhood of Memphis which contained the tombs of that capital city of Egypt.

In Paris, the Champs-Élysées retain their name of the Elysian Fields, first applied in the late 16th century to a formerly rural outlier beyond the formal parterre gardens behind the royal French palace of the Tuileries.

The poet Heinrich Heine explicitly parodied Schiller's sentiment in referring to the Jewish Sabbath food cholent as the "daughter of Elysium" in his poem "Princess Shabbat".

In John Ford's 1633 tragedy 'Tis Pity She's a Whore Giovanni seals his requited love for his sister Annabella, stating "And I'de not change it for the best to come: A life of pleasure in Elyzium".

Examples include the New Orleans neighbourhood of Elysian Fields in Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire as the déclassé purgatory where Blanche Dubois lives with Stanley and Stella Kowalski.

Its use in this context could be prolepsis, as the British countryside he is describing would become the burial ground of his dead comrades and heroes from World War I. Elysium is referenced in the Schiller poem which inspired Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" (9th symphony, 4th movement) - notably in the excerpt used as the European Anthem.