Sappho Fr. 31: Anxiety attack or Love Declaration?

Abstract

In a recent article1 the psychiatrist George Devereux reached the following conclusion about fr. 31: Sappho as a ‘masculine lesbian’ experiences ‘a perfect, “text-book case”, anxiety attack’, elicited by ‘a love-crisis’, viz. by the presence of a male rival for the attention of Sappho's favourite girl. He then sums up: ‘In fact, even if there existed no explicit tradition concerning Sappho's lesbianism, her reaction to her male rival would represent for the psychiatrist prima facie evidence of her perversion’ (p. 21).