What's a Muse?

The former title of this blog: 'Muse Parade'.

One of the more common uses for the word, 'muse' is for the nine inspirational Greek goddesses. This is not what I had in mind when I created the blog title, 'muse parade', but a parade of inspirational goddesses sounds pretty cool too! I'm just now getting familiar with what each of the nine represent.

Calliope - muse of epic/heroic poetry (the superior muse)
Melpomene - muse of tragedy
Thalia - muse of comedy & idyllic poetry
Polyhymnia - muse of sacred poetry, agriculture, geometry, grammar
Clio - muse of  history
Euterpe - muse of music
Erato - lyric and/or love poetry
Terpsichore - muse of dance
Urania - muse of astronomy & astronomical writing

This blog is obviously not about poetry. I have never really been into poetry. I actually have bad memories of being graded on my interpretation of poetry in grade school - as if the poems had only one interpretation. I think poetry is beautiful and complex and likely most poems have multiple interpretations - highly dependent on the audience.

Poetry was a huge form of art and communication to Greek gods. However, I think that poetry in this case extends beyond just poems - to other forms of intellectual endeavors such as science and other forms of literature. Zeus 'created' his nine daughters to be inspirational objects - sort of go-to personifications.

Polyhymnia is probably the closest muse to what inspires many of my posts. She is usually depicted in a meditative stance.

Primary source:
https://owlcation.com/humanities/Muses-Nine-Goddesses-of-Greek-Mythology

Depending on the dictionary you use to look up the word, 'muse' you'll get different definitions. Typically though you'll get noun and verb definitions. This is the definition I had in mind when I created the blog title (from Merriam-Webster): [muse: a state of deep thought or dreamy abstraction]. Attempting to create a clever title, I came up with Muse Parade, which I intended to represent, a parade (public display) of deep thought. In hindsight, I should have chosen something a bit less cryptic.