Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Golden Ass, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
The Power of Stories
Faithfulness and Loyalty
Identity, Transformation, and Curiosity
Consequences of Greed
Summary
Analysis
Lucius wakes up in terror during the first watch of the night. He takes the opportunity to purify himself in the ocean water and offer up praise to several goddesses, asking them to end his suffering. A woman with a divine form rises out of the water. She claims to be the “mother of the universe” and the “queen of all elements” and says she is moved by his pleas. She reveals her true name to be Isis.
In the last book of The Golden Ass, Lucius finally experiences a reprieve from all the suffering that he went through in the previous books. Though Isis might seem like a character who comes out of nowhere—perhaps even an example of a deus ex machina (a sudden, unlikely resolution of a problem)—the theme of loyalty to the gods has been woven throughout all of the previous books.
Themes
Isis takes pity on Lucius and promises he’ll be greeted by a priest with a garland of roses. In exchange for the blessing, the goddess asks Lucius to devote the remainder of his life to her. She withdraws.
Like many of the other gods, Isis doesn’t give help without expecting something in return, in this case, a pledge of loyalty from Lucius.
Themes
Lucius eagerly plans to follow the instructions Isis gave him. Later, a grand procession comes by, with many people offering prayers, music, and flowers in praise of different gods and goddesses. Lucius sees the priest with roses that Isis promised him would be there. He carefully takes a bite from the rose garland and is instantly turned back into a man.
After his long journey as a donkey, Lucius is finally turned back into a man. Befitting this happy occasion, the scene around him is a grand procession. Notably, the procession has a religious tone to it, suggesting that Lucius has been saved by his faithfulness.
Themes
Lucius is naked, so the priest (who has also been warned by an oracle) gets some clothes for him. The grand procession continues. Lucius begins to dedicate his life to the worship of the goddess Isis and befriends her priests. The priests somehow manage to get back Lucius’s horse, which he hasn’t seen since he left it with Photis in Hypata. Lucius increases his efforts to worship Isis and agrees to follow a prescribed diet.
The nakedness of Lucius suggests that, in a way, he has been reborn now that he is a man again. Lucius is overcome with gratitude, and the steps he takes to worship Isis suggest that he is serious about honoring the deal that Isis presented to him in his first vision of her over the water.
Themes
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Lucius goes through rituals, some of which he is not allowed to describe to the reader. To better serve the cult of Isis, Lucius moves to Rome. He gets more and more involved with his new religion but still feels that he hasn’t done enough, and so he also begins to worship the god Osiris, who is husband to Isis but who requires different rituals. Lucius goes further, fasting and shaving his head. He also gets involved in a legal profession in Rome, arguing cases in Latin.
Lucius’s actions show that he continues to grow in faithfulness and that he is leaving behind the greed, hunger, and curiosity that defined many of his prior actions. His involvement in law perhaps recalls the earlier scene when he was falsely accused of murdering three young men while staying with Milo. It also perhaps connects Lucius to the author, Apuleius, who studied and practiced law.
Themes
At one point, the god Osiris appears to Lucius in his sleep. He tells Lucius that he has done good work so far and that he should continue to work in a legal profession. He promises that Lucius has a good future in his cult, so Lucius shaves his head again and joyfully shows off his baldness wherever he goes.
On the one hand, the ending of The Golden Ass is relatively straightforward: after enduring many hardships, Lucius is finally rewarded by the gods and so he pledges his loyalty to them. It is a happy ending. Nevertheless, this straightforward religious reading is complicated by earlier events and by all the other characters who experienced unhappy endings, some of whom did nothing to deserve their bad endings. Ultimately, the book doesn’t give a consistent answer to the question of loyalty and whether people in general get what they deserve.
Themes
