Goethe's monodrama Proserpina is usually interpreted as a pure lamentation, a young girl's rightful mourning of her own death. Ovid's Metamorphoses, Goethe's main source, contains hopeful aspects not explicitly mentioned in Goethe's play, because it could be taken for granted that the audience knew about the elisions. The play may provoke the audience to contradict a solely negative characterization of death, by presenting not merely as the end but also as part of life. Goethe's oeuvre legitimates this interpretation.
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