Apollo and Daphne is transformed into a laurel tree. The myth of Apollo and Daphne has been examined as a battle between chastity (Daphne) and sexual desire (Apollo). As Apollo lustfully pursues Daphne, she is saved through her metamorphosis and confinement into the laurel tree which can be seen as an act of eternal chastity. Daphne is forced to sacrifice her body and become the laurel tree as her only form of escape from the pressures of Apollo's constant sexual desires. Apollo crafts himself a wreath out of her laurel branches and turning her symbol of chastity into a cultural symbol for him
The Wood Nymph The Wood Nymph The Wood Nymph (Swedish title: ; subtitled '), Op. 15, is a programmatic tone poem for orchestra composed in 1894 and 1895 by the Finnish composer Jean Sibelius. The ballade, which premiered on 17 April 1895 in Helsinki, Finland, with Sibelius conducting, follows the Swedish writer Viktor Rydberg's 1882 poem of the same name, in which a young man, Björn, wanders into the forest and is seduced and driven to despair by a ', or wood nymph. Organizationally, the tone poem consists of four informal sections, each of which corresponds to one of the poem's four stanzas