An Analysis of Leda by Robert Ji-Song Ku In Robert Ji-Song Ku's short story "Leda", the main character, Sorin, leads a imitation life. He applies himself a little too readily to his graduate studies in comparative literature: he doesn't just compare text with text; he also compares his life to the text, to “literary works” (Wong 281). If his life does not match that of at least one literary character on different levels of interpretation, emotional, physical or mental, he changes his behavior so that it does. For example, he starts "smoking and drinking - heavily... simply because all Hemingway's heroes did. For a while I only drank vodka martinis in public because I had read that James Bond drank it exclusively... I... ." . he also smoked [his] particular brand of cigarettes" (280). In "Leda," the two influential "works" (280) are Junichiro Tanizaki's The Bridge of Dreams, a "disturbing retelling of the Oedipal myth" (281), and the story of Leda, in Greek mythology. Both have a vast influence on Sorin, and their influences are intertwined in his behavior to the point that it is difficult to separate and identify them. "Leda" is primarily an Oedipal tale thanks to Bridge's influence, but, as Sorin "often finds himself doing things, saying things, and making certain choices [because]...some of the books' most intriguing characters have done the same," mixes Oedipus with Zeus, Castor, and Pollux to produce the character he becomes when he interacts with Leda, his lover, Oedipus, of course, is the Greek dramatic character who, when he discovers that he has married his mother and had children with her, gouges out his eyes the greek womanizer father of gods who, according to the Greek l...... middle of paper ...... or having lived his life vicariously. Works cited "Castor and Pollux". Microsoft Encarta online. February 27, 1999 http://encarta.msn.com/index/conciseindex/54/05444000.htm."Cheju Island." February 17, 1999 http://www.chejuinfo.net/index_e.html.Criss, PJ "Leda." February 17, 1999 http://www.cybercom.com/~grandpa/ledax.html.Hefner, Alan G. "Zeus." The Encyclopedia Mytica. February 27, 1999 http://www.pantheon.org/mythica/articles/z/zeus.html."Leda and the constellation Cygnus." Department of Engineering, University of Michigan. February 17, 1999 http://windows.ivv.nasa.gov/mythology/cygnus.html.Webb, Ruth H. "Leda." February 17, 1999 http://www.princeton.edu/~rhwebb/leda.html.Wong, Shawn, ed. Asian American Literature: A Brief Introduction and Anthology. New York: Harper Collins College Publishers, 1996.