Among mythological tales about the prophet Tiresias, one holds that he was a female seven years. The sex change resulted when he encountered two snakes entwined in the raptures of lovemaking, and thrashed them with his cudgel. In the curse’s seventh year, he again found the snakes procreating, and thought … if blows mutated me, maybe blows will un-mutate me. Sure enough, his preferred male state was restored.
