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Over the last couple of days I read Hamlet's Mill, which Wikipedia says has "tenuous arguments based on incorrect or outdated linguistic information." This is an understatement. The entire thing is an exercise in jumping to conclusions. I'm not even going to go into the argument, which is something along the lines of "myth was primitive science" or the fact that most of the books had nothing to do with the argument, but rather with finding equivalents throughout world mythology. No, I'm just going to reprint my new favorite paragraph in anything ever¹ ²:

...where he meets Siduri, the divine barmaid, "who dwells by the edge of the sea".
Under the eyes of severe philologists, slaves to exact "truth," one dare not make light of this supposedly "geographical" item with its faint surrealistic tang. Here is a perfectly divine barmaid by the edge of the sea, called by many names in many languages. Her bar should be as long as the famed one in Shanghai, for she has along her shelves not only beer and wine but more outlandish and antiquated drinks from many cultures, drinks such as honeymead, soma, sura (a kind of brandy), kawa, pulque, peyote-cocktail, decoctions of ginseng. In short, from everywhere she has the ritual intoxicating beverages which comfort the dreary souls who are denied the drink of immortality. One might call these drinks Lethe, after all.

So the whole book is like that. The whole book. In writing style and in ridiculous arguments. There is something on literally every page to make to make me stop and look at the authors funny.

Although I am kind of worried. There seems to be a disease infecting everyone who knows lots of different folklores - because these people know their stuff, clearly, it's just their conclusions that are lacking - that makes them want to connect everything, or just leap to really odd conclusions. Like, Atlantis was in Finland! All of Indo-European society was divided in three parts! Absolutely everyone really has the same mythology! Hamlet is Väinämöinen! And I mean, I know a lot of folklore. Am I next?

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¹ And mention the fact that he manages to associate the death of Pan with the king of the cats
²Admittedly I have a new favorite X all the time.

Current Music: La sonnambula: Ah non giunge

This is pretty much my new favorite sentence: "The name is Väinämöinen, due to vowel harmonization, but we had pity on the type-setter."

(it's from a book that argue, among other things, that Hamlet is equivalent to Lucius Junius Brutus, who killed Tarquinius; that Hamlet had a mill, like the Sampo, that ground out salt and is now on the bottom of the ocean; and that Samson is also a parallel figure. Among other things, including, as far as I can tell, that ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING is related to their thesis. On the bright side, it's led me to wikipedia Väinämöinen, giving me this picture and has a black-and-white version of this 16th century map. Check out the monsters! they're adorable!)

Current Music: maypole song

"A beautiful girl is mine, her form like that
of golden flowers, beloved Kleis,
for whom not even all Lydia would I take, or lovely...."

"Kleis has traditionally been taken to be Sappho's daughter..."

Ha ha, 19th century prudes trying to de-gay Sappho. I mean, I have no children, but I am p. sure that I would not talk about them that way.

Also, Campbell's Greek Lyric Poetry doesn't print the second stanza of this: Once again Love drives me on, that loosener of limbs,
bittersweet creature against which nothing can be done.

But to you, Atthis, the thought of me has grown
hateful, and you fly off to Andromeda.

And IDK, maybe it wasn't found yet. But I'm pretty sure you can also attribute that to prudery.

Current Music: Alcina: Ombre pallide

School started a while ago, I guess. And I guess it's been going fairly decently, though I'm not as into it this year as I have been. For one thing, it cuts into my reading time, and when I do read I'm really sleepy. I don't know about the rest of you, but I have very short patience when I'm sleepy. Not always in a snappy way: in fact, I am like a happy bear when I'm sleepy. What I have little patience for is media of any sort. I can only watch TV when I'm not tired, which is annoying, because otherwise it would be a great way of killing time. I can barely listen to music; only my very favorite songs can penetrate the fog surrounding my brain. And books. If I can even look at them, I get snappy with them more easily than I did over the summer, say*.

So now I am tired and really only read at meals** or when I have some spark of intelligence left in my sad brain (not often). I was reading A Pillar of Iron for three weeks or so. And it was ok, I guess. I might have been either more or less annoyed with it if I had read it in one or two sittings. It was about how Cicero was a perfect martyr whose only crime was loving his country too much and swerved from dull to awesome every few pages.

Then I started The Volcano Lover and was pretty annoyed by the style, and again I couldn't tell if I'd like it better when I was more alert or if it would grate on me in any mood. I made it about 15 pages. Now I'm 100-something pages into City of Saints and Madmen and well, it's not bad or anything. There's some pretty decent world-building, and the man can actually write decent English, though I have some quibbles with his chosen narrative voice. But really, the first story is about a man who falls in love with a mannequin in a store window. And didn't Hoffmann do that already, minus the slightly forced humor? The second is a history of the city, which is interesting, but in my current state at least, the humor grates on my nerves.

So I'm never entirely sure what's me and what's the sleep deprivation when I don't like something, for now.
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*and even over the summer, I was harsher than I usually am. I had a lot of books to read; even if you read fast, it's not worth reading something you don't like at all.

**because I have no friends who aren't paper and ink, duh

Current Music: Die Königin von Saba

I recently read Lawrence Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, mainly because George Steiner really liked it. And I really didn't. Or rather, I didn't really. I don't know why; the prose was actually quite lovely, which is very important, and there was a plot. It bothers me quite a bit that I don't know why I dislike it. I usually know - in fact, I usually dissect it here. While it is "allowed" to dislike something simply because you don't like it, it rarely happens to me. For example: things I dislike: Puccini, because his music tends to be pretty but not particularly memorable, or even different; Stephen Saylor, because his characters are unbelievable for their time; Vergil, because I find him to be lacking in poetic spirit*.

So since I finished the Durrell, I've been trying to put my finger on what exactly made it hard to get into. Perhaps the distance - the narration is a certain type of lyrical that reads as detached; but there's also a lack of distance on the narrator's part, perhaps related to the small scope (the novels are about a set of about six ex-pats, of various patriae, in Alexandria). Maybe the novels are better read with more time between them; I had an omnibus edition. Serial books tend to be better spaced out. Or maybe I just don't really care about the lovelives, no matter how dramatic, of other people, especially rather self-involved people. This self-involvement contributes to the lack of distance, I think; the narrator takes himself very seriously, and while there are some portions of the text that conflict with this self-presentation, Durrell is very much of the narrator's party.

Even after all that, I still don't know what exactly bothers me - and that bothers me greatly.

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*OH YEAH I WENT THERE

Current Music: leonardo leo: mi lusinga il cor d'affetto

Through Norton World Poetry, which goes from the Bronze age to about yesterday, I've encountered many new poets, and realized with a good deal of guilt that I like most of the French poets much better in English. This is, in part, because of the translations chosen, which are often very free. For instance, Georg Heym's Die Seefahrer.

( The Text )

Current Music: Neidhart von Reuental: Blozen wir den anger ligen sahen

Day X- The first novel you remember reading

LOL IDK.
No, really, I have absolutely no idea. I suppose it depends on what you count as a novel, for one thing, and even if you have a fairly loose definition of "novel" that includes "kid's book," I still have no idea. I suppose The Hobbit is pretty close to the first; I think I read Great Expectations fairly early on, but I don't really remember when. Perhaps E. B. Nesbit, Five Children and It, which is great and which I shall read to any hypothetical children of mine.

Current Music: si spietata il tuo rigore

Day IX- A Book you’ve read more than once

I re-read books. Not so much lately, because I've had very little time for re-reading, what with all the universe of books that awaits me, provided by the lovely university library, the dollar section of Strand, and various sellers on Amazon. But when I was younger, broke, and too lazy to go the library, I totally did. So it was not so much a mark of respect for the book as an indication of my boredom that I read things multiple times. I think I've read Sabriel eleven times.

But I suppose I've read Invisible Cities enough times to have practically memorized it because I love it; because it's beautiful, elusive, etc.

As a side note, I'm listening to the Lerner and Lowe Camelot, and god knows it's sappy as all hell, and the lyrics are not actually all that good, but damn if "Before I gaze at you again" and "I loved you once in silence," not to mention the finale, make me weep like a child.

Day VIII- An unpopular book you believe should be a Best-Seller

This is problematic. I suppose it refers to something you think everyone should read; but I fully admit that my criteria for books are different than most people's. (does it have decent prose? is it set/written before 1900? is this a totally ridiculous historical novel? is it The Last Days of Pompeii?) I like lots of action as much as the next person, but the books I like are often dismissed as "slow;" Name of the Rose is a perfect example.

But anyway, I can answer this question! Conan Doyle's already popular, though more people have heard of Sherlock Holmes than have read the stories. The Brigadier Gérard stories, however, are not, and really should be. They're hilarious - in one, the Brigadier has been entrusted by Napoléon with Papers of Great Importance, which he must carry through enemy territory. When, with great difficulty, he does so, he finds that they were false plans, and the real plan was for him to get captured and mislead the English - and some of them have a certain pathos, and many of them have ridiculously complex plots, and some have adorably Gothic elements. All is carried by the figure of the Brigadier, who is overly full of himself without being a figure of ridicule, and dashing enough to justify at least half of his bravado.

Day VII: A book that’s hard to read

What's this? a chance to complain about Thucydides?

Thucydides is very important. The Peloponnesian war is very interesting. The History of the Peloponnesian War is dull as ditch-water. No, that's unfair. 70% is uninteresting, because it consists of battle order and other things I couldn't follow in English. In Greek, people opened their mouths and it got harder. Unfortunately, those were the interesting bits. So it was a trade-off between interesting but grammatically overly complex and boring but readable.

In fact, it made such an impression on me (scarred me?) that here I am three months later, with memories of pain fresh in my head, even after I am done, and will hopefully never have to read him again. So yeah. Literally hard to read, and a book I can safely say that I am glad to be done with.

Day VI- A Book that makes you cry

Oh dear. A better question would be "a book that doesn't make me cry. It is pretty easy to play on my emotions. I cried at the end of Rienzi, for God's sake! That can actually be justified, though, for the most part. Rienzi is my type of character: noble, surrounded by people who don't understand him, chivalrous and proud to a fault, and of course trying very hard to establish a decent kingdom for his people. And of course he can't, and of course he falls, and of course he dies alone and in shame. That was in fact pretty much calculated to tear at my heartstrings.

But what really makes me bawl every time is La Morte d'Arthur. Seriously, I'm looking at the end now, and tearing up. This passage "Ah Launcelot, he said, thou were head of all Christian knights, and now I dare say, said Sir Ector, thou Sir Launcelot, there thou liest, that thou were never matched of earthly knight's hand. And thou were the courteoust knight that ever bare shield. And thou were the truest friend to thy lover that ever bestrad horse. And thou were the truest lover of a sinful man that ever loved woman. And thou were the kindest man that ever struck with sword. And thou were the goodliest person that ever came among press of knights. And thou was the meekest man and the gentlest that ever ate in hall among ladies. And thou were the sternest knight to thy mortal foe that ever put spear in the rest" sums up the whole work, "And thou were the truest lover of a sinful man that ever loved woman" especially. Lancelot's downfall is in the contradictions that Lionel lays out here. I think part of why Lancelot and Guinevere's story is so tragic is that it's not the young, pure love of many stories. In parts it borders on the sordid; and certainly Lancelot commits great crimes for Guinevere - the deaths of Gareth and Gaharis, in particular - yet nonetheless it's true love, in a way that, say, Aucassin and Nicolette isn't.

The greatest tragedy, and the one that makes me weep even over Camelot the musical, is that everything falls apart, and more that the seeds of the tragedy are there even at the height of the glory of Camelot. No one's allowed to be happy, except maybe for a little while. And the result is nothing - the best knights gone in the Grail Quest, and Mordred left at court to be mean and petty - and after Mordred's treachery, nothing. The last knights gather at Lancelot's grave and then disperse, and nothing is heard of them.

So I'm actually kind of a wreck now, because I looked up the end, and the death of Gareth and Gaheris, and Gawaine's last letter to Lancelot. And it's all so sad!

Current Music: Scherza infida

so I was "camping" yesterday. In a cabin with a/c and electric lights. The less said about that, the better. And my mac is out of commission, having had limeade and cheerios spilled on it. Yes, I was eating the cheerios with the limeade. We had no milk. So I'm on my Dell, which will give me eyestrain, since half of the screen is very dim. Anyway,

Day IV- A Book that reminds you of home.

I have certainly done a lot of reading at home, and there are certainly books that I associate with certain places or times. Unfortunately, these two statements don't coincide. Home is my default, and after a while you don't really notice the default. However, Lord of the Rings makes me feel that I've come home. The first time I read it, or rather had it read to me, was when I was four and five*. Since then I've read the whole trilogy at least ten times. The places and history are as familiar to me as the history of, say, Byzantium or Rome. Every time I read it, I feel happy (and then I cry buckets at the end, whatever). In fact, I'd be reading it now, if re-reads weren't lowest priority in the long tale of the forty-six books I have acquired and not yet read*.

And Day V- A Non-fiction book that you actually enjoyed.

Well, I take exception to the "actually!" I've been reading quite a bit of non-fiction lately*. In any case, The Castrati in Opera was pretty entertaining, although totally trashy. Much of it was essentially an 18th century gossip rag, though there's nothing wrong with that. Along with Opera and Sovereignty, it decided where I'd go first with my time machine - man-on-the-street interviews about Zeus with Athenians can wait, I'm going to the opera! Half for the baroque no one's recorded (yet, I hope!*) and half for the singer-drama. Farinelli refused to sing an aria because it was written for Caffarelli, and singing it would make it look as though Caffarelli were the better singer! One castrato said he wasn't going to sing, for the audience effect when he did show up! Two singers got into a physical fight onstage! However, while the music would probably be great (well, some of it at least. I admit, some baroque can be dull), I have a feeling that today's singers would be better - probably better trained, probably bigger voices. Nonetheless, going to an 18th century opera house would be an Experience that I would totally love, and maybe I'd get to see/hear Adriano in Siria without paying seventy dollars*.

Anyway, Opera and Sovereignty was much deeper, and while I was hoping it would put more focus on libretti, it was still very interesting. While seria libretti clearly uphold the picture of the world as governed by a just king (Clemenza di Tito is quite explicit), the very fact of opera's existence also supported the world order - in fact, the nobles were quite unhappy when the burghers opened their own opera house. Also, anything you may have heard about silence in the opera house being a Wagnerian thing is not exactly true: the Duke of Naples also had a list of rules and regulations for opera-goers in his house. Like you couldn't wear your sword.

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*Dad read it to me as bedtime stories, and of course had to stop every so often. After beginning one night after a cliff-hanger, he asked me if I was worried, and I replied that no, I had read ahead.
*If I keep going at a book a day, I'll have seven left when school starts. Alas, at least two of them are over 1000 pages.
*The History of Byzantium I'm reading right now so does not count, as it reads like the back-story to a trashy fantasy novel.
*Someone has recorded Pergolesi's Olimpiade, but it's not available on Amazon. GOD I AM SO BITTER.
*Man, I would kill for that Adriano in Siria on Amazon. Bitter Pergolesi fan right here.

Current Music: Adriano in Siria: Lieto cosi tal volto

Day III: A Book that completely surprised you (bad/good)

The ABC of Reading. I had started it quite a long time ago, and, having read only what was anthologized in the shorter Norton, I was predisposed to dislike it, as Pound was pretty much everything I hated in the twentieth century. And I got about halfway through and did, in fact, hate what I read. Although I did recognize some of his points, they were mainly lost in the swirling atmosphere of smugness. Like, you should read Provencal, Italian, French, and I believe Latin and Greek in order to consider yourself well-read in English. And really, that is a fair point: many of the forms of English poetry were imported from the Continent, especially in the Renaissance; many early sonnets are free translations (did you know that Whoso list to hunt is a free translation/imitation of Dante and also about Anne Boleyn?); and so on and so forth. But there is the assumption that, essentially, anyone can teach themselves Provencal. And hey, I probably could. I guess. If I had but inclination enough and time*. But the majority of people can't - if there's one thing we need it's for the idea of "being well-read" to be more exclusionary.

Anyway, despite having spent a decently long paragraph complaining about one of its main theses, I did enjoy it - mainly, however, for Pound's acerbic comments. (did you know Pound had a sense of humor? he parodied Housman pretty entertainingly.) Of course, even while being entertained, I was slightly put off. The following quote about Whitman is quite amusing: From an examination of Whitman made 12 years ago, the writer carried away the impression that there are 30 well-written pages; he is now unable to find them. And really, I agree, for the most part. I could never get behind Whitman. But the dismissiveness is unfortunate, and assumes that the reader accepts Pound as the ultimate authority. And I don't know that I trust anyone who likes Walter Savage Landor to be that authority. Pound claims that Landor doesn't waste words, or something of the sort, and likes him. I don't get it, as much as Pound must not get people who like Whitman. Landor wrote Past ruined Ilion, which is pretty much that operetta aria that is totally sappy and terrible and you love it anyway. But the "sappy and terrible" must be recognized. He did sappy a lot: Exhibit A and Exhibit B. He's basically the Salieri of poetry: pleasant enough, but you'd never mistake him for a master.

So when you have large lapses in your judgment like that, it's hard to take your word for things. And looking back, it's hard to say why I enjoyed it so much - but anyway, I did. Maybe it was the analysis of Renaissance English translations of Vergil - that was pretty interesting. And, I suppose, the put-downs, as much as they kept me from truly being behind his project. In any case, it surprised me, because it did not catch into flame from the sheer power of my burning hate.

__
*Actually, I totally would, and then speak only in Provencal, because it is a lovely language.

Current Music: Elisabetta al castello di Kenilworth

Day II: Least Favorite Book

I don't really have one. That is, there are books which I have disliked, and disliked intensely, for various reasons. I can't stand Toni Morrison, for example, in part because we read her out of white guilt in high school, as far as I can tell. Obviously what she's trying to do is important, but she doesn't have characters so much as points, and she doesn't suit her narrative style to her narrator, and there's at least one scene per book that's there mainly to shock. I realized, in 10th grade, that I couldn't write an essay about Song of Solomon because none of my points would stand, because she wasn't consistent enough. So I suppose you could say that that's my least favorite book. Certainly it has very few redeeming qualities that I can see. But "least favorite" to me implies that you think about it more often than when people ask you what your least favorite book is - I can't think of any books that I think about and think "God, that was awful," unless prompted. And in fact, some of the books that I think about and think "God, that was awful" are highly entertaining, because they were awful. (Shout-out to Karleen Koen's Through A Glass Darkly goes here.)

I have in fact been very lucky, or perhaps very good at choosing things I would like: out of the 30something books I've read this summer, I've disliked maybe five actively* and thought, "oh, this isn't really very good" about a couple more*. But I've absolutely loved a couple, been educated by some, and entertained by most.

So that was more positive than a least favorite book post probably should be, but really, livejournal, what is it about your fatal charm that makes it so...fatal?
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*Ugh, Ibid: A Life in Footnotes. Cute idea, terrible, terrible execution.
*The Warrior Prophet: Very rapey, includes the line "his/her skin pimpled"(from fear, cold, etc) about a million times, includes the line "his eyes blazed glory" (at all) but I think twice. In fact, probably due a post.

So I think I'm doing the 30 day book challenge*, only here instead of tumblr, because my tumblr is for pretty pictures, not words! And the first challenge is "your favorite book."

Now, like, I hope, anyone who reads a lot, I have a lot of trouble with this. There are books that I love, and books that I have loved, and books I've read to pieces. But I have trouble putting my finger on an absolute favorite. Setting aside what could be said about the display of choosing a favorite book - do I want to seem like a nerd (Lord of the Rings!) or slightly pretentious (Invisible Cities) or slightly unimaginative (Sherlock Holmes)- it's nearly impossible for me to actually decide. The three aforementioned books are the ones that spring to mind when asked for "my favorite book;" all three are from the recesses of my childhood. I read the last of them ten years ago. Of course, there's also The Once and Future King clamoring at my elbow, and The Bull from the Sea, and Eco's Baudolino. More recently, I loved Helen in Egypt: H. D. achieves the quality of a dream and evokes mystery, in the way that a priestess of Demeter at Elusis would call up the mystery of her site, all the while working with deep knowledge of the myths.

Such are the contenders for my heart and love, and I am hard-put to choose between them. Let us just say that my favorite book is one that keeps mystery at its heart, that takes place in a world not of today, and that has a certain beauty of language.

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*May not actually happen

I was going to do a whole long post on Edward Rutherford's London, but really it's not worth it. Basically, it's very long (1100 pages) and not very good. There are a couple of reasons: the prose, for instance, is at best mediocre and at worse awkward: "She was the widow of a knight, the daughter of a knight, and looked it" & "Could it be that Lady Whatshername was preparing for a sexual encounter?" The first is grammatically bad: "and looked it" or whatever the exact phrasing was is not parallel to the first two parts of the sentence. The second is a tone-killer. Lady Whatshername, in 18th century London, would not have thought of it as a "sexual encounter." (Really, does anyone?) And after a long and meticulous description of her toilette, in decent 18th century terms, the clinical, blatantly 20th century term is just terrible.

Another reason it's not great is because of the structure. The book ~spans 2000 years of London's history~, which means that Rutherford hits the high points of English history with Rutherford's bland interconnected families forced in. At one point, Chaucer, who is, incidentally, the godfather of one of the families' child, Chaucer casually mentions that he's going to write a story about a bunch of pilgrims! O M G! Further, as stated before, he can't draw a character to save his life. No, two repeated adjectives do not a personality make.

And the most important reason, I think, that it's not very good, is that Rutherford seems to have some scorn for historical people. I've read things that have less than stellar prose* and enjoyed them - my favorite historical series is Alan Gordon's Jester books, which are wonderful, but have a few stylistic quirks that get on my nerves quite a bit. But Gordon doesn't seem to be smirking up his sleeve at medieval people. Rutherford mocks medieval medical attitudes; treatment of women*; and 16th century medical knowledge. The problem with this is that it creates distance and threatens the immersion; and also, it's hard to like characters that the author looks down on. Presumably you write historical fiction because you like, at least a little bit, the past, and can deal with its imperfections in ways other than directly commenting on them.

So anyway, I only read it because it was long and I didn't have much other choice*, weight limits on airplanes being what they are, and I don't suggest that you read it, unless you're in a similar situation.

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*you kind of have to, given the lack of stellar prose
*treatment of women in the middle ages was awful. The way to deal with that in your novel is not saying "treatment of women in the middle ages was awful."
*and ugh, I picked the worst books to bring. I have disliked 3 of 6 that I read, and then Parzival fell apart.

So because obscure bel canto operas are sort of What I Do, I saw Mayr's Medea in Corintho today.

Three Main Impressions: 1. This opera house is gorgeous. 2. Medea is amazing, I must google her. 3. WHAT THE HELL DID I JUST WATCH

Because in the first act at least, this was Regietheater at its dubious finest. Which means: lots of supernumeraries, ridiculous costumes, and in this case, a bit of blackface. No, really. I have no idea why, but there were a bunch of captives in really embarrassing blackface. There was also a good deal of killing supernumeraries for no particular reason, during an aria about being happy - my best guess is that it was supposed to invoke the dark underside of Creusa and Jason's love, because it is after all founded upon Medea's betrayals.

There were also two young men running around the stage, who were supposed to represent love and hate, I'm pretty sure. Hate was dressed in pale blue and lichen green, because, well, I have no idea.

It wasn't all bad, though: during the second act, the stage was much less cluttered by unnecessary people and killing thereof, and was thus the more dramatic. Medea's costumes were interesting: she wore variations on black dresses for most of the opera, then at the end, after killing her children, she wore white and held her son's red ball.

Musically and dramatically, the opera is very uneven. Arias and duets tend to happen with no particular cause or transition, and the usurpation by Egeo is a mere distraction - it happens at the end of the first act and is dealt with during the intermission. The music is very rich, from that transitional period between classical and bel canto; and yet, it often feels flat and earthbound, without the transcendence of Donizetti or Bellini. Nonetheless, there are glorious moments, mainly when Medea sings.

All in all, a quite enjoyable night, if you ignore the staging.

The trailer of the opera (yeah, operas have trailers now I guess)

And Nadja Michael (Medea) singing "Glück, das mir verblieb," by Korngold

Nel mezzo del cammin del my Thucydides paper, I found myself lacking in motivation, so I decided to go outside to work, planning to use the cold as a motivator: two more pages and I could go in. Little did I know I had forgotten something very important.

Yeah, I locked myself out.

So clearly there is a lot of good poetry about Odysseus and Penelope.

And I can't get behind it, or most of it, 100%. I love the Merwin, for example, - As though he had got nowhere but older? amazing - but that must needs conflict with my love for what I believe is Homer's Odysseus, who wants nothing more than to go home. And much as I enjoy Stallings' bitter, perhaps unfaithful Penelope's voice, I like her faithful*.

My favorite writing on Odysseus is in fact in Plato's Myth of Er: "There came also the soul of Odysseus having yet to make a choice, and his lot happened to be the last of them all. Now the recollection of former tolls had disenchanted him of ambition, and he went about for a considerable time in search of the life of a private man who had no cares; he had some difficulty in finding this, which was lying about and had been neglected by everybody else; and when he saw it, he said that he would have done the had his lot been first instead of last, and that he was delighted to have it." And this is projecting onto the character no less than the later poems. Odysseus is still very much a Homeric hero, concerned with his kleos. Yet it is telling that he was initially unwilling to go to war, and that it was a threat to his son that forced him to go.

Any writing on a character that you have not yourself created is a kind of projection: I am sure that every version of Arthur, for example, bears with it something of the author, though his or her name be lost to time. And it is easy enough to project dissatisfaction, though heroic dissatisfaction onto Odysseus (To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield). He is the eternal traveler; he leaves places where he has been happy - but, it is often ignored, not for the unknown but for the known.

Why do I project the desire for homecoming and for a calm and quiet love for his wife onto Odysseus? for though it is Homerically justifiable, it is projection nonetheless. I think I want at least one happy couple in the corpus of Greek mythology,* and happy not just on a superficial fairy-tale level: Penelope and Odysseus are no longer children. They are linked by mental compatibility; Homer states that they "think the same." They have faced dangers to be with each other, to lie in each others' arms, as they do in Book 22. They complete each other.

I want their happiness because they are the first couple I really believed in. And so while I can admire the poems as poems - many of them are really spectacular - there is always something that keeps me back from loving them wholeheartedly.

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*This has its own problems considering Odysseus' infidelity, nor do I excuse his: I would have preferred them both patient.
*The other candidate is Alcestis and Admetus.

Current Music: Solomon, HWV 67: Welcome as the dawn of day

I dreamt about a story-telling contest. I told a story about a king whose three daughters died on three consecutive nights. They were sent to a place where a man and woman lived. The woman had a huge lower jaw, and the trick was not to mention it. The first two did, of course, and were thrown into Hell; the third didn’t. This story was applauded.
( and it continues )

Guess all the story-type represented and win a prize! Aarne-Thompson numbers must be included.

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Theodora Elucubrare

December 2018

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Theodora Elucubrare

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December 2018

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