~ A guest post by Laura Ford ~ Continuing our look at the etymology of proper names, it is interesting that the two women who jointly raised Odysseus have very similar names: Eurycleia means “broad fame,” and Anticleia means “opposing fame.” Do their names constitute a clue concerning their respective attitudes towards Odysseus’ quest for kleos by joining the expedition to Troy? Eurycleia was Odysseus’ wet nurse and the one… Read more
~ A guest post by Sarah Scott ~ I was fascinated by the recent CHS Open House discussion about names as micronarratives, and in particular how the name of a son can reflect a main characteristic of the father. One example mentioned was Telemakhos “he who fights at a distance”, which so aptly describes Odysseus both for his being away at Troy for so much of Telemakhos’ early life, and… Read more
|1 That man, tell me O Muse the song of that man, that versatile [polu-tropos] man, who in very many ways |2 veered from his path and wandered off far and wide, after he had destroyed the sacred citadel of Troy. |3 Many different cities of many different people did he see, getting to know different ways of thinking [noos]. |4 Many were the pains [algea] he suffered in his… Read more
We are pleased to share the following video, which was filmed for a HeroesX segment of AlumniX. In this clip Professor Nagy responds to a question about whether or not heroes can hope to achieve something that is beyond their portion or fate [huper moiran]. Nagy argues that within the ancient Greek song culture, the poetic phrase “beyond fate” can be equivalent to saying something is “beyond tradition.” This idea becomes… Read more
~ A guest post by Janet Ozsolak ~ The active interaction among the bard, internal audience and the external audience in a Homeric performance intrigued me since Version 1 of the HeroesX project. I wondered how the external audience, in the 5th century BCE, processed such a complicated narrative (Homeric Iliad and Odyssey). How did they kept them near and dear to their song culture? How did they connect the… Read more