In the gloss provided by Gregory Nagy in H24H[1] and the associated Sourcebook[1], mēnis is summarized as “superhuman anger, cosmic sanction”. Following the Kosmos Society Book Club discussion about Leonard Muellner’s The Anger of Achilles: Mênis in Greek Epic (available online at CHS)[3], we became interested in finding out how the word was used in other texts, so it seems appropriate to choose this for the next Core Vocab discussion. Muellner… Read more
The subject of the Iliad is the anger of Achilles, not Achilles himself. But what is this anger of his? The Book Club this month will be reading and discussing selections from The Anger of Achilles: Mênis in Greek Epic (available free online at the Center for Hellenic Studies.) We will be reading how Leonard Muellner uses the insights of Albert Lord on epic themes, and looks at such anger not… Read more
Apollo, Golden Bronze, (200CE) Louvre A guest post by Kevin McGrath Greetings everyone and welcome to Hour 25. What I would like to do today is to view briefly the first sixty-seven lines of Scroll 1 of the Homeric Iliad and then, prompted by you, to reread some of those lines and images more closely. As you well know the first word of the poem, mēnis, indicates ‘anger’, as both… Read more
Cosmic anger and the poetic function of the mênis theme in Greek epic Community members who have enjoyed our past discussions with Professor Leonard Muellner will be happy to hear that the Center for Hellenic Studies has added Muellner’s The Anger of Achilles: Mênis in Greek Epic to its curated collection of free, online books. As in his first full-length volume, The meaning of Homeric εὔχομαι through its formulas, Muellner has focused this… Read more
We are happy to share the following archive of posts written by Leonard Muellner during the second session of HeroesX. Muellner is the Chair of the Board of Readers for HeroesX and Professor of Classical Studies at Brandeis University. He has been collaborating with Professor Gregory Nagy for over four decades. Post ID: Archive_HeroesXv2_LennyMuellner_1 Key Terms: song culture, kleos aphtiton, Milman Parry, Albert Lord Scroll 9 Iliad, modern oral traditions, Korea,… Read more