sophia_sol | Taiwan and The Odyssey

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Taiwan and The Odyssey

I have RETURNED FROM TAIWAN. Er. I forgot to mention that's where I was going, didn't I. So. I was in Taiwan! And now I've returned! It was fun!

And that means now I get to go look at how long my f/rlist's gotten and weep. And also attack all the comments I've been meaning to respond to....

In other news, I just read The Odyssey for the first time ever. And it's, like, good or something. Shocker! I enjoyed the heck out of most of it, and spent a bunch of the first part happily shipping Telemachus/Athena-in-Mentor's-body (what, they totally have a mutual appreciation society going on), until in the second half it becomes more clear that really Athena just thinks Odysseus is totally awesome and forgets all about Telemachus to lavish her attention on Odysseus.

(I also shipped Odysseus/what's-his-face-the-swineherd a little bit. Another mutual appreciation society!)

Reading it, I ended up being rather surprised by some things about it, in which I had false expectations from my impressions from popular culture. The story was presented all inside out and backwards from how I was expecting. Silly me, I thought it was going to be ALL focusing on Odysseus, and that it was going to be relatively chronological. Nope! But I am OKAY WITH THAT. I kind of think Telemachus is awesome. Also I was fascinated that Odysseus gets home like halfway through the book. And the entire second half is him dealing with the issues of the unwanted suitors! The way that popular culture carries on about the Awesome Adventures Of Odysseus' Travels, you'd never guess. Years and years of travels take up one half the book, and a few days of doing stuff the entire second half. I THINK I CAN GUESS WHAT THE AUTHOR THOUGHT WAS MORE IMPORTANT. Hint: it's not the same thing we do.

Also the ending is really kind of weird. Oh look, there's going to be a battle between Odysseus' folks and the families of the dead suitors! Things are all gearing up! Things are tense and dramatic! Athena steps out and is like, "um, no" and then it all just ends? NOT VERY CONCLUSATORY. Or at least, the pacing feels all messed up to me.

In other news, I really like the rhythm of the language in the Odyssey. I got really caught up in it, and really loved it. Even though it does lots of things that are frowned on in modern composition, it works.

Also I love the sensation of being immersed in another cultures mores and values like that. The absolute importance placed on the proper treatment of guests, for example. Fascinating!

And now I think I have to read the Iliad, because -- actual slashtasticness that I hardly need to read into at all! Unlike the Odyssey where I kept on finding places TO read slash into it, but it would require actual effort to make arguments for the slash. Unlike Achilles/Patrocles.

Except that I'm kind of bored, mostly, by books that go on and on about war. I was bored in the warmongering bits of the Odyssey already, and there are a LOT fewer than there are in a book that's, well, all ABOUT war. So.

(actually what I am reading now is Wuthering Heights. It was kind of an abrupt brainshift to go straight from Odyssey to Wuthering Heights. They are very different from each other!)

sentientcitizen can attest that it is pretty hilarious the way, if you get me started about The Odyssey, I will swing wildly back and forth between earnest-academic and squeeful-fan in my expressions of enjoyment. I GO BOTH WAYS, OKAY. Except that I think this post ended up being more of the latter than the former? It wouldn't take much to get me nattering academically though, I think!

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The Iliad is great. I love the Iliad so much more than the Odyssey. But I like action and war stories. And I hate the second half of the Odyssey. Nothing happens! For a really, really long time! And then the ending is a huge anticlimax! I wrote a rant about this on my LJ years ago. http://seekingferret.livejournal.com/14092.html

Telemachus/Athena-in-Mentor's-body is a great ship! I support that.

On the plus side, you are now poised in the perfect moment to read Joyce's Ulysses. Seriously, the best time to read Ulysses is right after reading The Odyssey. Every time I reread Ulysses I go back and reread The Odyssey first. So, I say, seize the opportunity! Trust me, it's plenty slashtastic, too.

Hah, IDK, I actually really liked most of the second half? Except for the bits that were all RAH RAH KILLIN' TIME NOW. I mean, I agree that it has a very different feel than the adventuring first half, but it's fun too! Possibly mostly because I think Odysseus is hilarious, with his constant need to be overly wily about EVERYTHING.

And...Ulysses was on my to-read list, but one of the footnotes of my copy of the Odyssey included a quote from Ulysses and I kind of blanched and went MAYBE NEVER MIND because it looks like the kind of book that would be a lot of work to read, even if it is good. Which is not so much my thing!

The point isn't that Ulysses is good, which it is, but that Ulysses is fun. Ulysses is consistently HILARIOUS and SLASHTASTIC and TRIPPY and wonderful in all sorts of ways.

It also... can be a good deal of work. It doesn't have to be, but much of the enjoyment comes from being invested in the work. Yes, I won't deny that. It's work I enjoy, work I enjoy so much that whenever I encourage a friend to read Ulysses it comes with a blanket offer: Call me whenever you want, IM me whenever you want, and I will talk you through anything you need help with.

Also, it starts out easy and fun and gets more complicated as it goes along. There is actually a reading curve to get you acclimated, so even though it's complicated it's not really scary. My professor told us "Joyce teaches you how to read Ulysses in Ulysses".

Also, ahha "his constant need to be overly wily about EVERYTHING" is a great way to describe him. I love it.

Well, I will...maybe keep Ulysses on my to-read list, but I doubt it will be in my near future if I do get around to reading it.

http://notfic.dreamwidth.org/1527.html

Huh! That post is actually somewhat convincing -- at least the bit about crack aus and the Circe chapter. AUs are totally a weakness of mine....

Circe is great. I think I even may have forgotten to mention the genderswap AU where Bloom gives birth. CANON GENDERSWAP AU!!!

I name my computers after Iliad characters because that way I'll never ever run out of names. My old desktop was Paris, my old laptop was Agamemnon, my new laptop is Thersites. It is a great system.

Yes, you've told me this before! I do love this system of yours. It is great, and probably makes it much easier to come up with new names than my system! (flail around mentally for a while until I come up with something that I think feels thematically relevant)

WB! From TAIWAN! How was that?

I am a classics person and *I* have not yet read either of the homeric epics from start to finish. I keep meaning to do something about that... So I am really impressed!

Out of curiosity, what translation did you use?

Athena steps out and is like
Ahaha, deus ex machina!!! For some reason I find this really funny, probably how you phrased it. The ending is frequently used in tragedies too, where the god steps in at the last second and prevents (further) bloodshed. It is sort of very abrupt and very different from modern storytelling expectations.

PEE ESS: I love that you spoiler cut for a 2800 year old text <3

HAH. Well, I figured, if there were things about it that surprised me, I should allow other people to experience those surprises first hand too if they want to! :D

It is one of the things I love about Fandom: that we respect the first hand/ first time experience of newcomers much more than, say, Academia, which is more like, "And then in the end X dies. Oh, wait, maybe you didn't know that. Oh, well, now you do! As I was saying..."

Oh, I know! Academia is TERRIBLE for that. My sister once read a footnoted copy of some classic book or another, and a footnote early in the book spoilered the end. WHYYYYY.

(of course, it doesn't matter hugely to me, spoilerphile that I am, but I am deeply immersed in fandom's culture of how to approach spoilers, and breaking it feels ANATHEMA.)

Taiwan was awesome! I was there with my mom on a business trip of hers, so it was a more relaxed approach to being a tourist for me, since she spent a lot of every day in meetings. But it was awesome to be immersed in this other culture, especially since I'd never actually been to Asia before. And Taipei is a fascinating city! (also omg I am SO JEALOUS of their amazing metro system. Cheap and efficient and reliable! Better on ALL counts than my local bus system...)

You totally should read the homeric epics in their entirety! Thus far I can tell you it's very much worth it!

My translation was...Robert Fagles, I think. Yes.

See, the thing about the Athena thing is that she'd been so intimately involved in the proceedings all through the book, nudging people into doing the right thing, and this felt like it was going to be another thing like that, but then it was just OKAY THAT'S ALL FOLKS THE END. But yeah, probs I'd be less thrown by the ending if that was the storytelling style I'd grown up with!

Aw, it sounds lovely. Pretty lucky to have a mom who gets to go on business trips to Asia! I've never been anywhere east of Europe. Hee, metro systems are fascinating. They're digging up large parts of central Copenhagen to put one down right now, and apart from traffic being doubly bad UNTILL it's up and running, they keep bumping into archeological findings that need to be ANALYZED XD Putting one in from the beginning is key. Too bad they didn't think of that in the 12th century.

Homer is on my list! I think there might be a bigger chance I'll feel motivated once I've finished Latin, though.

Hee, well, they Doylist view would definitely be to say that the narrator ran out of time/ink. Probably it also it didn't feel so bad back then, because everyone was so familiar with all the myths, that people would think, "Oh, right, and then after that these things happened." Hmm... I don't know if there's anything specific about Odysseus later... I *think* there's a specific myth about his death, though?

I know, I was super lucky to get to go along with my mom this time! She doesn't do international business trips very often, and this is the only time I've been able to come along. I've been pretty envious of some other business trips my parents have taken too, though. Like my dad going to EGYPT ZOMG. (Also, I've never actually been to Europe, unless you include the immediate vicinity of the Frankfurt airport, so yeah.)

Silly medieval people, not putting in subway systems. *grin*

You should totally read Homer! But Latin is an excellent priority too.

I do like the Doylist view!

Yeah, there's a myth about his death. And it's mentioned in the Odyssey, actually. There's a prophecy, doncha know.

Egypt sounds really cool as well, I would definitely like to see it some day. You should go to Europe some day! We have Paris and stuff!

Hee, what a coincidence that there should be a prophecy! Astounding stuff :oP

Oh, I really WANT to go to Europe! So badly! There's so much density of history all around, to a far greater extent than can be found in North America. (yes, I know, there's a lot of history here too, but it's not visible and tangible to the same extent. There's no thousand-year-old buildings, things like that) And actually, Paris isn't really very high on my list of places in Europe I'd particularly like to visit, even though it is eternally popular. SO MANY COOL PLACES TO VISIT, THOUGH. HOW COULD I EVER CHOOSE.

I get that feeling of swooping history and tradition occasionally when I'm travelling here, but mostly I think Europeans are really used to ancient buildings and historical sites that we're stunned when tourists come and are impressed. But then, I had that same feeling in Rome of "OMG RUINS, YOU GUYS!" and the inhabitants were very clearly less impressed XD

Hee, I've been to Paris once, and I found it to be quite full of North Americans ;o)

Yeah, very true -- if you grow up surrounded by something, then it's hard to see it as special and exciting!

OMG IT'S A POST ABOUT HOMER, IT'S TEI-BAIT. I'm on narcotics atm so sorry if this makes no sense but Homer takes up enough of my brain-space I think I can manage talking about it!

1. The ending! My theory about the ending is basically exactly the opposite of calvinahobbes' above-- I don't think it was that he ran out of time, I think it was that he needed to tack something on the end: someone yelled "encore!" or something after the real story was finished towars the end of the 23rd section, so he started this whole new plot that would have taken too long to vring to an actual concluion, so he just chopped it off with Athena.

There are a whole bunch of fragments of other epics, one of which picks up where the Odyssey left off-- if I remember correctly, a son he had with... uh brain not working I don't remember who but one of the women on his way home had a child by him, who went looking for him and ended up killing him. I think. It's hard to date all these things, though, so I have no idea if Homer's listeners would have known of that.

You should 100% read the Iliad! In theory, I like the Odyssey better because the story is cooler, but for some reason I always end up going to the Iliad when I am in a Homeric mood. A cool thing about the Iliad which also applies, although not as well, the the Odyssey is that it's... symmetrical. i had a handy diagram, but it"s in Montreal.. basically, if you lay out the events in each book, there are parallels between the events in equivalent books, pivoting around the exact middle of the composition. er... i thought that was cool ? In terms of the Iliad being less interessting because it's just war, well, yeah... um, there is a whole book, I forget which one, that's just a list of all the ships and people who are participating in the war. So that bit is boring and useless and should be skipped over. But there are also really excellent non-war moments, like Hactor's wish for his son which made me LEGIT CRY the first time i read it.

Yay, I love that you love Homer so much! Have no fear, you are making perfect sense despite the narcotics. Although you have a "1" in an implication that you are beginning a numbered list that goes no further than a single point. :DDD

I like your ending theory too! Now I want to go back and reread the ending again with both yours and Calvina's theories in mind and see what I think is up.

OKAY if you think the Iliad is that awesome then I am totally reading it! Except I don't have a copy sitting readily to hand like I did the Odyssey, so I'll have to go find myself a copy. Do you know what the good translations are? I liked Fagles' Odyssey, but it would be good to have multiple options when I go searching used bookstores!

Also, yes, you are NOT THE ONLY ONE that thinks that the symmetry of composition is cool. THAT IS SO COOL.

Hm, well I love Lattimore's because he's so ridiculously obsessive about ~doing it right~ that you can actually match it up line-for-line. But it is not the most poetically arresting version. I hear lots of people love Fagles, though! And Lombardo is very readable and does some excellent things like setting apart in italics the monster similes which can be kind of confusing when they're integrated into the text. Then there's Pope, which is in rhyming couplets, which, er... I agree with Richard Bentley's assessment of it as "a pretty poem." Aha.

I was a fan of Lombardo's translation. Fagles is fine, too. I have no experience with any others. No, I take that back. I had a strong negative response to Fitzgerald.

I'd never heard of that one, but I just looked up the first few lines and it looks, um, weird. Example: LOL, Agamemnon the Lord Marshal. That epithet is used 50 times in the Iliad, is it seriously going to keep that up the whole way through? It looks like a good poetic version, I suppose...

Yeah, Fitzgerald is pretty ridiculous. I bounced hard off his Odyssey the first time, but parts of it have grown on me. It's now the version I own and reread before I reapproach Ulysses, though that's mainly because it was dirt cheap at a book sale. But when I bounced hard off his Iliad I switched to Lombardo and was like "Damn, this is awesome!"

Hm, I am getting the feeling that I should do some initial approaching of Ulysses...

As I said to

sophia_sol, I'm willing to do any handholding you might require to do such approaching. The first couple chapters really aren't that difficult, though reading Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man first or at least the cliffnotes, would probably be helpful.

Thank you for the suggestion! I will look into that first...

Thanks! I will keep this in mind!

Good to know! *makes notes*

I like your theory of the ending! Probably you know way more about it than I do anyway (I've mostly read the chapters with Odysseus' voyage).

ODYSSEY. What translation did you read, or are you one of those intimidating people who actually read Greek? ;-)

My copy is the W.H.D. Rouse translation; I got it at one of those get-kids-to-read "read x number of books and you win... a book!" things (I am a compulsive and voracious reader, so until I got WAY TOO OLD for them to let me do those anymore, my only problem was finding books I hadn't read yet to qualify! *g*) and it is AWESOME. Although it is in prose.

(Which was probably just as well, as I have trouble with poetry unless I can read it out loud. In the original. CANTERBURY TALES. ...yeah. I can't read Greek because some of the letters are also in Elvish only with different sounds, which confuses me.)

Anyway. Point. ODYSSEY. :D I was a fan even from the kiddie retellings I used to read - I was always Odysseus when we played Trojan War (we were strange kids, yeah) - but the real thing is Quite A Lot Awesomer. So I am basically agreeing with you on that, and now I will stop babbling. Maybe. ;-)

I read the Fagles translation! It was very good. No, I'm not one of those intimidating people who actually read Greek -- I WISH I was, but I'm not. I am, alas, monolingual with a few pitiful bits of knowledge about French and German only.

(CANTERBURY TALES. So awesome! I totally need to read the whole thing, at some point. But speaking of reading it out loud in the original, there was a dude in a West Civ class of mine once who knew all the rules of proper pronunciation of Middle English, and had the opening of the Canterbury Tales memorized, and it was so fascinating to listen to him recite it. It sounded like a totally foreign language, even though on the page it's half-comprehensible!)

(Also, you can read ELVISH? Awesome!)

Oh, hey, that is AWESOME that you used to play Trojan War as a kid! I was certainly a huge fan of greek myths as a kid, and read up a lot about them in bowdlerized versions, so I was pretty familiar already with a lot of the bits of the story from The Odyssey, but yeah, the real thing is DEFINITELY awesomer.

Oh, my Middle English pronunciation is ABYSMAL. I can do just enough of it to get the rhythm somewhere near even. Mostly I just sort of modernize / Scotticize / Germanize the words and revel in the word order being right. (You can TELL sometimes when a translator has hit a line like "who them hath holpen when that they were seke" and has tried to modernize the word order. It murders the rhythm entirely.) Even with the way I mangle it, though, I can tell that it's so much more incredibly beautiful and pointed than any translation could be.

'Also, you can read ELVISH? Awesome!'

The alphabet only, and a few dozen of the words (transliterated). I can read the LOTR and Silm maps for name-meaning pretty accurately, and translate the "A Elbereth Gilthoniel" and "Namarië" from memory - and I made up my username from cobbled-together bits - but I can't really do conjugations and such.

Oh yeah, I do love the word order thing! It's beautiful.

That's still very cool, that you know as much Elvish as that.

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Taiwan and The Odyssey

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