Books

Donum natalicium

Finismundo: The Last Voyage (Finismundo: A Última Viagem)

back Andrea Kouklanakis akouklan@fas.harvard.edu Abstract Finismundo: A Última Viagem (1990), written by the Brazilian poet Haroldo de Campos, uses Odysseus’ shipwreck as its foundational theme. In the Odyssey the question surrounding Odysseus’ death is articulated in ambiguous terms in book XI. Tiresias tells Odysseus that the hero will not meet death at sea (thánatos ex halós,v 134),if he propitiates Poseidon with sacrifices. Haroldo de Campos uses the phrase thánatos… Read more

Donum natalicium

Les Grecs en Amazonie. Un aller-retour de Claude Lévi-Strauss

back Marcel Detienne Des Grecs donc, parmi les Amérindiens, Indigènes ou natives, les Amérindiens font encore partie de certains paysages du Brésil. Malgré les conquêtes, les entreprises coloniales, ils n’ont pas le même statut que les Indiens d’Amérique du Nord. Car le Nord refuse, aujourd’hui encore, d’entendre parler d’autochtones : trop dangereux ; il refuse, comme la France où les droits des peuples autochtones ne sont toujours pas reconnus : chacun comprend… Read more

Donum natalicium

Homer and the Aegean Prehistorian

back Anthony Snodgrass With academic subjects as with people, many a close and intimate relationship can become cool and distant. It may even be broken off altogether, and replaced by a different relationship. In the case of academic disciplines, such a transfer of affections can lead to a radical and positive transformation of a subject, even when this also means the virtual disappearance of its older configuration. My offering… Read more

Donum natalicium

Le nom de Diomède

back Philippe ROUSSEAU Université Charles de Gaulle – Lille 3 UMR 8163 «Savoirs, Textes, Langage» Dans une démonstration qui a fait date Gregory Nagy, analysant à la suite de L. Palmer l’étymologie la plus probable du nom d’Achille comme une forme abrégée d’un nom *Akhí-lawos « dont le laos est en proie à l’akhos », écrit : « Plausible as it is, however, this reconstruction will not carry conviction unless we can be… Read more

Donum natalicium

2 ou 3 choses que je sais de l’Iliade

back Natasha Bershadsky {1. The rain/opening credits [1] } Sheets and sheets of rain pouring over the Trojan plain. The rain falling on some dilapidated mudbrick structures. Zoom: the mudbrick slowly melting under the rain. Back to the broader view: now streams of water are surging everywhere. The flood carries big stones, logs, pieces of armor, turning and tumbling in the water. [2]… Read more

Donum natalicium

Fathers and Sons; or, Recalling the Sound of Time

back Peter McMurray I. Can you see anything yet? “Well, Pyotr, can you see anything yet?” I first encountered these words, the opening line of Turgenev’s novel Fathers and Sons, shortly after finishing college. Having studied both Classics and Slavic literature, but really only Ancient Greek and South Slavic, I felt a compelling need to devour Russian and Latin literature (granted, mostly in translation) to make up for the obvious… Read more

Donum natalicium

Anthony Snodgrass: Homer and the Aegean Prehistorian

back Homer and the Aegean prehistorian Anthony Snodgrass With academic subjects as with people, many a close and intimate relationship can become cool and distant. It may even be broken off altogether, and replaced by a different relationship. In the case of academic disciplines, such a transfer of affections can lead to a radical and positive transformation of a subject, even when this also means the virtual disappearance of… Read more

Donum natalicium

Andrea Kouklanakis: Finismundo

back Finismundo: The Last Voyage (Finismundo: A Última Viagem) Andrea Kouklanakis akouklan@fas.harvard.edu Abstract Finismundo: A Última Viagem (1990), written by the Brazilian poet Haroldo de Campos, uses Odysseus’ shipwreck as its foundational theme. In the Odyssey the question surrounding Odysseus’ death is articulated in ambiguous terms in book XI. Tiresias tells Odysseus that the hero will not meet death at sea (thánatos ex halós,v 134),if he propitiates Poseidon with… Read more

Donum natalicium

The senses of an ending: myth, ritual, and poetic exodia in performance

back Richard P. Martin, Stanford University I like to think it fitting that I first met Gregory Nagy, some 40 years ago, at a puppet show. Fred Christie, then a Jesuit scholastic and graduate student at Harvard, had taken two of us, rather sceptical students of Greek from Boston College High School, to see Peter Arnott’s one-man miniature production of the Choephoroi, which turned out to be a mesmerizing performance. Read more

Donum natalicium

Steadfast in a Multiform Tradition: émpedos and asphalḗs in Homer and Beyond

back Claudia Filos Ἑλένης μὲν ταύτην ἄπιξιν παρὰ Πρωτέα ἔλεγον οἱ ἱρέες γενέσθαι. Δοκέει δέ μοι καὶ Ὅμηρος τὸν λόγον τοῦτον πυθέσθαι· ἀλλ’, οὐ γὰρ ὁμοίως ἐς τὴν ἐποποιίην εὐπρεπὴς ἦν τῷ ἑτέρῳ τῷ περ ἐχρήσατο, [ἐς ὃ] μετῆκε αὐτόν. The priests say that this is the way Helen came to Proteus. And it seems to me that Homer was aware of this version of the story, but since… Read more