Reading Wilson’s Iliad, one senses something of the chant of Homer’s verse, even through the written word.
- Emeritus Professor of Classics, La Trobe University
The Trojan Women is a genocide narrative. In this play, the great Athenian dramatist Euripides explores the enslavement of women, human sacrifice, rape and infanticide.
Perceptions about coronavirus “only killing old people” highlight the ageist way we sometimes refer to death and dying. Greek myth shows this isn’t new and ancient plays laid out the distinction.
Thucydides’ description of the plague that struck Athens in 430 BC is one of the great passages of Greek literature. It focusses on the social response, both of those who died and those who survived.
Like many Greek myths, the story of Persephone’s descent into the realm of Hades, and her emergence from it, has resonances in contemporary arts, most especially the notion of death and rebirth.
Virgil’s epic poem The Aeneid documents the founding of Rome by a Trojan hero. As with other ancient epics, our hero has to remain resolute in the face of significant divine hostility.
The story of the Odyssey is a quintessential quest that relates to the passage through life and the importance of love, family and home. Odysseus’s adventures have influenced everyone from Batman to Bob Dylan.
A central idea in the Iliad - a poetic work focused on the war for Troy - is the inevitability of death. The poem held a special place in antiquity, and has resonated in the millennia since.
For the first time in recent memory the possibility of imprisoning political rivals has entered the political discourse of a modern western election. But ostracism is an ancient democratic tradition that offers an alternative approach.
Australian politicians – unlike their American counterparts – have largely abandoned the art of stirring speeches. Good rhetoric doesn’t equal good policy, but at least it’s evidence of imaginative thinking.
The Athenian politician Cleon was one of the earliest demagogues. An effective, if vulgar speaker, he made extravagant promises and delivered extravagant accusations.
The history of the Gallipoli region enhances the story of the Anzac campaign and situates it in a notably rich cultural context.
If you do a historical study of the Gallipoli battlefields, or even if you are just a passing visitor to the sites, one of the first things to strike you is all the different names. At the Anzac battlefield…
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