He convinces me of the greatness of Sappho, makes me want to reread Homer and Sophocles, and try some more Plato, For this, I’m grateful.David Grene, one of the best known translators of the Greek classics, splendidly captures the peculiar quality of Herodotus, the father of history. Sélincourt’s love of Greek lyric poetry, however, is infectious, and he is especially good on Plato. I savored in particular, “it bears repeating.” My interest sagged in the middle of the book when the author retells material Herodotus reports for that, I’d rather get it from the original. Phrases such as “as I have said” and “as we shall see” abound.
In addition to overselling the author’s central insight, the book suffers in general from being wordy and repetitive. One example of change (not for the better) is in the position of women in society, which seems to have been better in earlier days. This book was also useful in helping me to realize that we oversimplify when we refer in a general way to “the ancient Greeks.” Are we talking about the dim antiquity of the Trojan War? Of Homer’s gathering and shaping of legends of it centuries later? Of the flowering of science and philosophy on the Ionian coast? Of Periclean Athens? There was continuity, but also change.
Unfortunately, Sélincourt doesn’t trust the reader to remember this insight the first, second, or third time he shares it. Their matter-of-fact cruelty and mendacity, indeed, their overall “self-regarding ethics,” to use Sélincourt’s phrase, mean there is no need to idealize them. The achievement of his Greeks was, in many ways, admirable, but they were not, as some maintain, our betters in all aspects of civilization. The main interest here is the author’s dissent from consensus opinions about the ancient Greeks, based on his thorough knowledge and love of the literature. What Sélincourt’s treatment offers instead is a tour d’horizon of Greek culture in antiquity.
I don’t think it fulfills that task as well as the more recent volume by James Romm (Yale University Press, 1998). This book was recommended as in introduction to Herodotus’s Histories.
0 kommentar(er)
