Thanks for all the links! Can’t wait to look at! I went to the Met last month and was struck this time by Dali’s Crucifixion and ended up in the contemporary wing.
I got sidetracked away from Beowulf-- too many other books. But I'm hoping to get back to it. I sometimes get frustrated when reading with a group when the pace is too fast. I hate feeling behind-- maybe it brings up feelings of being behind in school?-- and have to fight against the temptation to give up altogether.
You should check out Poems that Burn, a podcast that also has a related Substack.
Ben just got that graphic novel of The Iliad for his birthday. He's been using it to follow along as I read aloud from Catherine Alexander's translation. This is my first time reading The Iliad aloud. I have previously read it, of course, and I've listened to it as an audiobook. But reading it to other people has proved an interesting challenge. So many names I stumble over pronouncing. The catalog of heroes was a tough book. But I'm enjoying the journey. He's also got the graphic novel of The Odyssey, which he's reading aloud to me. I'm impressed at the caliber of the language in the graphic novels. They're essentially excerpts from the poems with beautiful language.
I wasn't familiar with the statue of Thetis. And I had forgotten about the shield depicting the Siege at Troy Thanks for sharing those. Auden's poem is so devastating.
Yes, I started a couple of years ago with Charlie's class and my five classmates. It was just on the Iliad, but it was fantastic. One of my classmates is former military so it was an invaluable perspective to have. I think the youngest person is a graduate student in his 20's and the oldest is in retirement age. Most of us are in the middle, some with families and some of us don't. It's an eclectic mix and every class has that type of mix. At youngest we have homeschooling high schoolers.
The other classes I have taken are The Odyssey, St. Augustine's Confessions, Virgil's Aeneid (which I am apparently revisiting with my original group), Aristotle's Politics, and Latin as a language course. Also of interest for your crowd, The Catherine Project has Greek language as a course. I have found the language course really ambitious and a lot of hard work, but I was highly motivated. I really want to take the Greek course, but as TCP becomes more known it is harder and harder to get into the classes that I want. I have enjoyed the classes so much that my husband started taking them. He did Aristotle's Metaphysics and a course on Max Weber. I can't remember the other courses that he did, but both of us are taking a break right now because I have my MFA and he took up a Peter Kreeft reading group at the church up the street. This spring I wanted to take the Aquinas Summa Theologica, but I am glad I held off. If not that I would have wanted to do Aristotle or Kierkegaard.
I am thinking someday that if I were to lead a group for TCP it would likely be something Aristotle or poetry focused group. Maybe split the difference and to Aristotle's Poetics! LOL
😱 Oh my! Well, someday if I ever I fall into a pit of money Scrooge McDuck-style 🤣 But seriously, what an awesome opportunity! I think Emily Wilson was a guest on a cruise?
Yes, The Shield of Achilles is amazing in lyricism and form. What Auden is doing is hard to pull off: changing meter within a poem to show a change in perspective. Thetis’s view is in ballad meter, a true song that wants to lilt. There is a hopeful expectation in her, and she is shocked at Hephaestus’s depiction of war which Auden renders in rhyming iambic pentameter, which evokes a more plainspoken property, especially with the enjambments, yet the rhyme makes it incantatory and memorable, especially the provocative couplets.
I really could go line by line of this one. Such a powerful poem to recite. I have to fight tears at that last stanza. To have a child who would not live long. I wonder how many mothers of soldiers have read this poem.
That is awesome. It is great you are going to be reading Ulysses. Here's a link about Stephen James Joyce that you may find interesting (I am not sure if you saw it when I posted it on David Roberts's comments)...
So much of Auden is powerful... He's easier to get into one's long term memory because of his strong lyrical bent. Funeral Blues, Epitaph for a Tyrant, Musee des Beaux Arts, etc. What he writes about is so terrible, yet true. Making it beautiful causes us to pay more attention. Alas... we don't live in a culture that really appreciates older poetry.
Musee des Beaux Arts is my favorite, in part because Brueghel is my favorite painter. The most "novelistic" of painters. There's a Brueghel in the Met.
I know a few scattered lines of that poem, but i should try to memorize it.
Oh, you might really like Catherine Project. I think they have poetry discussions now, too. I mean, just for the fellowship it can be quite special. Do you know Jessica Schnepp? She has gone to every Catholic Imagination Conference! She helped edit Sally and Micah’s anthology, and she was in Dallas with us. She was my Catherine Project tutor for the Aeneid and Augustine’s Confessions. But I did not know her or see her in Dallas. I met her afterward on Zoom for CP. I think you will find a lot of Catholic cross-over.
Thanks for all the links! Can’t wait to look at! I went to the Met last month and was struck this time by Dali’s Crucifixion and ended up in the contemporary wing.
I got sidetracked away from Beowulf-- too many other books. But I'm hoping to get back to it. I sometimes get frustrated when reading with a group when the pace is too fast. I hate feeling behind-- maybe it brings up feelings of being behind in school?-- and have to fight against the temptation to give up altogether.
You should check out Poems that Burn, a podcast that also has a related Substack.
Ben just got that graphic novel of The Iliad for his birthday. He's been using it to follow along as I read aloud from Catherine Alexander's translation. This is my first time reading The Iliad aloud. I have previously read it, of course, and I've listened to it as an audiobook. But reading it to other people has proved an interesting challenge. So many names I stumble over pronouncing. The catalog of heroes was a tough book. But I'm enjoying the journey. He's also got the graphic novel of The Odyssey, which he's reading aloud to me. I'm impressed at the caliber of the language in the graphic novels. They're essentially excerpts from the poems with beautiful language.
I wasn't familiar with the statue of Thetis. And I had forgotten about the shield depicting the Siege at Troy Thanks for sharing those. Auden's poem is so devastating.
Love it!!! Also how is it going with the Catherine Project? I think Zena's project is wonderful idea, so I'd love to hear about your experience!
Yes, I started a couple of years ago with Charlie's class and my five classmates. It was just on the Iliad, but it was fantastic. One of my classmates is former military so it was an invaluable perspective to have. I think the youngest person is a graduate student in his 20's and the oldest is in retirement age. Most of us are in the middle, some with families and some of us don't. It's an eclectic mix and every class has that type of mix. At youngest we have homeschooling high schoolers.
The other classes I have taken are The Odyssey, St. Augustine's Confessions, Virgil's Aeneid (which I am apparently revisiting with my original group), Aristotle's Politics, and Latin as a language course. Also of interest for your crowd, The Catherine Project has Greek language as a course. I have found the language course really ambitious and a lot of hard work, but I was highly motivated. I really want to take the Greek course, but as TCP becomes more known it is harder and harder to get into the classes that I want. I have enjoyed the classes so much that my husband started taking them. He did Aristotle's Metaphysics and a course on Max Weber. I can't remember the other courses that he did, but both of us are taking a break right now because I have my MFA and he took up a Peter Kreeft reading group at the church up the street. This spring I wanted to take the Aquinas Summa Theologica, but I am glad I held off. If not that I would have wanted to do Aristotle or Kierkegaard.
I am thinking someday that if I were to lead a group for TCP it would likely be something Aristotle or poetry focused group. Maybe split the difference and to Aristotle's Poetics! LOL
Amazing! Sounds wonderful...
And did I read somewhere that Classical Wisdom has a cruise… 🚢???
Yes :D It's with the Swan Hellenic and in conjunction with UCLA. Leaving Sept 14th! I have to check how many cabins are left... last I saw only 5...
😱 Oh my! Well, someday if I ever I fall into a pit of money Scrooge McDuck-style 🤣 But seriously, what an awesome opportunity! I think Emily Wilson was a guest on a cruise?
She was on the first one - with William B Irvine (Stoic Joy). This year it's Professor Guval of UCLA.
What a lovely gathering! Thanks for sharing, Zina. I’ve had Homer on my mind lately myself. And oh my goodness, that Auden poem is amazing.
Yes, The Shield of Achilles is amazing in lyricism and form. What Auden is doing is hard to pull off: changing meter within a poem to show a change in perspective. Thetis’s view is in ballad meter, a true song that wants to lilt. There is a hopeful expectation in her, and she is shocked at Hephaestus’s depiction of war which Auden renders in rhyming iambic pentameter, which evokes a more plainspoken property, especially with the enjambments, yet the rhyme makes it incantatory and memorable, especially the provocative couplets.
I really could go line by line of this one. Such a powerful poem to recite. I have to fight tears at that last stanza. To have a child who would not live long. I wonder how many mothers of soldiers have read this poem.
What a fantastic opportunity to gather together. I am reading The Iliad and The Odyssey later this year in preparation for tackling Ulysses.
That is awesome. It is great you are going to be reading Ulysses. Here's a link about Stephen James Joyce that you may find interesting (I am not sure if you saw it when I posted it on David Roberts's comments)...
https://open.substack.com/pub/prufrock/p/ghostwriting-for-stephen-james-joyce?r=fjyz7&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Warms my heart to see book lovers together.
And the Auden is so powerful and haunting.
I may have to memorize at least these four brutal lines:
That girls are raped, that two boys knife a third,
Were axioms to him, who'd never heard
Of any world where promises were kept,
Or one could weep because another wept.
So much of Auden is powerful... He's easier to get into one's long term memory because of his strong lyrical bent. Funeral Blues, Epitaph for a Tyrant, Musee des Beaux Arts, etc. What he writes about is so terrible, yet true. Making it beautiful causes us to pay more attention. Alas... we don't live in a culture that really appreciates older poetry.
Musee des Beaux Arts is my favorite, in part because Brueghel is my favorite painter. The most "novelistic" of painters. There's a Brueghel in the Met.
I know a few scattered lines of that poem, but i should try to memorize it.
What a great fellowship you all have, to read that work and then to see the art created from that work and to share the poetry together!
Oh, you might really like Catherine Project. I think they have poetry discussions now, too. I mean, just for the fellowship it can be quite special. Do you know Jessica Schnepp? She has gone to every Catholic Imagination Conference! She helped edit Sally and Micah’s anthology, and she was in Dallas with us. She was my Catherine Project tutor for the Aeneid and Augustine’s Confessions. But I did not know her or see her in Dallas. I met her afterward on Zoom for CP. I think you will find a lot of Catholic cross-over.