My wasted youth spent playing video games (Civilization, etc) could not have the appreciation of Ancient Greece that he had for the Roman Empire; this was one of his failings, if far from the chief….

Roman: I just got done collecting crushing taxes from poor people!
Greek: Oh, did you! Say, look over there!
Roman: What am I looking at!
Greek: *stabs him in the back with a spear and takes off running*

If it had all been a duel, the Greek would have tricked the Roman and won….

…. That said, about Martin’s perfect little intro, (originally written in 1993 by a member of the Silent Generation, and I suppose “correct” enough with facts, if too perfect for anything else), well—it’s very wooden and weird in style, about very funky people, and has lots of unexamined/uncritical assumptions about the past, (THEY were the GREEKS), you know. I can only imagine what a book of American Lyric Poetry would get, after the atom war (or whatever) blows most of it into oblivion…. It would be nice to have that perspective, although I can’t even imagine what bollocks they’d write about us—back when the computers worked, and the white man was on top, or whatever it is.

I mean, if it were American Lyric Poetry, what would we say to the ‘bad’ parts? Can you really have it both ways? They’re “bad”…. “Women, ha! Whores, the lot of them!” Well, that’s just like today. Keep moving, nothing to see here…. They’re “bad”…. “Her! She likes to take it in the ass! I have a funny story about her!” Yes! THEY were the GREEKS; hear now, O my Grandparents, you, who birthed my mother, their WISDOM….

I mean, gimme a fucking break, right. Try to take the content into account, when you’re being perfect, talking about nothing in particular, nothing but petty things, because you’re grand….

That said, I wouldn’t throw the poets out of the city. I would be tempted to. Calvie would do it. But I would let them live. Because sometimes a certain amount of good-natured disorder is okay…. although I would encourage them, by my own example (my SPOTLESS life— you know, before the atom war, people showered EVERY DAY), to fucking behave for a change, you know.

Just to switch it up, dog. Just so that you know, what it’s like. 🤪

…. One begins to see what Simone de Beauvoir was talking about. You’d think it couldn’t have really been so bad, if you’d not really read them.

…. Though of course, even when the poet does not convince me that he emotes sanely, I think it’s better than some stupid game (or real-world fight, like kids Used To Do, well, some do anyway, you know), where you just emote, you just feel, and you don’t try to figure out whether it’s right or not—you don’t even Defend it (like some crazy poet), you just Do it.

And Alcman is alright—he’s permissible.

“Of seasons he created three,
Summer, winter, and autumn to boot;
And for a fourth, spring, when things
Are growing, but a man can’t eat his fill.”

You could put that to music and it would be a like a folk song, you know, or a OneRepublic song, except the label would get in the way.

White Guy Pretending To Be Black: Yeah, the Label will get in the way! The label’s gonna label you, dog! The label’s gonna label you Weird! But here, bro, I got something for you!
Ryan Tedder: (emoting) O help me sweet Jesus….

…. Sappho is better in fragments longer than a single word. Good job, Oxford!

I guess everything’s pedantic if you’re a linguist…. If I were a rich, bad Roman, I would beat my slaves and beat my linguists.

…. “…. hear thou my prayer, [Artemis,] save me from harm: for thee it is/a small thing, goddess, but so much to me.” (Theognis)

“Go for a righteous life without much property
rather than wealth dishonestly acquired.
All honour, Cyrnus, is contained in honesty,
and every honest man’s a man of worth.” (Theognis)

“Cyrnus, don’t ever talk too big, for no man knows
What change another day and night May bring.”
(Theognis)

“When ill befalls a man, none wants to be his friend
Cyrnus, though he be of the same womb born.”
(Theognis)

“May I have heaven’s favour and the gods’ good will,
Cyrnus. I crave no status otherwise.”
(Theognis)

Theognis doesn’t really require commentary; he’s just simple and pretty as a flower. Of course, sometimes of course a little dip or valley interrupts the broad friendly tableland, but really he is quite honest without being base, we can only imagine how pleasing when given meter and music, and what else is there in a poet, but that?

…. “Poets say much that’s false.”
Solon

And the funny thing is, much of the Bible is poetry; the Psalms, the poems, say that no one is good. (Psalm 53). Luther and Calvin and the lawyers take that in very literal way, like it’s a statistical statement, you know. God the statistician. (In Psalms?) But it’s an emotional—even just in those few lines of Psalm 53, there are deep wells of emotion, great, great journeys—the different faces of experience. Poetry has to be read appropriately, otherwise it’s lies, you know. And of course Solon was probably talking about poetasters, you know; obviously he wasn’t talking about Hebrew or biblical poetry. Some poets Are just liars, and sometimes people dance to their songs because they’re just deluded, or just happy, but there’s not much truth to it, any way you slice the apple, you know. But even good poetry has to be read appropriately, (I mean, just look at the context: boo hoo!—Oh, yay! You know, are you speaking statistically when you get like that?), according to the Way In Which the poet tells the truth. You can’t tell certain truths with statistics, and sometimes all statisticians do is cover things up and try hard to diminish knowledge, to obscure things, really. “Lies, damn lies, and statistics.” And, sure, sometimes poetasters tell lies, just to get people grin-y. “All….” There’s no club you can join, you know, the Truth Club, where people just never wanted to do bad. And, then, not every person down to the last schmuck is a liar, which is how it’s sometimes been related, because of the lies of, religious, poets, you know.

…. I won’t try to make too many essays here,—even for Psalms and Proverbs I just select from them instead of turning them into legal things—but the parts that are epigrammatic, proverb-y, you know: I suppose largely the Anonymous Theognidea, are very nice, and not so unlike much of Anne Bradstreet, I suppose. And that is not to be some comment about what they both are Not—‘not Hawaiian’, said the specialist about the new age book—but just that they are both not immoral, not that they are both not any measurable thing, (if indeed we can measure even things like time and race, precisely, at least, though indeed we forget that).

…. I suppose that even at the dawn of ancient times there were some fools and some souls who tried to live the right way.

Great collection of Greek poetry ranging from the 7th Century through the 5th Century BC. A period when gods, goddess, and the underlings were central players in life. There are pleas to the gods and thanks as well. Archilochus, however, finds writing erotica a better use of time. Simonides uses the god's creation of women and ties it to different animals in a very unflattering way. The collection covers wars, pointers for daily life, and even drinking songs. Not all poet’s works are complete several, including Sappho, contain only fragments of what has survived. Also several of the poems have lines or works filled in where missing. Perhaps what is most surprising is how much we still have today even after the destruction of the library at Alexandria. ( )

A few years ago I thought I would quickly read Republic. This tactical error has lead to an obsession with Greek literature and I am now scraping the barrel with this anthology in a desperate attempt to find new material. It basically contains every extant Greek lyric from before 450BC with the exception of Pindar and Bacchylides. Some authors are suurvived by only a single line of verse which is sad, but also frustrating as it's impossible to get any clear idea of who they were. Others do come across clearly and there's some really beautiful stuff. Sappho is of particular interest as her enormous reputation today is based on such a slender number of verses.

Recommended for anyone who must read everything by the ancient Greeks or for those who want an overview of what sort of work they were producing. Clear translations and sensible notes. For what it is, I cannot find fault with it. ( )