{"id":34846,"date":"2019-06-21T06:00:15","date_gmt":"2019-06-21T11:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs2.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/?p=34846"},"modified":"2019-05-24T11:48:28","modified_gmt":"2019-05-24T16:48:28","slug":"ancient-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/ancient-greece\/","title":{"rendered":"Ancient Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Guest post by Wesley B.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve always wanted to visit Greece. Something about the combination of its natural beauty – the snow-kissed mountains visible from the sunny beaches – and its immense historical legacy is irresistible to me. Unfortunately, I have not yet had the chance to make my pilgrimage there. Fortunately, few places are easier to experience vicariously through their cultural artifacts – and we have lots of them here at the Library!<\/p>\n

A.N. Whitehead once wrote, \u201cthe safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.\u201d So, if you\u2019re interested in philosophy – and, as Plato\u2019s teacher Socrates argues, we all should be – what better place to start than with the acclaimed ancient Athenian? We have several volumes of his writing available to check out, and despite the accumulated weight of their age and reputation, I find them to be highly accessible. This is partially due to their dramatic structure – Plato\u2019s works are structured as conversations between Socrates and other notable Greek figures – but also to their subject matter. The dialogues explore issues that are still just as relevant today, such as truth, beauty, justice, and, above all, how to live a good life.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re more literarily inclined, we also have several translations available of Homer\u2019s epic poems, The Iliad<\/strong><\/em><\/a> and The Odyssey.<\/strong><\/em><\/a> Though The Iliad<\/em> is a war story, it\u2019s a war story filled with love – the war itself is launched by Menelaus, the king of Sparta, to reclaim his wife, Helen, who had been abducted by the Trojan prince Paris. Achilles, the greatest of the Greek heroes, withdraws from the war due to a perceived slight, until his lover Patroclus is killed, sending him into a divine rage that turns the tide of the war. The Odyssey<\/em> takes place after the war has ended, and is a rousing adventure that shows the cunning Odysseus overcoming all sorts of obstacles to return home to his family.<\/p>\n

Of course, it\u2019s not all dusty old tomes – we have shiny new tomes as well! In the aforementioned Odyssey, one of the obstacles Odysseus has to overcome is Circe, the witch of Aeaea, who turns his crew into pigs, and attempts to do the same to Odysseus. She does this because… well, actually, Homer doesn\u2019t give her a motive. It\u2019s taken for granted that she does it because she\u2019s a witch, and bewitching men is simply what they do. Unsatisfied with this explanation (or lack thereof), Madeline Miller gives us a different perspective in her aptly titled novel Circe<\/strong><\/em><\/a>. The first person account of the goddess\u2019s life starts well before her meeting with Odysseus, and continues past that point, covering a broad swath of Greek mythology. More importantly, it allows Miller to flesh out her subject\u2019s inner life, humanizing the divine figure and transforming her from an antagonist to someone we empathize with deeply. Simple yet elegant, Miller\u2019s prose echoes Homer\u2019s poetry while still asserting her (and Circe\u2019s) voice as unique.<\/p>\n

And if you want something that\u2019s not a tome at all, we have you covered there too! Assassin\u2019s Creed Odyssey<\/strong><\/em><\/a>, the latest entry in Ubisoft\u2019s long-running series, tells the story of Kassandra, a Greek mercenary. While trying to find her estranged family, she becomes embroiled in a massive cult conspiracy spanning all of Greece, all set against the backdrop of the Peloponnesian War. As you might expect, there\u2019s a lot of assassinating to be done, but unlike older games in the series, the large (and beautiful!) open world is filled with characters to talk to, do quests for, recruit to your ship\u2019s crew, and even romance! And perhaps most thrillingly (to me at least), you can have your very own dialogues with Socrates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guest post by Wesley B. I\u2019ve always wanted to visit Greece. Something about the combination of its natural beauty – the snow-kissed mountains visible from the sunny beaches – and its immense historical legacy is irresistible to me. Unfortunately, I have not yet had the chance to make my pilgrimage[Read more]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[10,8],"tags":[2124,4535,2122,4958],"class_list":["post-34846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-staff-picks","tag-ancient-greece","tag-greek-gods-and-goddesses","tag-greek-mythology","tag-greek-philosophy"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd0CXx-942","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34846","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34846"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34846\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":34871,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34846\/revisions\/34871"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34846"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34846"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.davenportlibrary.com\/reference\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34846"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}