.
| Hearsay: |
More on Homer’s possible Homerella status.
The book’s most headline-grabbing claim is about authorship. Dalby argues that the composer of The Iliad and The Odyssey was a woman. Initially, this idea seems pretty silly, and not even original. Samuel Butler (author of Erewhon) argued in the 19th century that The Odyssey is by a woman, on the grounds that the poem is set in a nonmilitary world, and shows deep sympathy with female characters. The argument is a weak one: The whole point of imaginative literature, some would say, is that it allows poets, writers, and audience to participate in alien forms of experience.
But Dalby deploys a much stronger set of arguments for female authorship, based on comparative anthropological analysis of how women preserve songs, stories, and folk tales.
January 2006
December
2005
November
2005
October
2005
September
2005
August
2005
July
2005
June
2005
May
2005
April
2005
March
2005
February
2005
January
2005
December
2004
November
2004
October
2004
September
2004
August
2004
July
2004
June
2004
May
2004
April
2004
March
2004
February
2004
January
2004
December
2003
November
2003
October
2003
September
2003
August
2003
Bookninja © Copyright
The opinions expressed on this site are those of individual participants
and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the site owners,
organizers, or other participants.
[powered by WordPress.]
December 15th, 2006 at 3:22 am
Totally silly.
The claim that The Iliad and Oddessy must be written by a female because the oddessy has some “female themes” (whatever that means) and sympathizes with some females is ludicrious enough to begin with… but the Iliad is the ultimate male book, far more masculine than the Oddessy is feminine.
Based on the idea we could tell the authorship by those gendered themes, we’d have to conclude the author of both was male… or we would have to conclude they weren’t writtnen by the same person.
This is likely, but if so it is becuase they were both co-written by tones of ancient poets… not by some mythical first feminist.