Writes Thomas Hoskins, Teacher of Classics and English
Last Friday saw the second lecture in the Classics Department’s Odyssey lecture series. This time, I provided an overview of the key themes in the epic. This covered the popular hits (“xenia” – guest friendship, “nostos” – journey home, “oikos” – the household) but also explored some other crucial elements within the text, such as storytelling, the presentation of time and the focus on quotidian processes.
The thrust of the lecture was that the epic is endlessly complex and shifting, while each theme is likewise far from simplistic, unlike Nolan’s recent film which, despite being entertaining, was guilty of flattening almost all of the nuance within the original epic (I would be very happy to discuss this with anyone who disagrees!).
The next lecture is on Friday 16 October, where Mr Goss will be discussing Homeric Archaeology.
