The Greeks Us

Greek Identity of the Western World

( 19th - 20th c. A.D. )

Rilke
Ein Wehn im Gott

Oscar Wilde
When 'gan the West to burn

Borges
Averroes' ideal

Valery
Perfection dans tous les ordres

Yeats
Sailing to Byzantium (1927)
Byzantium (1930)

Virginia Woolf
They sang from trees in the meadow of life
The most modern thing you ever saw
Aeschylus translated brings despair

T. S. Eliot
The historical sense

   He mounted to the parapet again and gazed out over Dublin bay, his fair oakpale hair stirring slightly.
- God! he said quietly. Isn't the sea what Algy calls it: a great sweet mother? The snotgreen sea. The scrotumtightening sea. Epi oinopa ponton [To the sea that looks like wine]. Ah, Daedalus, the Greeks! I must teach you. You must read them in the original. Thalatta! Thalatta! [The Sea! The Sea!] She is our great sweet mother. Come and look.(...)
   God, Kinch, if you and I could only work together we might do something for the island. Hellenise it.

James Joyce, Ulysses

Cf.  Aspects of Byzantium in Modern Popular Music
Constantinople Home Page : Constantinople and the West ||| Greek History
Myths and Legends of Ancient Greece and Rome

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