Reclaiming Homer

 From Crisis:

Homer, like many of the famous Dead White European Males, has fallen on hard times simply for being an old, dead, white, European male—as Bernard Knox wrote in the 1990s. Yet, Homer is the great voice of our age of rage and resentment. Far from celebrating and glorifying violence, Homer subtly deconstructs the Hesiodic cosmos of rage and violence, and sings into being a cosmos of love that is based on compassion and forgiveness.

“Rage—Goddess—sing the rage of Peleus’ son Achilles.” Those are the immortal words of the greatest song ever sung. What is important to realize when being introduced to Achilles, is that he is attributed with a divine trait, mēnis, rage or wrath. Mēnis is the term Homer uses to describe the rage of the divines. Kholos, by contrast, is the term Homer uses to describe the rage of mortal humans. There is a divine horror to the rage of Achilles at the beginning of his epic.

Civilization is formed by song. This necessitates us to ask what song and civilization was Homer singing into existence? (Read more.)