Karin Kukkonen
Literature makes you feel, and it can get you thinking too. But how do you move from signs on a page to thoughts and feelings? And why does fiction sometimes feel more real than the world around us? My name is Karin Kukkonen, and together with my colleagues from the Literature, Cognition and Emotions Project, LCE for short, we will discuss these and other topics in the coming weeks. My guest today is Silvio Bär, Professor of Classics at the University of Oslo. Silvio, welcome to the podcast.
Silvio Bär
Thank you, Karin. Thanks a lot for having me.
Karin Kukkonen
Your work, Silvio, engages with ancient Greek literature in particular, and your special topic is the epic and its heroes. So I'd like to start with the question on who is your favourite hero and what makes him – I assume it's a “him” – what makes him special?
Silvio Bär
Yeah. Thank you. Well, I don't think I have one favourite hero. There are several epic characters that I find interesting, male and female. But perhaps just let me mention two of them. The epic character I've worked on most extensively is Heracles. And what I find particularly interesting and also challenging about Heracles is the fact that he's actually not an epic hero proper, but that he still, nonetheless, plays a role in almost all Greek epics. For example, he's... Heracles is a generation or two older than the warriors who fight in the Trojan War. So, he does not participate in the Trojan War, but he is mentioned and he's remembered by the warriors of the Trojan War as a role model. And this is something I find quite intriguing: the idea that even the big heroes of the Trojan War have role models from the, so to say, good old days who they look up to. So that would be one example of a potential favourite hero. Another epic character I find very interesting is Odysseus. And, in the… Odysseus already turns up in the Iliad; there he is a major warrior; he is already a gifted speaker, but it's actually only in the Odyssey where he is fully developed as the prototypical trickster. As... as the...
Karin Kukkonen
“Cunning Ulysses”.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. “Cunning Ulysses”, “much-travelled Odysseus”, that sort of thing. And what I find particularly interesting there is the fact that, despite his prototypical slyness, his intelligence, as you mentioned, yeah... He makes mistakes, and he has to learn his lesson – and he has to learn his lesson the hard way. The best example to illustrate this is the episode on the island of the Cyclops. So, thanks to his inventiveness, they – Odysseus and his crew – they manage to escape. But then, when Odysseus eventually feels safe, he makes stupid mistakes: he reveals his identity towards the Cyclops.
Karin Kukkonen
Because before he had said "my name is nobody".
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. That is that famous story: "I am nobody, then nobody blinded me", all that. But then, he just can't resist the temptation to say, "oh, and by the way, I am Odysseus", yeah. And then the result is devastating, because the Cyclops, Polyphemus, is the son of Poseidon – the sea god Poseidon. And so, the Cyclops asks his father, Poseidon, to take revenge on Odysseus for vengeance on his behalf. And then, Odysseus' entire misery begins. So, I mean, we can say, despite his above-average intelligence, Odysseus has made a stupid mistake and he has to pay a high price for it. But – and that is the interesting thing – he learns from it. Because from now on, he makes bloody sure that he no longer reveals his identity so carelessly. And that's what I find interesting about Odysseus: he shows us that being clever does not mean that you don't make mistakes. Being clever means that you learn from your mistakes.
Karin Kukkonen
So, you refer to these characters as epic characters, whereas I've used the term “heroes”. Do you see a difference – or a significant difference – between these?
Silvio Bär
Well, I mean, a hero is a type of epic character, yeah. So an epic character is basically any character, any figure that turns up, major or minor, whereas a hero would... “hero” is perhaps a bit outdated today. Perhaps a warrior, yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
All right. But I'm happy to stick to the epic characters.
Silvio Bär
Yeah, well, it's just a traditional way of referring, yeah, heroes – or heroines, if you want, so... Well, think of the Amazons.
Karin Kukkonen
... Camilla in Virgil.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
So, these epic characters that you're working on, they're several thousand years old, and yet it seems that even today... we can't stop telling their stories. And I'm thinking, for example, of the recent bestsellers like Miller's The Song of Achilles. What do you think it is that… that keeps us fascinated with characters like Achilles, Odysseus, Heracles?
Silvio Bär
Well, I'm very glad you're asking me that question, because as a classicist I am, of course, often asked questions like, “why Classics?”, or “why these old texts?”, “what's so interesting about them still?”. And I think actually, I mean... you just mentioned a brilliant example, Madeline Miller's bestselling novel The Song of Achilles, which is, I think, the best proof that these stories simply mean something to us, that there is something about these stories and these heroes or characters. And, yeah, I mean, when we stick a bit to Miller's example, then, one point that comes immediately to my mind would be there the change of perspective, because Miller's novel tells the story of the Iliad from the perspective of Patroclus, Achilles' best friend. And the story takes up a motif that is already latent in the Iliad, though not explicit – and that was already a matter of discussion in antiquity – namely, the idea of a potential homoerotic attraction between the two, or even a relationship. And, I mean, of course we could say, well, this is just a change of perspective that fell on fruitful ground, that kind of hit the zeitgeist. But I think the ultimate explanation lies deeper, because I think that, in the event, the reason why those characters – like Achilles and Odysseus – still fascinate is because, on the one hand, we can relate to them, but on the other they're also quite alien to us, yeah. So, we could say, if you wanted to put it a bit more sophisticatedly, we could say it's the combination of familiarity and alienation at the same time. And this is, I think, something that just fascinates us, because a character we know in and out, a character that is exactly like us, that would be boring, yeah. But whereas, on the other hand, a character to whom we can't relate at all would be totally alien, would be disconcerting. But perhaps Achilles is a good example, again, to use. When you think of Achilles in the Iliad… the entire Iliad begins with and is about Achilles withdrawing from the battlefield because he has been publicly humiliated. He has been publicly shamed by Agamemnon, the commander-in-chief. And this feeling, the feeling of humiliation, is something we all know or we can all relate to, somehow, yeah – these days, perhaps even more so when you think of all these things like online shaming, public shaming, that sort of thing. But then, the reason why Achilles has been publicly shamed is totally alien to us. It is because Agamemnon has taken away his favourite slave, Briseis, a young woman, in an act of vengeance. And this is obviously something we can't relate to because the, I mean, the Greeks, they were slaveholders; slavery was a natural part of their life. This is something that alienates us totally from them. I would argue we can relate to Achilles’ feeling, his feelings, but we can't relate to the reasons behind the feeling. So that would be, for me, an example where we have this familiarity and alienation at the same time. Another aspect that perhaps also, in my opinion, surely also plays a role is the versatility of those old epic heroes or figures. And here perhaps we could take Odysseus as an example. I mentioned Odysseus before already. And, I mean, he is, and he's always been, best known for his intelligence, his superior intelligence. So, this is a stable characteristic of Odysseus. Yeah, there is no Odysseus who is stupid. But the way his intelligence is viewed, that changes over time, that varies considerably. So, we have already in Attic tragedy, for example, in Euripides, we find a decidedly negative Odysseus, where his intelligence, his cunningness, his slyness has a negative connotation.
Karin Kukkonen
So he's the villain...?
Silvio Bär
Yeah, he is the villain. He's a bad guy. I mean, Hekabe freaks… totally freaks out in the Trojan Women when she's informed that she is going to be Odysseus’ slave. The idea that she's going to be a slave, that is one thing, but that she's going to be Odysseus’ slave, that freaks her totally out. And then, for example, also in Dante in the Divine Comedy, there he is… he goes straight to hell, yeah, because he's such a bad guy. So here we could perhaps say he's… on the one hand, Odysseus is stable enough to make him a recognizable figure through history, his intelligence being his main feature; but on the other hand, he's also sufficiently versatile, so he can be adapted to the needs of new literary genres, new media, the zeitgeist, whatever.
Karin Kukkonen
Because of the fascination that this character… holds?
Silvio Bär
Exactly, Exactly. I mean, he is a superior, intelligent person... A person with superior intelligence is fascinating. So that makes him a fascinating character. But then the fact that you can play on this and view him very differently and change him accordingly, or that he can be changed, that makes him attractive in different genres, in different periods.
Karin Kukkonen
So more generally, actually... I mean, you gave Odysseus as a very striking example of an epic character who travels across history. Do you think all epic characters – or all epic characters who would answer to the description of “hero” – have that potential? Or do you think there are some epic characters or some heroic qualities that tie a character to a particular time? And perhaps cognitive aspects play a role in that versatility – or this adaptability – to different periods as well?
Silvio Bär
Yeah, well, that is a… that is a great question. I must confess I don't have a clear answer here. I mean, Achilles and Odysseus clearly are examples for characters who do have that potential, yeah. But I... I really don't know. And I... I might add, not yet, because research on how exactly heroes and other epic characters – male as well as female ones – travel through literary history is very much at the heart of a major research project of mine at the moment. So, your question really hits in the focus, hits in the centre of what I'm actually trying to figure out at the moment. So… well, I could also say, ask me again in a couple of years!
Karin Kukkonen
Do you have any educated guesses?
Silvio Bär
Well, I mean, it's always much more difficult to show that something is impossible than to show that something is possible. But frankly, I can't think of a major epic character from antiquity who did not have any sort of afterlife. As a general tendency or as a rule, so to say, a general rule, I'd rather say that characters tend to be… to become more rounded in the course of literary history, because often new stories are being invented to supplement gaps or perceived gaps in, for example, in the biography of a character. Again, Achilles would be an example for that. For example, Achilles and the story of his vulnerability. We all know the story of Achilles’ heel, yeah – so the only spot on his body where he is vulnerable, where he can be wounded and killed; then, this is what actually, eventually, happens.
Karin Kukkonen
It kind of has to, doesn't it?
Silvio Bär
Well, it has to. Yes, exactly. It's well, I mean, he has to be killed at some point. And, I mean, this is a very famous story. But when we look at the ancient sources, the first source we have is actually very late, it's from the first century A.D. And I mean, of course, it's always possible that it goes back to later sources that we don't have. But still, I mean, we have several stories about attempts to make Achilles immortal already in the Homeric hymns. But the story we all know as canonical, that is as late as the early Roman Empire.
Karin Kukkonen
So that's the story of his mom grabbing him by the heel, and...?
Silvio Bär
Yeah, I mean, the story of… not necessarily his mother, but someone… it may be his mother grabbing him and trying to make him immortal. That is older. But then the story that is explicitly... because where she is holding him on his heel, that… this is then the mortal spot, according to the sources we have, that is an early-Roman-Empire source. Or another example would be stories about Achilles' childhood and his youth. That is something we never hear anything about in the Iliad. But then also from the early Roman Empire on, we have stories supplementing incidents – what happens in his childhood, in his youth, that sort of thing. To generalize, I'd say a character that is not fully fledged or fully mature, so to say, from the very beginning has a strong potential to travel through history, to be reused, to be reshaped in new literary genres, in new media, exactly because he or she offers the opportunity for expansion and elaboration. And I think here – because you asked me about the cognitive aspect – I think here the cognitive element comes in because literary – to put it very simple, but I think very true – literary characters are not real people. Mieke Bal once famously said that literary characters are “paper people”.
Karin Kukkonen
Paper people!
Silvio Bär
Or papyrus people...
Karin Kukkonen
Papyrus people!
Silvio Bär
... in the case of antiquity, yeah! But of course, literary characters resemble real people, otherwise they wouldn't go down as characters. And because they… I mean, they're not real people, but we want them to be real people, let's put it that way – because of that, we as humans have an urge to make them more human, so to say; to attribute human traits to them. And so, they are being made more human in the course of literary history – I think that is the point. And, I mean, a human needs… a grown-up needs a childhood history, let's put it that way. So, at some point people realize, “but we don't know anything about Achilles' youth, about his childhood”, so those stories were made up. And I think that is just a human… a natural process that has its roots in this cognitive urge to see literary characters as real people – and not as paper people.
Karin Kukkonen
To have that relatability.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly.
Karin Kukkonen
And these stories about the childhood of Achilles, do they explain his character or why he does certain things...?
Silvio Bär
Oh, yes, oh, yes, they do. I mean, there is this great story – I don't recall it in its details now – but there is this great story that Achilles was hidden on an island in female clothing, disguised as a girl. But then I think some guy blew the trumpet and then he jumped out because he wanted to go to war. And then his disguise was revealed, that sort of thing. And that is, of course, an anecdote that explains… it has an aetiological function, one would say in mythology – explaining that it was in his very nature to be a warrior, and that warfare was what he wanted. He couldn't help it.
Karin Kukkonen
In some of your other research, you suggest that not only do we generate more and more stories about these epic characters, but also do the readers, for example, of the Homeric epics have something like an epic memory. Could you explain what that is and how it works?
Silvio Bär
Yes. Well, when I use the term “epic memory”, I use it with reference both to the readers of the Homeric epics as well as in relation to the memory of the characters in the epics. So, it’s… in both cases, what I mean is basically pre-existing knowledge that both readers and characters have in relation to the world of epic. Yeah, if we take the example of the Iliad again, at the heart of the Iliad, of the entire narrative of the Iliad, is one incident that takes place in the last year of the Trojan War: the thing about… what I said before about Achilles' public humiliation and the consequences, then. So, the narrated time of the Iliad covers a period of about roughly fifty days in the tenth final year of the war. So, what would be the epic memory, then, of the readers of the Iliad as well as of the characters in the Iliad, would be anything that happened in the world of epic before that tenth year. So, for example, the reasons why the war broke out, the judgment of Paris, that sort of thing. So, that would be an example of the epic memory. And, in practice it is important because it's very typical of the Homeric epics that they're actually full of allusions all over the place to such previous events. And, as I said, what's interesting here is that really epic memory is something that readers and characters share. And this, in turn, has to do with the fact that the stories of the ancient epics like the Trojan War or others, they were largely common knowledge at that time. So, we don't know when the Iliad was first performed and where, but… but when the Iliad was first performed, we can assume, strongly assume, or we must assume, that the stories as such were not new. Everyone knew the stories, or at least the main storylines, yeah – not all the details, perhaps, but the main storylines, more or less by heart, yeah. And yeah, I mean, this again, why this is so has several reasons. There are several causes, so to say, why people knew the stories. One cause is the mythological background of the stories. So, ancient epic is for the most part based on the mythology of the Greeks. And mythology is, basically… mythology are stories that are part of the collective memory of a culture. So, everyone knows the stories. Another related cause is the oral background of the Homeric epics. Before the Iliad and also the Odyssey were written down, there had been a centuries-old, very old – we don't know how old, but it must have been centuries-old – oral tradition where these and similar stories were told and retold time and again, and they were performed orally. So, they were widely known. And I mean, these are the main reasons. And maybe a third reason is also – and now comes the cognitive element in again – I think we really essentially need to assume that the ancient Greeks – and also the Romans, for that matter – had a very different idea about what a good story is.
Karin Kukkonen
In what sense?
Silvio Bär
In the sense – I think I'm now really, really simplifying things – but I think we can say that basically for us, a good story is a new story; which, I think, – correct me if I'm wrong – but I would argue that this is a Romantic idea.
Karin Kukkonen
I guess I would have said, 19th century and onwards, yes…
Silvio Bär
Yes, exactly.
Karin Kukkonen
…where that really changes, where you go from...
Silvio Bär
Yeah. I mean, if you – I don't know – if you're at the airport and you want something to read during your flight, you buy a novel in the local bookshop, you expect a new exciting story and you'd be disappointed if it retold a story you already know, probably.
Karin Kukkonen
Except if it's The Song of Achilles.
Silvio Bär
Except if it's The Song of Achilles, exactly. But even there, you want a change of perspective, yeah? It has to be told from the perspective of Patroclus, otherwise it would just be a retranslation, that would be fair enough. But I think that is really a difference between us and the ancients, so to say, if we can say that so; because for them, a good story was an old story, an old story told afresh – perhaps in a new literary genre, perhaps in a new medium, with different twists, but essentially the same old story. So, they were… or in other words, they were not bored hearing the same old story over and over again, as long as an epic singer was able to perform it in a way that made it appealing, yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
So this is an attention to actually the way in which it is put together?
Silvio Bär
Definitely. Definitely. And we see that much, much more clearly, then, later when it comes to tragedy, because in Attic tragedy, there, for the most part, I think tragedy is based on mythology, so on known stories. But then, often you have plot twists that do not completely overturn the story, but that give a new emphasis, new twists to the story.
Karin Kukkonen
I mean, like Medea and the children.
Silvio Bär
Yeah, for example, For example, yeah. Or, a good example that is still discussed in scholarship is Sophocles’ King Oedipus. There are theories saying that the self-blinding of Oedipus was actually an invention of Sophocles. Difficult to say, but if it was so, then this was certainly an unexpected plot twist. So it was the known story, yeah, but it was a new way of Oedipus dealing with the situation at the end.
Karin Kukkonen
And now we can't, I guess, imagine him, you know, not ending up blind and in self-exile...
Silvio Bär
Well, yeah, exactly. Because the story has become so canonical, yeah. When we hear Oedipus the King, that is, the entire reception has gone through Sophocles; that is tied tightly, tightly tied to Sophocles. We can't imagine of anything else, yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
So that would be our epic memory in a way?
Silvio Bär
Yeah. Or our tragic memory in this sense.
Karin Kukkonen
Very true, yes! You mentioned earlier on there is a tendency that some epic characters, especially the major heroes, will reappear across different epics. And there are even some epics that we have lost, but that we know about because the heroes make an appearance in another epic. I guess Heracles may be an example for that...?
Silvio Bär
Absolutely, yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
How do you as a classicist approach these… well, let's call them “heroes without texts”?
Silvio Bär
I very much like that expression, “heroes without texts”. With your permission, I'd like to take over that expression for my research in the future. Yeah, I think that that is very fitting. To answer your question, well, I've mentioned before that most, if not all, ancient epic heroes have some sort of what I call transtextual history, meaning that they travel through literary history. Some stay in the epic genre, others go over to other genres like, for example, drama. But you rightly say that lots of texts have been lost or have not been transmitted, yeah, have not made it into the mediaeval manuscript tradition. And yes, this is a big issue, is a big problem, of course, in Classics, because we know of lots of texts that existed. We have titles, sometimes you have a couple of quotes – “fragments”, as we call them, then. And yeah, I mean, Heracles would be again an excellent example because – as I said before – Heracles makes an appearance in almost all existing Greek epics: in the Iliad, in the Odyssey, later also in Apollonius of Rhodes’ Argonautica, etc. But he's never a protagonist. He's always only a very minor figure.
Karin Kukkonen
Or you meet him in the Underworld...?
Silvio Bär
Oh, yeah, exactly, yeah. In the Odyssey, you meet him in the Underworld, yeah. But when I say “minor”, I don't mean “unimportant”. I mean, that is part of my argument in my research: To say that Heracles is a very important figure, although he's only a minor character. But the point is that we do know of lots of Greek epics that dealt with the life and the deeds of Heracles at great length, that did have Heracles as their protagonist. But those are all lost; we only have the titles, a couple of scattered fragments. So, yes, this is a big issue. And well, I mean, of course you can just ignore this fact and say, “well… my bad” or “their bad”, or “our bad”, whatever. But… of course, there are still more than enough Greek and Latin texts to read, yeah; a scholar’s lifetime wouldn't be enough to read all the Greek and Latin that exists. But – and here again, the cognitive comes of course in – surely you agree that the human mind loves mysteries, yeah? And the less we know about something, the more we want to know it, yeah. So it just… it just triggers us. And one very traditional method is, of course, simply to kind of extract as much from the existing fragments as possible to make… assumptions, inferences, educated guesses, let's put it that way, about the rest of the text, what it may have looked like. But of course that is very speculative.
Karin Kukkonen
So, you couldn't recreate an epic of Heracles?
Silvio Bär
Well, I mean, some people have tried it, which would, of course, be, well… fascinating. But there is so much speculation involved. But, I mean, there are attempts, perhaps not at recreating in that sense. But again, in Homeric studies, there is this so-called area of neoanalysis. So, neoanalysis acknowledges that the Iliad and the Odyssey are fully-fledged poems in their own right. But, at the same time, neoanalysis claims that there are traces of other lost epics hidden, so to say, in all the references and allusions to other stories which I mentioned before. Like, again, for example, Heracles is a good example – I keep mentioning Heracles because he's on the top of my mind – as I said, there are lots of allusions to Heracles or references to Heracles in the Iliad and also, amongst other things, to his destruction of Troy. Troy was destroyed twice, first by Heracles, and then it was rebuilt and then it was destroyed for a second time, definitely, by the Greeks.
Karin Kukkonen
So they're kind of completing his work...?
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. And one theory is – about which I've read at least – is that some scholars claim that those allusions to the first Trojan War actually amount to something like an epic about a first Trojan War that must have existed at some point, but that hasn't survived. And then the Iliad would basically be the successor epic to that. But I mean, you probably realize from the way I'm phrasing it, I'm very sceptical here. Yeah, I mean, it all sounds fascinating and you can't… the problem is you can't disprove it because it's so speculative. Yeah, the more speculative a theory is, the more difficult it gets to actually disprove it. Yeah, so it can't be proven, it can't be disproven. So, my final answer to your – ah, “final”, not final, but – my answer to your question is, at the end of the day, very simple, actually: I really approach the epic heroes in and through those texts we have, and I acknowledge the fact that I may be missing something here and there because we don't have all the texts.
Karin Kukkonen
So these epics – you've already talked a little bit about this... They have a particular oral quality. They come out of an oral tradition. There is an oral performance aspect to them and there is also – and I've read this from your research and others' – certain traces of orality in the text itself, for example, in the epithets that run through epics, like we've talked about “cunning Ulysses”, which keeps recurring; “Achilles of the swift foot”; and perhaps also other sort of repetitive patterns in these texts. When one reads the epic, this of course is quite strange to a modern reader. So it's not just that this is an old story, but also that this is a story written in a way that is suited to, I think, a quite different reception situation. But maybe there is something else to these repetitions than simply aiding the memory of the singer. What could be the function of these epithets and repetitions in the narrative?
Silvio Bär
Well, that's an excellent question. I'm afraid a detailed answer would result in a very complex elaboration. So, well, let me try to give you the kind of the bigger picture here. So, yeah, you're absolutely right, that is a typical feature of the Homeric epics, something that every reader notices in an instant: those so-called “epithets”, yeah – so, adjectives that accompany the name of a character by default. So, you mentioned “cunning Odysseus”, “much-enduring Odysseus”, yeah; “swift-footed Achilles”, many others; “red-haired Menelaos”, that sort of thing.
Karin Kukkonen
“Grey-eyed Athene”.
Silvio Bär
Yes, exactly. It's important that you're mentioning that also the gods, the deities, have epithets, yeah, so “grey-eyed Athene”, “bright-eyed Athene”, is perhaps the most famous one; “laughter-loving Aphrodite”… many, many.
Karin Kukkonen
“Zeus of the Aegis”.
Silvio Bär
Yeah, exactly. Yes, yes, exactly. So there is there's actually a useful Wikipedia entry on exactly that on the English Wikipedia, all in English, with a long list of all these epithets. So if any of our listeners want to check up on that, they'll find this find information. Well, what is interesting as well as puzzling is the fact that these epithets often are used – or sometimes, often – are used without seemingly fitting context. For example, Achilles may be called swift-footed even when he's sitting in his hut, sulking; and that's what he's doing most of the time in the Iliad, isn't he? Or Odysseus may be called “much-enduring” even when he's totally at ease and relaxed – like we are here. So, yeah, why is that? And you've already given a partial answer in your question: these epithets are essentially traces of the oral background, the oral origin of the Homeric epics. And in this context, there is one name of a scholar I need to mention here, namely, the name of Milman Parry. Milman Parry was an American scholar who about a hundred years ago wrote a PhD about the language of Homer. And there he showed... He was able to show systematically that those epithets were the product of an oral origin of the Homeric epics, and that the epic singer in that oral world of sung epic poetry would use those epithets not according to context, but according to metrical convenience. So, Achilles may be called “swift-footed” simply because the epithet fitted the metrical context, the hexameter, at that point, and…
Karin Kukkonen
So it can be slotted in to give you the amount of syllables you need.
Silvio Bär
Exactly, exactly. So the epic singer was singing about Achilles sitting in his hut, being sulky, whatever. But at that specific point in the hexameter, he had a slot left for “swift-footed”, so he would fit it in. And he wouldn't care about what the context was, but he would care about that he was improvising, singing, playing his guitar and having to fit in an epithet, yeah. And that was part of Parry's theory that this would help the – here the cognitive aspect comes in; Parry did cognitive research, he just didn't call it “cognitive”, yeah – that at this point he would, while singing “swift-footed” and playing his guitar, he would already have a bit of time to think about his next line. That was at the time – and still is, without exaggeration – a revolution in Homeric studies. And we can still say from today's perspective that Parry by and large was right.
Karin Kukkonen
But what about, then, the narrative function? If we start moving beyond... Parry.
Silvio Bär
Well, that comes now kind of after Parry, yeah. So if you ask – I'm not a specialist in that field – but if you asked a Homeric scholar today, of course it depends who you ask, but most would probably, when you ask them about Parry, would probably say “yes, but!”, yeah. Parry was essentially right, but his theories were simply too one-sided or, let's say, a bit too technical, too mechanical. So it's not always or not simply, not just always about this mechanical “putting in whatever suits the hexameter”. This may be the case, but there may be cases where an epithet may, in fact, be meaningful in a certain context. Of course, we can't travel back in time and ask Homer – or whoever it was – what he meant in each single case. But we can, I mean, we're all also literary scholars, so we read texts, we look at contexts, we try to make sense of what’s in the text.
Karin Kukkonen
We do the second-best thing to asking Homer.
Silvio Bär
Well, exactly, we do the second-best thing, yes, exactly. So, for example, an epithet in a certain context may have an intratextual function. Meaning… intratextuality means… basically means that it refers back or it has a reference to something in the same text. So if you, for example, have a cluster of the same epithet in a scene, in a passage, then this cluster of epithets may serve the function of putting the scene together or perhaps linking two passages together, that sort of thing. So that is one example. Or another point – and here again, the cognitive aspect comes in – I would say… I mean, I'm not a psychologist, but I would argue that when, let's say, what is said and what is happening, yeah… Like, again, “swift-footed Achilles” lying in his hut, there is a clash of semantics and pragmatics, so to say, and that results in a cognitive dissonance. So, the reader or the listener needs to resolve that cognitive dissonance. And this may result, for example, in the epithet being perceived as ironic. So to make a long story short: Parry was right, yes, but it's not as simple as that. These epithets can have a function, they clearly have a function in certain contexts, and in some contexts it may be relatively easy to figure out what their function may have been; in others it may be more difficult.
Karin Kukkonen
And we may have to draw on things like cognitive theory.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. Which – for a long time I keep saying – is a concept that I think should be used more often in literary studies: This idea of the cognitive dissonance, which I find a useful idea because this is something that often happens, yeah. I mean, whenever someone says something, but – I don't know – if I… if I tell you a joke, but I'm crying at the same time, it doesn't go together. So it triggers a cognitive dissonance.
Karin Kukkonen
And a challenge for you to…
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Yeah. It challenges you to make sense of that contradiction. And the same also goes for literature, doesn't it?
Karin Kukkonen
And of course, for ancient texts. So, I mean, we already talked about the way in which these are also alienating characters.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. I mean, that would also – for us, not for the people at that time, but for us – … there's also sort of a cognitive dissonance that… we can totally understand that Achilles is offended and angry, but we can't relate to the reasons behind it. That triggers a cognitive dissonance in us. So we have to somehow come to terms with that as well.
Karin Kukkonen
So this is one of the ways in which you as a classicist, then, make use of cognitive approaches?
Silvio Bär
Yes. So it would be a challenge where I think the cognitive approach can be a way of tackling the challenge, yes, absolutely. Or at least recognize the challenge, because that is often kind of at the heart of a challenge – to actually recognize that there is something going on there.
Karin Kukkonen
Absolutely.
Silvio Bär
So to say… or that there is something that needs to be resolved.
Karin Kukkonen
And does that.... Where do you see, I mean, this is an issue – I think – that applies to Classics, but also to other historical approaches to literature: the navigation of the historical distance.
Silvio Bär
Absolutely. Absolutely. And I mean, it also… I would have to ask you the question now, because you are an early modernist, yeah? But I would argue that the same problem also applies to when you’re working with literature from the 19th century. We tend to think, oh yeah, this is all the same stuff, we can read it, it's more or less the same language, yeah; we don't need a translation at least. But there may be…
Karin Kukkonen
We still need an edition.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. And there may be historical gaps. There may be things going on that are totally different, totally… maybe totally alien. We may perhaps not realize they're alien, but they may be.
Karin Kukkonen
And yet there are so many things that – because of certain cognitive continuities – we recognize.
Silvio Bär
Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah, I mean, here we're back at the… we need a mixture between familiarity and alienation. If something is totally alien to us, we can't relate to it.
Karin Kukkonen
Yeah, we can't do anything with it, right. To conclude our interview, I'd like to invite you to share your recommendations.
Silvio Bär
Yes, of course, happily. Well, I mean, I've been talking about the Homeric epics so much, so my primary recommendation would really be as simple as to read the Iliad and the Odyssey, yeah. So, anyone who has not read Homer should read Homer. It's great fun. And there’s of course the question of which translation to choose. And… Homer is probably one of the most translated classics at all, if not the most translated. My personal favourite is still Richmond Lattimore, the translation by Richmond Lattimore from the 1950s and 1960s. A bit old-fashioned to read, but… sometimes not always super-accurate. But what I think Lattimore really gets better than all the others, in my opinion, is that he catches the essence of the poetic flow of the Homeric original. So when I read Lattimore, I really feel like this is equivalent to what Homer sounds like. Yeah.
Karin Kukkonen
High praise, indeed.
Silvio Bär
Yes. But I know… I mean, Lattimore is… his translations are kind of… either you like them or you don't, yeah. So, I know some of my colleagues, when they hear me, they will shout out and say “no!”. There are lots of others, good ones, yeah. Or if you don't know, just take two very different translations, compare them, look what you like best, yeah. So, I mean, that's actually if… I don't want to be so partial, my recommendation is: read the Iliad, read the Odyssey, choose whichever translation suits you best and use a bit of time and energy to basically just get to know them.
Karin Kukkonen
That's a very nice recommendation. Thank you so much, Silvio, for this…
Silvio Bär
You’re most welcome, yes. Thanks for having me.
Karin Kukkonen
… wonderful conversation on Ulysses, Achilles, Heracles, and everything in between all of those.
Silvio Bär
Exactly. Exactly. Of course, it's not just… I mean, we talked a lot about Homer, yeah. It's not just Homer – there is a lot more to read. And there's also, if I may add that, there is a lot of interesting research going on in Classics related to cognitive research. So there is a lot on Homer, but there's also, for example, on ancient rhetoric, there is a lot of interesting research there. And there's a webpage called “Cognitive Classics” which I can recommend. There you can find information on things that are going on in Classics relating to cognitive research.
Karin Kukkonen
Thank you very much.
Silvio Bär
Thank you.