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Post by Prince Hal on Mar 9, 2019 12:37:47 GMT -5
Duh, it just occurred to me that the oldest version of this story is Homer's Odyssey, in which Odysseus' return home from the Trojan War is delayed when he shacks up with Calypso on her island, and meanwhile his wife back home is faithfully saying no to a whole houseful of suitors. When he gets home, he has the gall to test her faithfulness by pretending to be someone else! Not to derail the thread, but I'm going to suggest that you're misreading Odysseus's character here. For brevity's sake I'm going to leave aside any discussion of the differences between what "faithfulness" might have meant to the Greeks as opposed to our understanding of it or just how much control Odysseus could have exerted over these two godlike women and begin with your assertion that Odysseus has been unfaithful to Penelope, and not just with Calypso, btw, but with Circe earlier on his voyage home. Whether we judge him unfaithful or not is immaterial to your other assertion that he disguises himself to test Penelope's loyalty. Odysseus is kept a prisoner by Calypso for seven years. When we first see him, in Book Five, Odysseus is staring homeward, weeping. Not sobbing, tearing up or even crying, but "weeping." His profound homesickness and his desperate longing for Penelope are as poignant a depiction of nostalgia as you're likely to read, one which hearkens to its roots as an aching for one's home. In any event, Odysseus's long journey has been an exercise in learning humility, and even here he has not quite been humbled as much as he will be. Long story short, the king will eventually disguise himself as a beggar not to test his wife's faithfulness, but to be able to operate as his own undercover agent to assess his enemies' strengths and developing a strategy to defeat them. Odysseus will be further humbled before his triumph over the suitors, and the only tests of truth that will eventually be administered are those that Penelope uses to determine whether the beggar is truly her lost husband, with the final one being the Test of the Bed. Sorry if this seems pedantic; I'm sure it does. It's just that the story is one I dearly love. Okay, back onto the main track. PS: Regrets. Didn't want to post this without thanking Scott for embarking on the kind of thread that makes this place so special, especially given how painful a subject it must be for him. Thank you, Scott!
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Post by Icctrombone on Mar 9, 2019 13:26:02 GMT -5
I just stumbled onto this thread. Good stuff , man.
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Crimebuster
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Post by Crimebuster on Mar 21, 2019 21:23:43 GMT -5
This one is more of a footnote, but it's still interesting in its own way. Let's take a look at Young Love #126
One of the interesting things about this is that it's cover dated July, 1977. Not only is this well after the end of the war, it's also very late in the game for romance comics — in fact, as late as it gets. This is DC's final romance comic, as it's the last issue of Young Love, which was their last romance comic standing. Marvel had already cancelled their two romance books by this point, meaning that other than an occasional doomed attempt by Charlton to revive the genre, this issue is basically the end of the romance comic genre. And it goes out with a bang, as this is one of my favorite romance comic ever, thanks to a wide range of totally bizarre stories. We're going to skip the other three, though, and just look at DC's very last romance story, "My Boyfriend's Best Friend was my Rival!" by writer Bob Toomey and artist Bill Draut. The story is simple: Melanie is upset because hr boyfriend David is spending all his time with his old 'Nam buddy Avery. Avery, you see, was a helicopter pilot who saved David's life twice in Vietnam before being shot down. As a result, he still has severe post traumatic stress, so David is spending a lot of time with him in order to help calm him down. It's particularly bad because the 6th anniversary of his copter being shot down is tonight - the same night as David and Melanie's first anniversary dating. Melanie is really ticked off at David for prioritizing his friend's mental health over their relationship. She's not very sympathetic at all to Avery's issues, saying stuff like "That was six years ago!" and "Is your precious Avery really so important to you?" Finally, she gets really ticked off when David breaks their anniversary date. She rushes over to the airfield where avery has his helicopter company, and she just runs up and slaps him across the face! He's like... the hell?! After a short discussion, they realize that David has basically been making crap up: Avery isn't suffering from PTSD at all, David is simply using that as an excuse when he wants to step out on Melanie with other women. Avery and Melanie track David down at a restaurant and discover the other woman is Melanie's best friend, a photographer named Simone. Avery and Melanie grab bowls of pasta and dump them on the couple's heads,then take photographs of them while pointing and laughing cruelly. THE END!! Avery is really the only person in this story who comes off well at all - David is basically a sociopath, Simone is cruelly manipulating Melanie throughout in order to cheat behind her friend's back, and Melanie is self centered and seem to completely lack empathy for Avery's supposed plight. At the end, Melanie and Avery leave together in one of those last panel "...and then she found love with some other guy!" endings that DC liked to take on to otherwise downbeat stories. I find this one interesting because even by the spring of 1977, stories about Vietnam vets experiencing mental health issues upon returning from the war had already become a bit of a cliche — probably because it was a common enough thing in real life that everyone was familiar with it. At least, some things are assumed in this story that suggests as much - it's assumed that both Melanie and the reader will find David's excuse plausible enough to be believable. The fact that it touches on the plight of returning soldiers without feeling any need to actually explain or address it is maybe the most telling bit of subtext. It speaks to a broader societal conversation that this book isn't exactly a part of, but is definitely aware of. I like the issues that deal with the war as text rather than subtext, but this has enough to unpack to make it an interesting, if minor, addition to the Vietnam romance comics field.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Mar 21, 2019 21:44:57 GMT -5
Duh, it just occurred to me that the oldest version of this story is Homer's Odyssey, in which Odysseus' return home from the Trojan War is delayed when he shacks up with Calypso on her island, and meanwhile his wife back home is faithfully saying no to a whole houseful of suitors. When he gets home, he has the gall to test her faithfulness by pretending to be someone else! Not to derail the thread, but I'm going to suggest that you're misreading Odysseus's character here. For brevity's sake I'm going to leave aside any discussion of the differences between what "faithfulness" might have meant to the Greeks as opposed to our understanding of it or just how much control Odysseus could have exerted over these two godlike women and begin with your assertion that Odysseus has been unfaithful to Penelope, and not just with Calypso, btw, but with Circe earlier on his voyage home. Whether we judge him unfaithful or not is immaterial to your other assertion that he disguises himself to test Penelope's loyalty. Odysseus is kept a prisoner by Calypso for seven years. When we first see him, in Book Five, Odysseus is staring homeward, weeping. Not sobbing, tearing up or even crying, but "weeping." His profound homesickness and his desperate longing for Penelope are as poignant a depiction of nostalgia as you're likely to read, one which hearkens to its roots as an aching for one's home. In any event, Odysseus's long journey has been an exercise in learning humility, and even here he has not quite been humbled as much as he will be. Long story short, the king will eventually disguise himself as a beggar not to test his wife's faithfulness, but to be able to operate as his own undercover agent to assess his enemies' strengths and developing a strategy to defeat them. Odysseus will be further humbled before his triumph over the suitors, and the only tests of truth that will eventually be administered are those that Penelope uses to determine whether the beggar is truly her lost husband, with the final one being the Test of the Bed. Sorry if this seems pedantic; I'm sure it does. It's just that the story is one I dearly love. Okay, back onto the main track. PS: Regrets. Didn't want to post this without thanking Scott for embarking on the kind of thread that makes this place so special, especially given how painful a subject it must be for him. Thank you, Scott! How can I resist the temptation? We are doing The Odyssey right now. For this unit, I have my students conduct debates after each island and/or chapter on Ithaca. They debate whether or not Odysseus is a redeemed hero using both the Greek criteria and a modern one that the class creates together at the start of the unit. You are interpreting Odysseus' actions from a Greek standpoint. rberman is approaching his actions from a modern standpoint. Neither of you are in the wrong in how you choose to view Odysseus' actions and attitudes towards Penelope. I do have to argue that Odysseus overtly states to Athena that he is concerned about Penelope's faithfulness, and he certainly had the opportunity to reveal his identity to her sooner than he did. Whether one interprets these actions as being indicative of an inadvertent double standard or of a hero correctly ascertaining that, in accordance with the values of his culture, there IS a permissible and appropriate double standard so long as he loves his wife, is in the eye of the beholder. Year after year, my students finally generally agree that whether Odysseus is slime or a hero who has redeemed himself comes down to what he chooses to tell Penelope about his time abroad after the final page. Unfortunately, we'll never know how that plays out. I have long considered starting an actual CLASSICS section of the site, devoted to discussing classic literature, film and music, and damn if these kinds of discussions don't get me thinking about it all over again.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Mar 21, 2019 22:14:59 GMT -5
One of the interesting things about this is that it's cover dated July, 1977. Not only is this well after the end of the war, it's also very late in the game for romance comics — in fact, as late as it gets. This is DC's final romance comic, as it's the last issue of Young Love, which was their last romance comic standing. Marvel had already cancelled their two romance books by this point, meaning that other than an occasional doomed attempt by Charlton to revive the genre, this issue is basically the end of the romance comic genre. ... I find this one interesting because even by the spring of 1977, stories about Vietnam vets experiencing mental health issues upon returning from the war had already become a bit of a cliche — probably because it was a common enough thing in real life that everyone was familiar with it. At least, some things are assumed in this story that suggests as much - it's assumed that both Melanie and the reader will find David's excuse plausible enough to be believable. I wonder if maybe this was an inventory story that had been lying around for a while?
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Post by Prince Hal on Mar 21, 2019 22:47:04 GMT -5
Not to derail the thread, but I'm going to suggest that you're misreading Odysseus's character here. For brevity's sake I'm going to leave aside any discussion of the differences between what "faithfulness" might have meant to the Greeks as opposed to our understanding of it or just how much control Odysseus could have exerted over these two godlike women and begin with your assertion that Odysseus has been unfaithful to Penelope, and not just with Calypso, btw, but with Circe earlier on his voyage home. Whether we judge him unfaithful or not is immaterial to your other assertion that he disguises himself to test Penelope's loyalty. Odysseus is kept a prisoner by Calypso for seven years. When we first see him, in Book Five, Odysseus is staring homeward, weeping. Not sobbing, tearing up or even crying, but "weeping." His profound homesickness and his desperate longing for Penelope are as poignant a depiction of nostalgia as you're likely to read, one which hearkens to its roots as an aching for one's home. In any event, Odysseus's long journey has been an exercise in learning humility, and even here he has not quite been humbled as much as he will be. Long story short, the king will eventually disguise himself as a beggar not to test his wife's faithfulness, but to be able to operate as his own undercover agent to assess his enemies' strengths and developing a strategy to defeat them. Odysseus will be further humbled before his triumph over the suitors, and the only tests of truth that will eventually be administered are those that Penelope uses to determine whether the beggar is truly her lost husband, with the final one being the Test of the Bed. Sorry if this seems pedantic; I'm sure it does. It's just that the story is one I dearly love. Okay, back onto the main track. PS: Regrets. Didn't want to post this without thanking Scott for embarking on the kind of thread that makes this place so special, especially given how painful a subject it must be for him. Thank you, Scott! How can I resist the temptation? We are doing The Odyssey right now. For this unit, I have my students conduct debates after each island and/or chapter on Ithaca. They debate whether or not Odysseus is a redeemed hero using both the Greek criteria and a modern one that the class creates together at the start of the unit. You are interpreting Odysseus' actions from a Greek standpoint. rberman is approaching his actions from a modern standpoint. Neither of you are in the wrong in how you choose to view Odysseus' actions and attitudes towards Penelope. I do have to argue that Odysseus overtly states to Athena that he is concerned about Penelope's faithfulness, and he certainly had the opportunity to reveal his identity to her sooner than he did. Whether one interprets these actions as being indicative of an inadvertent double standard or of a hero correctly ascertaining that, in accordance with the values of his culture, there IS a permissible and appropriate double standard so long as he loves his wife, is in the eye of the beholder. Year after year, my students finally generally agree that whether Odysseus is slime or a hero who has redeemed himself comes down to what he chooses to tell Penelope about his time abroad after the final page. Unfortunately, we'll never know how that plays out. I have long considered starting an actual CLASSICS section of the site, devoted to discussing classic literature, film and music, and damn if these kinds of discussions don't get me thinking about it all over again.Please do this! I think Homer is asking his listeners/ readers to reconsider the status of women in Greek society, to reconsider the unbalanced way of living that exalts the traditionally masculine (warfare, physical courage, the pursuit of glory, unfaithfulness) and downplays the feminine (contemplation, humility, patience, loyalty, compassion) . The story is full of powerful women from whom Odysseus must learn: Athena, the Sirens, Calypso, Circe, Anticlea, and Penelope herself. His long painful struggle is one of self-discovery and transformation. Like Greece, he must leave behind the kind of savagery and unbalanced nature that led to the mindless slaughter of the Trojan War. Odysseus and his men (the first literary examples of characters suffering from PTSD?) leave Troy brutalized by their experiences and all but Odysseus pay for their unwillingness or inability to change. Odysseus becomes more "feminine" as a result of his encounters; he feels emotions more deeply -- recall his "weeping" as he stares homeward; he becomes more self-disciplined as his journey goes on; he learns patience and humility; and he rejects the notion that glory is more important than love. Like the sun, whose east-to-west and back east journey mimics, and Penelope, whose stratagem mimics the moon's waxing and waning, these two balance each other: husband and wife; sun and moon; two halves of one nature. Remember, too, that Odysseus is not fated to live happily ever after and remain home with his beloved in Ithaca, but to be punished further for his hubris. He must leave Penelope yet again and travel inland carrying an oar until he encounters people so far removed from any knowledge of the sea that they think the oar is a winnowing fan. There he must plant the oar in the ground and teach the landlubbers about the glories of Poseidon. PS, Shax: Have you ever explored with your students the Telegony, a "sequel" or perhaps more properly, a continuation of the Odyssey? It exists only in summary, but it's well worth discussing if only because of its attempt to wrap up the stories of Odysseus, Telemachus, and Penelope.
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Post by beccabear67 on Mar 21, 2019 22:54:14 GMT -5
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Post by rberman on Mar 22, 2019 2:06:26 GMT -5
How can I resist the temptation? We are doing The Odyssey right now. For this unit, I have my students conduct debates after each island and/or chapter on Ithaca. They debate whether or not Odysseus is a redeemed hero using both the Greek criteria and a modern one that the class creates together at the start of the unit. You are interpreting Odysseus' actions from a Greek standpoint. rberman is approaching his actions from a modern standpoint. Neither of you are in the wrong in how you choose to view Odysseus' actions and attitudes towards Penelope. I do have to argue that Odysseus overtly states to Athena that he is concerned about Penelope's faithfulness, and he certainly had the opportunity to reveal his identity to her sooner than he did. Whether one interprets these actions as being indicative of an inadvertent double standard or of a hero correctly ascertaining that, in accordance with the values of his culture, there IS a permissible and appropriate double standard so long as he loves his wife, is in the eye of the beholder. Year after year, my students finally generally agree that whether Odysseus is slime or a hero who has redeemed himself comes down to what he chooses to tell Penelope about his time abroad after the final page. Unfortunately, we'll never know how that plays out. I have long considered starting an actual CLASSICS section of the site, devoted to discussing classic literature, film and music, and damn if these kinds of discussions don't get me thinking about it all over again.Please do this! I think Homer is asking his listeners/ readers to reconsider the status of women in Greek society, to reconsider the unbalanced way of living that exalts the traditionally masculine (warfare, physical courage, the pursuit of glory, unfaithfulness) and downplays the feminine (contemplation, humility, patience, loyalty, compassion) . The story is full of powerful women from whom Odysseus must learn: Athena, the Sirens, Calypso, Circe, Anticlea, and Penelope herself. His long painful struggle is one of self-discovery and transformation. Like Greece, he must leave behind the kind of savagery and unbalanced nature that led to the mindless slaughter of the Trojan War. Odysseus and his men (the first literary examples of characters suffering from PTSD?) leave Troy brutalized by their experiences and all but Odysseus pay for their unwillingness or inability to change. Odysseus becomes more "feminine" as a result of his encounters; he feels emotions more deeply -- recall his "weeping" as he stares homeward; he becomes more self-disciplined as his journey goes on; he learns patience and humility; and he rejects the notion that glory is more important than love. Like the sun, whose east-to-west and back east journey mimics, and Penelope, whose stratagem mimics the moon's waxing and waning, these two balance each other: husband and wife; sun and moon; two halves of one nature. Remember, too, that Odysseus is not fated to live happily ever after and remain home with his beloved in Ithaca, but to be punished further for his hubris. He must leave Penelope yet again and travel inland carrying an oar until he encounters people so far removed from any knowledge of the sea that they think the oar is a winnowing fan. There he must plant the oar in the ground and teach the landlubbers about the glories of Poseidon. PS, Shax: Have you ever explored with your students the Telegony, a "sequel" or perhaps more properly, a continuation of the Odyssey? It exists only in summary, but it's well worth discussing if only because of its attempt to wrap up the stories of Odysseus, Telemachus, and Penelope. The other piece of the puzzle is that The Odyssey several times repeats the gossip about Agammemnon having been slain by his wife Clytemnestra and her lover Aegisthus upon his return from the Trojan War. This sets up a tension as to whether Odysseys will suffer the same fate after years abroad. I am not sure that the ancients viewed weeping warriors as getting in touch with their feminine side.
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Post by Prince Hal on Mar 22, 2019 4:57:34 GMT -5
Men didn’t weep about missing their wives. Compare Odysseus’s desire for domesticity in the Odyssey to Achilles’ desire for glory in the Iliad as the driving goal of their existence.
And remember Achilles’ comment on the pursuit of glory when Odysseus encounters him in Hades.
Women are on the ascendant in the Odysssey; I think Homer is trying to capture the changes that occurred in Greek society as a result of the events that began 400 or so years before he wrote/ composed/ sang his epic.
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shaxper
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Post by shaxper on Mar 22, 2019 6:08:46 GMT -5
PS, Shax: Have you ever explored with your students the Telegony, a "sequel" or perhaps more properly, a continuation of the Odyssey? It exists only in summary, but it's well worth discussing if only because of its attempt to wrap up the stories of Odysseus, Telemachus, and Penelope. I was completely unaware of this! Meanwhile, I perceive Homer's depiction of powerful women as cautionary: out there in the strange, wide world, there are actually powerful women, and a true hero isn't charmed by them but instead puts them in their place. Penelope is a contrast to them. She is wise and powerful, but chooses not to act, even as it causes injury to her and to Telemachus. She patiently awaits the return of her man to put things right.
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Post by Prince Hal on Mar 22, 2019 10:26:27 GMT -5
PS, Shax: Have you ever explored with your students the Telegony, a "sequel" or perhaps more properly, a continuation of the Odyssey? It exists only in summary, but it's well worth discussing if only because of its attempt to wrap up the stories of Odysseus, Telemachus, and Penelope. I was completely unaware of this! Meanwhile, I perceive Homer's depiction of powerful women as cautionary: out there in the strange, wide world, there are actually powerful women, and a true hero isn't charmed by them but instead puts them in their place. Penelope is a contrast to them. She is wise and powerful, but chooses not to act, even as it causes injury to her and to Telemachus. She patiently awaits the return of her man to put things right. Ooh, I see few examples of Odysseus putting those women in their place, though. He is their captive (Circe, Calypso), or their pupil (Athene, Anticleia). He literally begs Circe on his knees for his freedom. He is reduced to tears on Calypso's island, where he and turns down immortality for the love of his mortal wife and the risk of everyday life. It is only the intervention of Hermes and by extension, Zeus, that enables him to escape either of those demi-goddesses. Even when he returns to Penelope, he must submit to her tests before he can resume his place by her side.
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Post by wildfire2099 on Mar 25, 2019 6:56:48 GMT -5
PS, Shax: Have you ever explored with your students the Telegony, a "sequel" or perhaps more properly, a continuation of the Odyssey? It exists only in summary, but it's well worth discussing if only because of its attempt to wrap up the stories of Odysseus, Telemachus, and Penelope. I was completely unaware of this! Meanwhile, I perceive Homer's depiction of powerful women as cautionary: out there in the strange, wide world, there are actually powerful women, and a true hero isn't charmed by them but instead puts them in their place. Penelope is a contrast to them. She is wise and powerful, but chooses not to act, even as it causes injury to her and to Telemachus. She patiently awaits the return of her man to put things right. There is also the newish Madeline Miller book Circe (Which I just reviewed in the book thread)... It uses some of the bits in the summary of the Telegony and tells an actual story. As Circe is the 'hero' of the book, Odysseus doesn't come off great, but it's an interesting take
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Crimebuster
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Post by Crimebuster on Apr 1, 2020 19:45:15 GMT -5
I'm going to be continuing this sometime soon (in theory, anyway...) and I was wondering what you guys would think about a video review rather than a written review. I see pros and cons, but I was thinking about recording a video where I discuss the next couple of stories rather than writing it out.
Thoughts?
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Post by electricmastro on Apr 1, 2020 23:32:02 GMT -5
Patsy Walker #122 (August 1965, Marvel Comics) was quite compelling. I can only imagine this was how many lovers were feeling just as the US was becoming directly involved in Vietnam:
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Crimebuster
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Post by Crimebuster on Apr 1, 2020 23:33:10 GMT -5
I will be covering this story shortly!
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