Classical Inquiries

Catullus
By Gregory Nagy

Back and forth from general to special kinds of erotic love, further variations on a theme of love-on-wings in Song 1 of Sappho and elsewhere

2020.12.25 | By Gregory Nagy §0. In Song 1 of Sappho, as our mind’s eye views the goddess Aphrodite at the moment when she starts driving her chariot drawn by birds called strouthoi and travels in a miraculous instant, with the speed of light, all the way down from the bright heavens above, down to the dark soil of our earthly human existence here below, how are we to imagine… Read more

Guest Post

The love of small birds

2020.11.13 | By Natasha Bershadsky §0. I pick up here the thread of an essay by Gregory Nagy where he connects a vase painting that pictures a girl with a little pet bird, as painted by the Meidias Painter, with Poems 2 and 3 of Catullus. I will argue that there is a poetics of fluidity in identifying this little bird, and that the identities of such birds actually depends… Read more

Guest Post

A Turkish Angora Cat in Paris: An insight into Catullus’ ‘Sparrow Poem’ (c. 2) arising from a Modern Greek Song

2019.03.18 | By Lucia Athanassaki This response has been inspired by Gregory Nagy’s discussion of Catullus’ famous ‘Sparrow Poem’ (c. 2) in Classical Inquiries 2018.12.13. According to Nagy, Catullus’ model was Sappho’s ‘Sparrow Song’, lost to us but not to Catullus, in which the Lesbian poet expressed her affection for her little sparrow. Taking my lead from a Modern Greek pet song, I shall explore a slightly different path, the possibility… Read more

By Gregory Nagy

A scenario for exchanges of comments on a planned monograph about the ancient reception of Sappho

2019.03.08 | By Gregory Nagy As the title of this posting for 2019.03.08 indicates, I am planning to produce a monograph about the ancient reception of Sappho, and part of the plan is to organize a system for exchanging comments about this monograph, the text of which is I think not yet ready for publication in print. In this posting, I attempt to get the conversation started by making selected… Read more

By Gregory Nagy

Homo ludens at play with the songs of Sappho: Experiments in comparative reception theory, Essay Seven

2019.03.01 | By Gregory Nagy §0. This posting for 2019.03.01 is Essay Seven of a long-term project that started with Essay One at 2019.01.08. The numbering of my paragraphs here in Essay Seven continues from §110 of Essay Six, posted 2019.02.22, continuing from earlier posts. In Essay Seven here, I attempt to round out my findings, as of now, about the reception of Sappho’s songs in the ancient world. Most… Read more