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Summary: Good Scholarship + Talented Author = Great Read
Comment: This relatively short work by the famed ancient historian M. I. Finely remains as influential and important today as it was when it was published over 30 years ago, no small feat in field that has seen major shifts in opinion over the same time period. Finley is one of those unique authors that can combine solid historical scholarship within an engaging framework that makes his works accessible to all, from the lay reader to a student of the field. I found the book to be both an interesting companion to The Odyssey as well as an interesting read in its own right, although I have been know to be a bit partial to Greek history. Regardless of ones interests, Finley is a very accessible author who consistently leaves me craving more.
The main goal of the book is too illuminate the obscure world of Greek prehistory using the later of the two major epic poems attributed to Homer, The Odyssey. Finley set himself no small task, for both the Iliad and The Odyssey have been regarded as representing a picture of the Greek Bronze Age to varying degrees since the founding of modern historical scholarship and indeed even before. What Finley proposes is a departure from this line of thought, namely that the epics of Homer recall the memory of the `Heroic Age of the Greeks' that is traditionally associated with the Mycenaean civilization of the later Bronze Age. Instead he suggests that the poems represent a time closer to Homers own, thought to be c. 800-750 B. C. The time period in question is known by various names but is most often called the Greek Dark Age, the period of time between the collapse of the Mycenaean civilization c. 1200 B.C. and the onset of the Archaic Age c. 750. Through an examination of the texts in combination with modern archeological findings, Finley paints a very convincing picture of what life was like in the Mycenaean and Dark Age and how The Odyssey much more closely reflects the latter. Outlining his thesis and the marked resistance it has met from a good portion of the scholarly community, Finley methodically addresses criticisms and in a good many cases turns the table on those that would rather reject his work.
Being that the poem is concerned mainly with the exploits, travels, and trials of Odysseus, mythical King of Ithaca, the social, economic, and cultural conditions exposed are necessarily not representative of the vast majority of the people living in the society. This is something we must be content with in a comparison of text and archeology of this sort, as a rule of thumb epic poems, our only written record of the time, can have nothing to do with the lives of most people, only those at the very apex of society. Although this certainly has its limitations, any light provided for this period no matter how narrow the focus shines a bit more on all the other parts. Particularly interesting are the sections dealing with ancient economy of the ruling class, primarily characterized in a reciprocal gift giving system that conferred the most respect and power to those ruler who could give wealth away to others as `presents' thereby ensuring that they owed him something when need arose. In this means wealth was accumulated in order to be dispersed in exchange for service and the acknowledgement of ones social position. An essential book for anyone trying to find the very real world that lays just beyond on the pages of western literature's greatest epics, a world that Finely brings to life again almost as much as Homer does, if not in a different sphere.
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Summary: A classic on classics
Comment: M.I. (Sir Moses) Finley belonged to a generation of scholars who wrote gracefully, intelligibly and critically for a broad intelligent, curious audience instead of wasting knowledge and ideas squabbling with colleagues behind the closed door of impenetrable academicspeak. That's one reason to enjoy THE WORLD OF ODYSSEUS. Just as compelling is watching him tackle the slippery slope of locating the poet Homer and the events he sang of in "The Illiad" and "The Odyssey" in time, place and culture. He stood in line a couple of millennia behind the first to probe Homer, and others continue to study and argue the issues, but his remains a classic in the effort.
Finley addresses the sociological, economic and religious systems of the Heroic Age, and gives a close reading of the Homeric texts in doing so. He finds considerable evidence of the preliterate culture he is seeking in the poetry and provides a convincing argument as to why they can be trusted to offer verisimilitude if not fact. The world he opens up is fascinating. My copy is the second edition, to which Finley added appendices in which he sorted through archeological activity and other scholarship in the field, nodding to the difficulty but also the irresistible adventure in pushing back to a time before recorded history to find out what mattered.
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Summary: Solid Scholarship
Comment: This book deduces pre-homeric mores from references to domestic and social arrangements in Homer's works. It covers Homer and his relation to classical Greece; bards and heroes as a social class; wealth and labor; households, kiniships and community; and morals and values. Heavy reference is made to the text of the Iliad and particularly the Odyssey, and there are many close observations. For example, common folk attend assemblies and may react, but do not make proposals or even speak. But there are lapses. The author seems to miss the point that the Ancients thought every departure from reason was inspired by a god. Also, he fails to note that Nestor prays for fame for himself and his wife, a point that vitiates his argument that queens who attend banquets or participate in affairs of state are overstepping their bounds. Otherwise, the book presents plausible customs and morals flowing from the texts. The nobility in every kingdom was separate from commoners, slaves, and indentured freemen. The degree of input that a king wanted from nobles was up to the king. Nobles looked down on those who traded for profit, as ever, but the author overlooks the reason--because concentration of capital threatened the nobility. He omits the most plausible reason for Laertes' self-exile after Odysseus's departure, a directive from Athena. Otherwise, this book explains Homeric customs at a high order of scholarship. Any reader will achieve a deeper understanding of the texts.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Solid scholarship
Comment: This book deduces pre-homeric mores from references to domestic and social arrangements in Homer's works. It covers Homer and his relation to classical Greece; bards and heroes as a social class; wealth and labor; households, kiniships and community; and morals and values. Heavy reference is made to the text of the Iliad and particularly the Odyssey, and there are many close observations. For example, common folk attend assemblies and may react, but do not make proposals or even speak. But there are lapses. The author seems to miss the point that the Ancients thought every departure from reason was inspired by a god. Also, he fails to note that Nestor prays for fame for himself and his wife, a point that vitiates his argument that queens who attend banquets or participate in affairs of state are overstepping their bounds. Otherwise, the book presents plausible customs and morals flowing from the texts. The nobility in every kingdom was separate from commoners, slaves, and indentured freemen. The degree of input that a king wanted from nobles was up to the king. Nobles looked down on those who traded for profit, as ever, but the author overlooks the reason--because concentration of capital threatened the nobility. He omits the most plausible reason for Laertes' self-exile after Odysseus's departure, a directive from Athena. Otherwise, this book explains Homeric customs at a high order of scholarship. Any reader will achieve a deeper understanding of the texts.
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Summary: Unanswerable
Comment: Well, here's Finley's conclusion: Homer's stories about the Trojan War are fiction, and Schliemann's "discoveries" of Troy do not support his wild claims (despite Schliemann's other services to archaeology). Finley quotes the sceptical judgment of Charles Newton, the British Museum curator, who in 1878 wrote that we don't know the size of that kernel of truth in Homer's epics. Finley went further: there is no historical truth at all in The Iliad, and as little in The Odyssey also.My impression is that Finley was, and remains, a minority. Most Greek scholars (historical, archaeological, or philological) feel that there IS some real facts in Homer. For instance, J. B. Bury, writing in early last century in his History of Greece to the Death of Alexander the Great, stated that the traditional date of the Fall of Troy - i.e., the date indicated by Homer - 1183 BC, is correct, and that Homer's Troy corresponds to archaeological facts! Bury was the Regius Professor of Modern History at Cambridge (strange title for a scholar of ANCIENT Greece and Rome), writing his book at a time when Finley was an infant. It is possible that archaeological finds by 1954 have cast more doubts on Schliemann's labors, which were made in the 19th century. But then Finley quotes Newton with approval, and Newton wrote in 1878. It is equally possible (though I don't know) that modern archaeological discoveries have further supported Schliemann and not Finley. In a sense, the whole debate is moot. Many great works of literature are a mix of facts and fiction: Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, China's Three Kingdoms and The Journey to the West, Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. These are great books. To be sure, that kernel of truth may be very small in Homer, but we don't read Hamlet, let alone see it acted on stage, because we think the story is "real". That Homer's stories were believed by the ancients to be true (Alexander for one) is a major reason why we still have them today. And who can say for sure one finds nothing but true facts in history books? Can't true history contain a kernel of fiction also? Alexander, who believed in Homer without question and was inspired by The Iliad, is the subject of countless biographies, but whether we know whole truth and nothing but concerning Alexander is still a mystery. The difference between him and Achilles is a matter of degrees.
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