Read more
Architecture, art, sculpture, economics, mathematics, science, metaphysics, comedy, tragedy, drama and epic poetry were all devised and perfected by the Greeks. Of the four classical orders of architecture, three were invented by the Greeks and the fourth, the only one the Romans could come up with, was a combination of two of the former.The powerful ghost of ancient Greece still lingers on in the popular mind as the first great civilization and one of the most influential in the creation of modern thought. It is the starting block of Western European civilization.In his new Odyssey, eminent writer Harry Mount tells the story of ancient Greece while on the trail of its greatest son, Odysseus. In the charming, anecdotal style of his bestselling , Harry visits Troy, still looming over the plain where Achilles dragged Hector's body through the dust, and attempts to swim the Hellespont, in emulation of Lord Byron and the doomed Greek lover, Leander. Whether in Odysseus's kingdom on Ithaca, Homer's birthplace of Chios or the Minotaur's lair on Crete, Mount brings the Odyssey - and ancient Greece - back to life.
List of contents
Introduction: from Heathrow to Troy
1 Bye-bye, Penelope
2 From Europe to Asia - by Breast Stroke
3 Greece 1 Rome 0
4 Shakespeare's Classical Education
5 My Great-Grandfather's Cenotaph at Gallipoli
6 In Search of Priam's Troy
7 In the Wake of Odysseus
8 Sex Life in Ancient Greece
9 Homer - The Early Years
10 How Homer Conquered the World
11 It was all Greek to Jesus
12 Mykonos - the Party's Only
13 Into the Marble Mountain
14 The Athenian Miracle
15 A Marathon Effort
16 The Decline and Fall of Plato's Athens
17 Greek Tiger Mothers - the Sparton Guide to Bringing Up Baby
18 Scylla and Circe Get An Italian Makeover
19 The Sicilian Cyclops
20 Going Home to Ithaca
21 Calypso's Lament
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
About the author
Harry Mount studied ancient and modern history and classics at Magdalen College, Oxford, where he gained a First. He has written a number of books including the top ten bestseller Amo, Amas, Amat and All That (Short Books), A Lust for Windowsills (Little Brown) and How England Made the English (Viking). He is a former New York correspondent for The Daily Telegraph and has written for the Spectator, The Daily Telegraph and The Daily Mail. He is now editor of The Oldie Magazine.
Report
The book is packed with such goodies ... As he picks his way among the ruins, brooding on the past - his own, and that of Greece - the author remains essentially English ... Equally, at times, Harry Mount has an air of being the living embodiment of the study of classics itself: noble, solitary, uneasily beleaguered, and sporting a slightly silly hat. Spectator
