And then the epode hits: Typhon, the hundred-headed monstrosity, trembles in fear & shrieks from the bottom of the earth as the Muses' music reach his ears; the snow-covered Etna weighs down upon his chest, and soon his furor manifests itself as an earthquake, an eruption:
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Pindar's art is fundamentally shamanic. He travels to the solar world of the dead. His schizophrenic metaphors arise from his ability to break on through, to see & breathe with new eyes. The opening to Ol. 1 is a radical reinterpretation of nature, only superficially a priamel.pic.twitter.com/0M2BAK4DcK
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The Greeks went to battle with an acute consciousness of life's finitude & of their individuality. Pindar does not praise Thebes; only the fallen youth & his family. They knew it would all end there, but still calmly marched on to battle; they were in it for the glory.pic.twitter.com/s4HA1YUfzs
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In this poem, Isth. 7, Pindar praises both the victor and his uncle who died in battle, ultimately concluding with this prayer: "O golden-haired Loxias,in the Pythian contest too, grant us one more crown of flowers." "More life, & more victory." - such is the moral of the story.
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Even by Pindar's standard, these lines are difficult. Glory's effect is described as a breath that spreads upon men; manly deeds to conquistador-like exploration, which however has to stop at some point; the Pillars of Heracles, where the world of man, ends.pic.twitter.com/pHFKMMFRdS
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Fascinating chiastic structure here. Pindar recounts how the family were famous for their hippic victories & for their ability in war, before losing most of their men in battle, and, later, winning again at the Games. A B B A He organizes their story as a cyclical process.pic.twitter.com/BqeuBBw8kF
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Pindar expressed himself through an idiolect, a language of his own creation. Homer's Greek is an artificial, codified literary language, but Pindar not only invented his vocabulary, he would modify & bend syntax sometimes to near complete obscurity.
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