Planctae

Hearken now, lady Thetis, to what I am eager to tell thee.

Thou knowest how honored in my heart is the hero, Aeson's son, and the others that have helped him in the contest, and how I have saved them when they passed between the wandering rocks, where roar terrible storms of fire and the waves foam round the rugged reefs.

And now past the mighty rock of Scylla and Charybdis, horribly belching, a course awaits them.

But thee indeed from thy infancy did I tend with my own hands, and love beyond all others that dwell in the salt sea, because thou didst refuse to share the couch of Zeus for all his desire.

And the heroes, seized by anguish, left the Sirens, but other perils still worse, destructive to ships, awaited them in the meeting-place of the seas.

For on the one side appeared the smooth rock of Scylla, on the other Charybdis ceaselessly spouted and roared.

In another part the Wandering Rocks were booming beneath the mighty surge, where before the burning flame spurted forth from the top of the crags, above the rock glowing with fire, and the air was misty with smoke, nor could you have seen the sun's light.

Then, though Hephaestus had ceased from his toils, the sea was still sending up a warm vapor.

In Homer's Odyssey, the poet refers to the Argo Passimilusa, which means the ship of interest to all.

And he mentions that the Argo passed to the Wandering Rocks and that Hera, the goddess, loved Jason.

It appears that the audience already knew who Jason was and what he was up to, the way that it's referenced, and if the dating of the Odyssey is correct, which is fixed back to the 7th or 8th century BC, it's thought that the Argonaut story was well known that far back.

And then you have a little bit later, Hesiod in the 700-ish BC timeframe.

And now Ulysses had to choose between two ways.

One of them was through the wandering rocks.

Cersei had told him of these, that they were the rocks which floated about in the sea, and that when any ship came near them they moved very fast through the water, and caught the ship between them, and broke it up.

So fast did they move that they caught even the birds as they flew, and Cersei told him that only one ship had ever escaped them, and that was the Argo, when the heroes went in it to fetch back the golden fleece.

Uh, she's also saying that once you pass the Sirens, you're gonna have two routes to choose between.

We don't get both routes in today's passage, just the first, uh, the first route being near the capital W Wandering, capital R Rocks, the Wandering Rocks, which is a perilous, the most perilous, uh, passage it sounds, because only one ship has ever passed by.

And that's saying something when even the little birdies that bring Zeus his, uh, daily meals of ambrosia can't even get by it.

So the Argo, famous ship, famous crew, famous leader Jason, uh, was only able to get by under Hera's protection.

So we've done a series of history episodes now, including historical game.

to accompany our Wandering Rocks episodes, which Wandering Rocks is not the history episode.

Yeah.

It's the mechanics episode.

In the game Labyrinth, which is the technique.

Yeah.

But there is so much history in Wandering Rocks that having this little companion series, I think is really helpful to go a little bit deeper.

Our title for today's episode is Silken Thomas.

And now Ulysses had to choose between two ways.

One of them was through the wandering rocks.

Cersei had told him of these, that they were the rocks which floated about in the sea, and that when any ship came near them they moved very fast through the water, and caught the ship between them, and broke it up.

So fast did they move that they caught even the birds as they flew, and Cersei told him that only one ship had ever escaped them, and that was the Argo, when the heroes went in it to fetch back the golden fleece.

I think that's all of our business out of the way.

Well, without further ado, let's get into Wandering Rocks.

If you're following along at home, the text we're looking at today is from pages 229 to 232 in the 1990 Vintage International Edition, which I have on hand today.

Dermot, I've always asked you to do Last Time on Ulysses.

definitely

somebody else's dream job and for him it's like nah

Alright, well today we're gonna look at two sections of wandering rocks Which is why I have my book out here because when we're gonna look at very briefly because it's a very brief Sketch and then the next is a bit longer.

The first section we're gonna look at is the seventh section of wandering rocks, which is deals with Miss Dunn.