Troy

No.

That are so ripped in a Brad Pitt and Troy way with the line and everything.

Well, I mean, that's what better way to get your reps in by chemically inducing your reps.

You're right.

listen then o king all our hope has ever been in the help of minerva but from the day when diomed and ulysses dared having bloody hands to snatch her image from her holy place in troy her face was turned from us well do i remember how the eyes of the image well-nigh before they had set it in the camp blazed with wrath and how the salt sweat stood upon its limbs aye and how it thrice leapt from the ground shaking shield and spear then calchas told us that we must cross the seas again and seek at home fresh omens for our war and this indeed they are doing even now and will return anon also the soothsayer said meanwhile ye must make the likeness of a horse to be a peace-offering to minerva and take heed that ye make it huge of bulk so that the men of troy may not receive it into their gates nor bring it within their walls and get safety for themselves thereby for if he said the men of troy harm this image at all they shall surely perish but if they bring it into their city then shall asia lay siege hereafter to the city of pelops and our children shall suffer the doom which we would fain have brought on troy these words wrought much on the men of troy and as they pondered on them lo the gods sent another marvel to deceive them for while laocoon the priest of neptune was slaying a bull at the altar of his god there came two serpents across the sea from tenedos whose heads and necks whereon were thick manes of hair were high above the waves and many scaly coils trailed behind in the waters and when they reached the land they still sped forward their eyes were red as blood and blazed with fire and their forked tongues hissed loud for rage then all the men of troy grew pale with fear and fled away but these turned not aside this way or that seeking laocoon where he stood and first they wrapped themselves about his little sons one serpent about each and began to devour them and when the father would have given help to his children having a sword in his hand they seized upon himself and bound him fast with their folds twice they compassed about his body and twice his neck lifting their heads far above him and all the while he strove to tear them away with his hands his priest's scarlet dripping with blood nor did he cease to cry horribly aloud even as a bull bellows when after an ill stroke of the axe it flees from the altar but when their work was done the two glided to the citadel of minerva and hid themselves beneath the feet and shield of the goddess and men said one to another lo the priest laocoon has been judged according to his deeds for he cast his spear against this holy thing and now the gods have slain him then all cried out together that the horse of wood must be drawn to the citadel whereupon they opened the sion gate and pulled down the wall that was thereby and put rollers under the feet of the horse and joined ropes thereto so in much joy they drew it into the city youths and maidens singing about it the while and laying their hands to the ropes with great gladness and yet there wanted not signs and tokens of evil to come four times it halted on the threshold of the gate and men might have heard a clashing of arms within cassandra also opened her mouth prophesying evil but no man heeded her for that was ever the doom upon her not to be believed speaking truth so the men of troy drew the horse into the city and that night they kept a feast to all the gods with great joy not knowing that the last day of the great city had come chapter two the sack of troy but when night was now fully come and the men of troy lay asleep lo from the ship of king agamemnon there rose up a flame for a signal to the greeks and these straightway manned their ships and made across the sea from tenedos there being a great calm and the moon also giving them light sinon likewise opened a secret door that was in the great horse and the chiefs issued forth therefrom and opened the gates of the city slaying those that kept watch meanwhile

there came a vision

to neas who now hector being dead was the chief hope and stay of the men of troy it was hector's self that he seemed to see but not such as he had seen him coming back rejoicing with the arms of achilles or setting fire to the ships but even as he lay after that achilles dragged him at his chariot wheels covered with dust and blood his feet swollen and pierced through with thongs to him said neas not knowing what he said why hast thou tarried so long much have we suffered waiting for thee and what grief hath marked thy face and whence these wounds but to this the spirit answered nothing but said groaning the while fly son of venus fly and save thee from these flames the enemy is in the walls and troy hath utterly perished if any hand could have saved our city this hand had done so thou art now the hope of troy take then her gods and flee with them for company seeking the city that thou shalt one day build across the sea and now the alarm of battle came nearer and nearer and neas waking from sleep climbed upon the roof and looked on the city as a shepherd stands and sees a fierce flame sweeping before the south wind over the corn-fields or a flood rushing down from the mountains so he stood and as he looked the great palace of deiphobus sank down in the fire and the house of eucalygon that was hard by blazed forth till the sea by sigium shone with the light then scarce knowing what he sought he girded on his armour thinking perchance that he might yet win some place of vantage or at the least might avenge himself on the enemy or find honour in his death but as he passed from out of his house there met him panthus the priest of apollo that was on the citadel who cried to him O Aeneas, the glory is departed from Troy, and the Greeks have the mastery in the city, for armed men are coming forth from the great horse of wood, and thousands also swarm in at the gates which Sinan hath treacherously opened.

And as he spake, others came up under the light of the moon, as Hypanis, and Dimas, and young Coribus, who had but newly come to Troy, seeking Cassandra to be his wife.

to whom

neas spake if ye are minded my brethren to follow me to the death come on for how things fare this night ye see the gods who were the stay of this city have departed from it nor is aught remaining to which we may bring succour yet can we die as brave men in battle and haply he that counts his life to be lost may yet save it then even as ravening wolves hastened through the mist seeking for prey so they went through the city doing dreadful deeds and for a while the men of greece fled before them first of all there met them androgyos with a great company following him who thinking them to be friends said haste comrades why are ye so late we are spoiling this city of troy and ye are but newly come from the ships but forthwith for they answered him not as he had looked for he knew that he had fallen among enemies then even as one who treads upon a snake unawares among thorns and flies from it when it rises angrily against him with swelling neck so andragius would have fled but the men of troy rushed on and seeing that they knew all the place and that great fear was upon the greeks slew many men then said corbus we have good luck in this matter my friends come now let us change our shields and put upon us the armour of these greeks for whether we deal with our enemy by craft or by force who will ask then he took to himself the helmet and shield of andragius and also girded his sword upon him in like manner did the others and thus going disguised among the greeks slew many so that some again fled to the ships and some were fain to climb into the horse of wood but lo men came dragging by the hair from the temple of minerva the virgin cassandra whom when corbus beheld and how she lifted up her eyes to heaven but as for her hands they were bound with iron he endured not the sight but threw himself upon those that dragged her the others following him then did a grievous mischance befall them for the men of troy that stood upon the roof of the temple cast spears against them judging them to be enemies the greeks also being wroth that the virgin should be taken from them fought the more fiercely and many who had before been put to flight in the city came against them and prevailed being indeed many against few then first of all fell corbus being slain by penelius the boeotian and ripias also the most righteous of all the sons of troy but the gods dealt not with him after his righteousness hypannus also was slain and dimus and panthus escaped not for all that more than other men he feared the gods and was also the priest of apollo then was neas severed from the rest having with him two only iphitus and peleus iphitus being an old man and peleus sorely wounded by ulysses and these hearing a great shouting hastened to the palace of king priam where the battle was fiercer than in any place beside for some of the greeks were seeking to climb the walls laying ladders thereto whereon they stood holding forth their shields with their left hands and with their right grasping the roofs

nor did he cease to cry out in his wrath against gods and men also he bade his comrades have a care of his father and his son and of the household gods and girded him again with arms and so passed into the city and first he went to the wall and to the gate by which he had come forth and then to his house if haply she had returned hither but there indeed the men of greece were come and the fire had well-nigh mastered it and after that he went to the citadel and to the palace of king priam and lo in the porch of juno's temple phnix and ulysses were keeping guard over the spoil even the treasure of the temples tables of the gods and solid cups of gold and raiment and a long array of them that had been taken captive children

and women

There are very few people who actively advocate for the original text.

because most people know the stories the elements of it the fact that it's a journey it's taken years like obviously they talk about the 10-year journey to get home but they don't talk about the 10 years sitting about the beach waiting for Troy to become available to them People know bits about it.

And I had an interesting conversation with Leslie about this yesterday because they don't really teach classics in school anymore.

We got elements of it when I was in secondary school and you got to learn about some myths and everybody knew about the Trojan horse, for instance.

And now Trojan horse has become common parlance because of IT, because it's regarded to a virus and something hidden within something else.

So people have got different interpretations of what Trojan horse is.

And if they have any interesting that we'll find out what the meaning is behind that actual phrase as well so people do know about the certain elements of the story there's like the fall of Troy, Helen not so much Odysseus to be perfectly honest but yes there's the whole story thing so he's got the license to include all the major elements but make it his own he doesn't need to stick to it and i know he's got some criticism on that part from scholars who have said it's not true to what was actually written what was actually translated there's not enough sex in it that was one of them there's not enough sex in the film you think

okay yeah yeah

In movie history.

Did you watch Brad Pitt as Achilles in the movie Troy probably 15 years ago? I can't remember.

I've seen a bunch of scenes from it, but I've never watched it all the way through.

Okay, so it's not, it doesn't resonate at all with your lecture about this.

Yeah, he is respected across both epics.

We do get a chance to see him back at home again in the Odyssey.

So he not only survives Troy, and he does return home.

So I think he's broadly and widely respected.

Helen, to the later Greeks the type of the wanton, appears in the Odyssey as the faithful wife, respected and self-respecting, of King Menelaus.

She lives in his palace, busy with domestic duties, and when she thinks of the past it is to rejoice over her return home and escape from Troy, where, she says, I used to mourn over the cruel fate which Aphrodite sent upon me when she led me from my beloved country, leaving behind me my daughter, my home, and my husband dear, who lacked nothing of perfection in mind or in body.

It is a very different picture from that of Paris's mistress as we have her in later stories, flying with a foreign youth from her lawful lord and betraying her too fond master.

So Clytemnestra, after the lyric poets of the 7th and 6th centuries had worked up her story, is that most dreadful figure to King Man, the regicide, the woman who dares by craft and guile to kill the man set over her as ruler.

But in the Odyssey the story is very different.

It is told twice, by Agamemnon to Odysseus in Hades and by Nestor to Telemachus at Pylos, and this last version is significant enough to be given word for word.

We Greeks, says Nestor, were lingering over there at Troy, and many a task did we fulfil.

But he, Aegisthus, at his ease in the quiet valleys of Argos where the horses feed, tried to beguile the wife of Agamemnon with soft words.

So Troas is right on the edge of Turkey.

It's Troy, you know, like the walls of Troy.

And Brad Pitt with his really big thighs and short skirt that he wears in the movie.

That Troy.

So setting sail from Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samothrace and the following day to Neapolis.

And from there we went to Philippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony.

So when I was reading through that, I was so pumped up.

It actually made me think of like Troy.

You know, you got Brad Pitt and he's fighting and slicing and killing people in all angles.

He flings his shield around onto his back as an arrow perfectly timed and like hits it.

And then came the casting of Steve Rogers, which has always been like with any Marvel character, there's always fan casting that gets very contentious.

I remember years and years ago around the time the movie Troy came out that Marvel was thinking about Brad Pitt, but that really wasn't like a serious discussion.

I think that was more speculation than anything else.

When they finally got...