Helen is not the subject but the test case. She is the figure around which questions of causation, perception, agency, and the reliability of language organize. The movement runs from Homer, where she is a condition, through Euripides and Gorgias, to Thucydides where she disappears entirely and the mechanism persists. The distance between the laterContinue reading “Pandora and Helen”
Tag Archives: Rome
Medusa
The power of sight. Aristotle captures is succinctly: All men by nature desire to know. An indication of this is the delight we take in our senses; for even apart from their usefulness they are loved for themselves, and above all others the sense of sight. Metaphysics 980a:21 Sight is superior because it reveals theContinue reading “Medusa”
Aphrodite
Aphrodite born of inseminated sea foam. Her name evokes the froth (aphros) and hints at deep currents. Sailors would intuitively know how they are moved by the unseen. The Twelve Olympians that appear as the definitive powers holding dominion were not the first. Like all Greek myths, they hold power only after family drama andContinue reading “Aphrodite”
Protective Arts 