University of Virginia Library

Surviving The Bomb

I have a few remarks to
make about Ms. Prinz's review
of the Virginia Player's
production of Macbeth. I am
not a student of Shakespeare,
but one of the Classics who has
read so much (2000-years-worth)
literary criticism that I
can no longer read Homer
without some impertinent
remark about the "Disunity of
the Iliad" popping into my
head.

What is so unsound about a
new version of Macbeth?
Christopher Logue has
"translated" Book XVI of the
Iliad, in which Hector kills
Patroclus, in such an innovative
and vital way that I am sure
the 19th century German
classical scholars turned in
their graves when it was
published: after all, these men
knew what Homer was.

Homer was a great sage who
could be understood
meaningfully only by tearing
him apart, and after we had his
vital organs out on the table we
could fully comprehend what
he was trying to say. Well,
Christopher Logue was more
interested in rewriting Homer
so that the sophisticated 20th
century machine, such as
myself, would have a definite
"rush."

It is so important to restate
the literature of times long
gone by within the context of
one's contemporary world. If
we don't do this, Ms. Prinz, I
fear that Homer and
Shakespeare will not survive
the Bomb.

Bravo to Mr. Bell, a director
who not only is wildly
imaginative, but a man who
had the courage to review
Shakespeare in this sterile
literary world of ours. As far as
I am concerned, the
entire production of Bell's
Macbeth is brilliant, and I am
not proud to seem an
intellectual ass to the
professional critics in saying so.