“Then on the centre of the shield itself

Through his extraordinary skill he fashioned

Numerous images as decoration.

On it he made the earth, the sky, the sea

The sun that never wearies, the full moon,

And all the wonderous stars that crown the sky-

The Pleiades, the Hyades, Orion

The mighty warrior, and the Great Bear,

Known as the Wagon, which revolves in place,

The only constellation never washed

By Ocean’s streams.”

In Book 18 of The Iliad, Achilles – devastated by the death of his beloved Patroclus – vows to take revenge on his killer, Hector, who has also stolen the armour that Patroclus had borrowed from him. Thetis, his mother, makes him promise not to return to battle until she has obtained a new set of armour from Hephaestus (Vulcan in Roman mythology). At her request the craftsman god creates an immortal set of armour with a stunning decorated shield.

In the middle of his epic poem Homer has set a description of the shield itself, creating one of the earliest examples of Ekphrasis, the use of a detailed account of a piece of art as a literary device. Achilles’ shield contains heaven and earth and two cities, one at peace and one at war, farmland with fields being ploughed and harvested, vineyards, cattle menaced by a lion, a wedding, and a man on trial for murder.  At the end of the passage Homer describes a group of young men and women dancing in the open air.  

Over the centuries this section of the Iliad has struck many readers and listeners with its beauty and the power of the images described.  It has been interpreted in many different ways and has inspired poets from Hesiod to W.H. Auden. 

As we look at these lines in detail, we will examine the elements that make it such a memorable description and consider ways in which it underlines the themes of the Iliad as a whole. 

This study is suitable for people who are not familiar with the Iliad as well as those who have already read the poem. 

JOINING DETAILS:

• Single meeting study facilitated by Caroline Hammond
• Wednesday 16 April, 6.00-8.00 pm BST
• £30 to include background materials and opening notes

SPECIAL OFFER: Unexpected cancellations for personal reasons mean that we are now able to offer places at £500 each (rather than £700) for anyone booking two or more places! Email us for more information.

In 2025 we will return for our fifth visit to the enchanting island of Agistri on the Saronic Gulf. This year we will study Homer’s Odyssey and Euripides’ Trojan Women in a location that evokes the landscape and environment in which these extraordinary and enduring works were written. Join us if you can!

“Tell me about a complicated man.
Muse, tell me how he wandered and was lost
when he had wrecked the holy town of Troy.
and where he went, and who he met, the pain
he suffered on the storms at sea, and how
he worked to save his life and bring his men
back home.”

The opening lines of Emily Wilson’s translation of Homer’s Odyssey

In 2019 the London Literary Salon travelled to Agistri to read The Odyssey and in 2024 we completed the Homeric cycle by reading The Iliad on the island, using Emily Wilson’s powerful contemporary translations for both studies. In 2025 we will return to Agistri to revisit The Odyssey in all its vivid and gripping glory.

Our Odyssey study will use Homer’s epic poem to consider closely the guest-host relationship, the defining struggle of humans against overwhelming nature, the struggle to know ourselves in foreign spaces, our understanding of the heroic and the role of myth and epic in lived experience.

Actor Jane Wymark and poet Caroline Hammond will join Salon Director Toby Brothers in leading this week-long study, sharing their insights into the spoken word, metre and translation and how to read out loud to greater effect. In an era where the epic poem is in eclipse (the novel and film having taken over as the preferred vehicles for  complex narratives) we will explore aspects of the Odyssey as a work in the oral tradition.

Our chosen venue is a small family-run hotel that is easily accessible (just one hour by ferry from Athens) on the beautiful and quiet island of Agistri. It provides the perfect setting for our study, offering a relaxing atmosphere, excellent food and opportunities for additional cultural and recreational activities.

STUDY DETAILS:

• Share details of this study using this link
• Seven-day study of Homer’s Odyssey on the island of Agistri: 28 April – 5 May 2025.
• Facilitated by Toby Brothers, Jane Wymark and Caroline Hammond.
• Cost: £700 for the Salon study, to include preparatory meeting in April (via Zoom, date to be confirmed), background materials and opening notes. Opening notes will be sent after registration.
• The study programme will run for four to five hours per day for five days, with one day left open and travel at each end. There will be time for other optional activities including kayaking adventures, a trip to the Temple of Aphaia on Aegina, or pure relaxation.
• Before you arrive on Agistri we will ask you to read Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey (WW Norton & Co, ISBN-10: 0393356256; ISBN-13: 978-0393356250). Ian McKellen’s audio reading of Robert Fagles’ translation is also a great way to experience The Odyssey.
• Payment: we understand that you may not want to pay the entire charge at once, so we ask for an initial (non-returnable) deposit of £20 on registration followed by £180 within 28 days and the balance of £500 by 31 January 2025.
• Refunds: please note that any refunds will be entirely at the discretion of the London Literary Salon, dependent on our ability to fill the place, and will be subject to a charge to cover our administration costs.

BOOKING

To ask questions please email us at litsalon@gmail.com using ‘Agistri 2025 – Odyssey’ as the subject line. Payment will be by bank transfer (N.B. we will supply bank details). If the study sells out early we will maintain a waiting list as we do sometimes find that people have to withdraw for reasons beyond their control.

ADDITIONAL COSTS

Room and half board (breakfast and dinner each day) will be arranged by each participant with the hotel and paid for directly to them. A deposit to cover two nights accommodation will be required by the hotel. We will send you full contact details for payment on registration. We have set out the anticipated charges below, but these may be subject to change at the time of booking at the discretion of the hotel.

Accommodation prices per night at the hotel – Rosy’s Little Village – estimated on the basis of figures available in October 2024:

• Single – €77 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per day
• Double – €87 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Triple – €77 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Family room for two people – €97 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Family room for three people – €107 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day

Please consider sharing accommodation with another participant as this helps us to ensure everyone can stay on site; double and triple rooms offer split levels and so allow sharers a significant degree of privacy.

Flights to Athens: when booking please make sure you can arrive in Piraeus by 15.00 local time on the first day of your study to catch the ferry. We will not be meeting formally on the final day of each study, so you have choices about your return (ferries are frequent and the travel time to Piraeus is one hour).

Ferry to Agistri: normally around €14 each way, but may be €30 for arrival if the group chooses to use a private water taxi.

Incidental expenses: drinks, lunches, extra trips etc.

Insurance: we hope this will be entirely redundant, but we do ask you to arrange your own travel and health insurance to protect you in case of anything untoward happening. We will ask you for details of the insurance provider and reference number, as well as your mobile phone number and details of next of kin to add to our (confidential) records for use during the study.

In 2025 we will return for our fifth visit to the enchanting island of Agistri on the Saronic Gulf. This year we will study Homer’s Odyssey and Euripides’ Trojan Women in a location that evokes the landscape and environment in which these extraordinary and enduring works were written. Join us if you can!

“The strong do what they can, the weak suffer what they must.”

 Thucydides’ Melian Dialogue

When, in 458 BC, The Oresteia of Aeschylus – a trilogy in which the climax of the third play, The Eumenides, upheld the Athenian traditions of liberality and the rule of law – triumphed at the Dionysia, it must have been exhilarating for the audience to witness the exaltation of their own city. Much had changed just forty-three years later when Euripides’ Trojan Women was performed and won the second prize in the contest.

For the last ten of those years Athens had waged the hugely destructive Peloponnesian War against Sparta and several Greek cities had suffered a fate not unlike that of Troy. Although a truce with Sparta was just about holding, the Athenians were still trying to expand their martial capability through colonisation. In the summer of 416 BC, less than a year before Euripides’ play appeared, Athens laid siege to the small but wealthy island of Melos in the South Aegean (which had already donated much to the war effort but drew the line at being occupied and exploited) and, once the Melians were defeated, massacred its male population and enslaved the women and children.

The audience at the theatre of Dionysus in Athens would have included veterans of the Melian campaign, and it speaks for the Greek respect for theatre and artistic freedom that performance of the play was permitted at all. That openness is not always matched by our own society today: In 1980 A Short Sharp Shock! a play by Howard Brenton and Tony Howard satirising British politics of the time led to outrage, questions in the House of Commons and an attempt to close down the Royal Court Theatre. Four years after the UK’s 1982 Falklands War, a verse play by Steven Berkoff, Sink the Belgrano!, caused a similarly huge controversy. 

During our 2023 visit to Agistri we considered the theatrical representation of the Trojan War and its aftermath in The Oresteia. In 2025 we will embark on the study of Trojan Women with Salon Director Toby Brothers, actor Jane Wymark and poet Caroline Donnelly bringing their considerable talents and energy to exploring the dramatic possibilities of the text and the poetry contained within this phenomenal work.

Our chosen venue is a small family-run hotel that is easily accessible (just one hour by ferry from Athens) on the beautiful and quiet island of Agistri. It provides the perfect setting for our study, offering a relaxing atmosphere, excellent food and opportunities for additional cultural and recreational activities.

STUDY DETAILS:

• Seven-day study of Euripides’ Trojan Women on the island of Agistri: 7 – 14 May 2025.
• Facilitated by Toby Brothers, Jane Wymark and Caroline Hammond.
• Cost: £700 for the Salon study, to include preparatory meeting in April (via Zoom, date to be confirmed), background materials and opening notes. Opening notes will be sent after registration.
• The study programme will run for four to five hours per day for five days, with one day left open and travel at each end. There will be time for other optional activities including kayaking adventures, a trip to the Temple of Aphaia on Aegina, or pure relaxation.
• We will ask you to read the recommended translation of Trojan Women by Emily Wilson contained in this volume: Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides (Modern Library Classics – Paperback, ISBN 978-0812983098) before arriving on Agistri.
• Payment: we understand that you may not want to pay the entire charge at once, so we ask for an initial (non-returnable) deposit of £20 on registration followed by £180 within 28 days and the balance of £500 by 31 January 2025.
• Refunds: please note that any refunds will be entirely at the discretion of the London Literary Salon, dependent on our ability to fill the place, and will be subject to a charge to cover our administration costs.

BOOKING

To ask questions please email us at litsalon@gmail.com using ‘Agistri 2025 – Trojan Women’ as the subject line. Payment will be by bank transfer (N.B. we will supply bank details). If the study sells out early we will maintain a waiting list as we do sometimes find that people have to withdraw for reasons beyond their control.

ADDITIONAL COSTS

Room and half board (breakfast and dinner each day) will be arranged by each participant with the hotel and paid for directly to them. A deposit to cover two nights accommodation will be required by the hotel. We will send you full contact details for payment on registration. We have set out the anticipated charges below, but these may be subject to change at the time of booking at the discretion of the hotel.

Accommodation prices per night at the hotel – Rosy’s Little Village – estimated on the basis of figures available in October 2024:

• Single – €77 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €50 per day
• Double – €87 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Triple – €77 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Family room for two people – €97 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Family room for three people – €107 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day
• Family room for four people – €120 per night plus half board (breakfast and dinner) estimated at €55 per person per day

Please consider sharing accommodation with another participant as this helps us to ensure everyone can stay on site; double and triple rooms offer split levels and so allow a significant degree of privacy to sharers.

Flights to Athens: when booking please make sure you can arrive in Piraeus by 15.00 local time on the first day of your study to catch the ferry. We will not be meeting formally on the final day of each study, so you will have choices about your return (ferries are frequent and the travel time to Piraeus is one hour).

Ferry to Agistri: normally around €14 each way, but may be €30 for arrival if the group chooses to use a private water taxi.

Incidental expenses: drinks, lunches, extra trips etc.

Insurance: we hope this will be entirely redundant, but we do ask you to arrange your own travel and health insurance to protect you in case of anything untoward happening. We will ask you for details of the insurance provider and reference number, as well as your mobile phone number and details of next of kin to add to our (confidential) records for use during the study.

“Elektra”, a sculpture by Christian Friedrich Tieck, 1824,
photograph by Manfred Brückels, Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0

In Greek mythology the House of Atreus is a rich source of drama: all three of the great tragedians wrote about the revenge of Orestes on his mother following the Trojan War. Aeschylus’s Libation Bearers focuses primarily on Orestes, but Electra is also key, and in both Euripides’ and Sophocles’ eponymous works Electra takes centre stage. Together these plays give us a wonderful opportunity to compare three representations of a single character. 

The study will start with detailed study of Sophocles’ Electra, probably the last of the plays to be written and performed. This version of Electra – written shortly before Sophocles’ death in his nineties – offers perhaps the most complex characterisation and has provoked polarised opinions with one critic calling it ‘a combination of matricide and good spirits’! 

We will then go on to explore sections of Aeschylus’s Libation Bearers and Euripides’ Electra, to compare the three versions of the grieving daughter and consider the ongoing relevance of this iconic character. 

Our primary text will be The Greek Plays: Sixteen Plays by Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides, edited by Mary Lefkowitz and James Romm (ISBN 978-0812983098) which contains all three of the plays we will study, but all translations are welcome. 

JOINING DETAILS: 

• Four two-hour meetings on Zoom led by Susanna Taggart
• Tuesdays, 5.00-7.00 pm (UK), 20 May – 10 June 
• £120 for four meetings to include opening notes and resources