The Legacy of the Trojan War

Arts & Ideas

BBC

Society & Culture

4.2 • 598 Ratings

🗓️ 21 November 2019

⏱️ 46 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Why do the legendary walls of a Bronze Age city in Asia still cast such a long shadow? Novelist and classics expert Natalie Haynes, Alev Scott author of Ottoman Odyssey, archaeologist Naoíse Mac Sweeney and medievalist Hetta Howes join Rana Mitter to share new perspectives on the conflict immortalised in Homer's Iliad as the British Museum opens an exhibition dedicated to Troy.

Troy: Myth and Reality runs at the British Museum in London from November 21st to 8th March 2020. Natalie Haynes is the author of novels which retell Greek myths including The Amber Fury, the Children of Jocasta and A Thousand Ships: This is the Woman's War. Hetta Howes teaches medieval literature at City University and is a New Generation Thinker on the scheme run by the BBC and the AHRC to put research on radio. Alev Scott is the author of Ottoman Odyssey and Turkish Awakening. Naoíse Mac Sweeney is Associate Professor of Ancient History at the University of Leicester.

Producer: Torquil MacLeod

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron. Evil genius. He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it. That's like hiding at your own funeral. Yeah, a big, great gig. I'm Russell Kane. Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius. Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius. It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?
0:23.3	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's out of ice cream.
0:28.8	Listen to evil genius on BBC Sounds.
0:33.3	BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts.
0:36.9	Hello, welcome to the BBC Arts and Ideas podcast.
0:40.6	In just a few moments, we'll be heading over to the gates of the legendary city of Troy.
0:45.3	But first, this.
0:46.9	Hi, I'm Alastair Suk, and I want to tell you about the way I see it,
0:51.2	a brand new podcast from BBC Radio 3.
0:56.2	It's a 30-part series in which we're throwing open the collection at MoMA, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, to some of the
1:01.2	sharpest creative minds of our time. We'll be speaking to comedian, Steve Martin, writer
1:07.6	Roxanne Gay, musician Steve Reich, and many, many more. I'll be your guide throughout the series, so join me as I explore one of the greatest collections of modern art in the world. If you'd like to hear more, just search for The Way I See It on BBC Sounds.
1:25.3	Hello, let's begin today's free thinking by eavesdropping on a bit of an argument.
1:30.4	There will be no peace until Troy falls and Agamemnon Litts primes crown to his head.
1:35.6	But if a deal's been struck, why more slaughter and sorrow? Thetus, this is what you wanted,
1:40.9	isn't it? Glory for Achilles. Have you changed your mind? She went wheedling round
1:46.3	my husband to get a hero's sword back into her son's hand, even gave him his new armour, and now she's
1:51.4	trying to save his neck. Please, everyone, I have a fort to share. She's two-faced. And you are so
1:58.3	smitten with Agamemnon, you're blind to the suffering of everyone else in the world.
2:03.3	For a goddess, hearer, you have an inanimate heart.
2:05.9	Butterfly?
2:06.7	Messenry.
	...

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