On March 30, 1992, Tom Dodge lost his stepfather and inherited the duty of caring for his mother, a woman he confesses he never got to know. Suddenly he was confronted with the extent to which she had slipped into the fog of Alzheimer's. During his childhood, Dodge was never allowed to bring up the topic of his birth, but his mind whirled with questions: Who was my real father? Where was he? Who am I? Now, even if he summoned the courage to ask for the truth, would she be able to tell him? This memoir, interweaving the twin themes of adult responsiblity for a parent suffering from Alzheimer's and the search for a birth parent, is a painful account, raw with emotion, of an alienated adolescence. But it is also a nostalgic look back at life in small-town Texas in the 1940s and 1950s, a life where young boys frolicked in the swimming hole and worked in the family garden. Oedipus Road is a timeless and timely, funny and heart-breaking, evocative account of one man's journey down the road of self-discovery.
Oedipus on the Road is a rendering of the journey that leads Oedipus from Thebes to Colonus - and from a world of exile to one of legend. This is the chapter that Sophocles never wrote, the redemptive passage of the fallen, blinded king to his final - this time glorious - encounter with destiny. Bauchau finds Oedipus stranded outside the walls of his former palace, eye sockets and soul still bleeding, and leads him - along with his daughter Antigone and the seductive shepherd-bandit Clius, whose loyalty to the pair probably has less to do with his allegiance to Oedipus than his intentions toward his daughter - through a geographical and spiritual landscape littered with the physical, artistic, and mental rites of passage that separate Oedipus from immortality.
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Looks at how nine classical myths, including Oedipus, Electra, and Psyche are used to explain psychological theories, and assesses the validity of these comparisons.
Cultures of all epochs have consulted oracles in times of need. This fascinating exploration of the enduring popularity of oracles examines how they are interpreted and why. Taking examples from literature and history, from the oracles at Delphi to those in Macbeth, and further still to the works of Kafka and Bob Dylan, and even in the film The Matrix, Wood combines storytelling and commentary to provide a lively account of humanity's persistent faith in signs, which continues to exert an important influence on the course of civilization.
The Rough Guide to Greece has been the definitive guidebook to the country for 30 years. This new full-colour edition has been completely revamped and updated, keeping all our best features like detailed background and a journalistic eye for detail, but with new user-friendly accommodation, eating reviews and crystal-clear maps. Get the lowdown on Greece's world class attractions from the Acropolis to Crete's Minoan Palaces. Rediscover Athens and find the perfect bars to kick off a night out. Read insider tips on the best beaches to escape the crowds, the choicest accommodation from boutique to backpacker plus information on how to hike the Samarian Gorge, windsurf off Corfu or hire a yacht in the Cyclades. As our readers put it: "a superb bit of kit - and as essential as a pair of shorts", "what really shines through is the writers love of the subject", "entertaining and a wealth of information". Make the most of your time, with The Rough Guide to Greece. Now available in ePub format.
An exploration of myth, legend, and origin stories passed from generation to generation. In the thirteenth century BC, a quarter of a century before the Trojan War, seven Greek warrior heroes went against the Greek city of Thebes to restore one of their number to the throne of his father, the famous King Oedipus. Several children of those seven heroes would later take part in the siege of Troy. This adventure was equal in the minds of Greeks and Romans with the siege of Troy as told in Homer’s epic The Iliad, an event which it predated by a generation. And while the story contains mythical elements, there are no factual, historical, or archaeological reasons to suggest that the military campaign did not take place much as described. Initially sung in verse and later committed to written form via histories, ancient poems, and plays, Seven Against Thebes is a historical narrative concerning one of the greatest military adventures of all time.
A cultural “biography” of Robert Frost’s beloved poem, arguably the most popular piece of American literature “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood . . .” One hundred years after its first publication in August 1915, Robert Frost’s poem “The Road Not Taken” is so ubiquitous that it’s easy to forget that it is, in fact, a poem. Yet poetry it is, and Frost’s immortal lines remain unbelievably popular. And yet in spite of this devotion, almost everyone gets the poem hopelessly wrong. David Orr’s The Road Not Taken dives directly into the controversy, illuminating the poem’s enduring greatness while revealing its mystifying contradictions. Widely admired as the poetry columnist for the New York Times Book Review, Orr is the perfect guide for lay readers and experts alike. Orr offers a lively look at the poem’s cultural influence, its artistic complexity, and its historical journey from the margins of the First World War all the way to its canonical place today as a true masterpiece of American literature. “The Road Not Taken” seems straightforward: a nameless traveler is faced with a choice: two paths forward, with only one to walk. And everyone remembers the traveler taking “the one less traveled by, / And that has made all the difference.” But for a century readers and critics have fought bitterly over what the poem really says. Is it a paean to triumphant self-assertion, where an individual boldly chooses to live outside conformity? Or a biting commentary on human self-deception, where a person chooses between identical roads and yet later romanticizes the decision as life altering? What Orr artfully reveals is that the poem speaks to both of these impulses, and all the possibilities that lie between them. The poem gives us a portrait of choice without making a decision itself. And in this, “The Road Not Taken” is distinctively American, for the United States is the country of choice in all its ambiguous splendor. Published for the poem’s centennial—along with a new Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition of Frost’s poems, edited and introduced by Orr himself—The Road Not Taken is a treasure for all readers, a triumph of artistic exploration and cultural investigation that sings with its own unforgettably poetic voice. Praise for The Road Not Taken: “The most satisfying part of Orr’s fresh appraisal of ‘The Road Not Taken’ is the reappraisal it can inspire in longtime Frost readers whose readings have frozen solid. The crossroads between the poet and the man is where Frost leaves his poems for us to discover, turning what seems like a fork in the road into a site of limitless potential.” —The Boston Globe
Drawing on comprehensive analyses of all of Sophocles' plays, on structuralist anthropology, and on other extensive work on myth and tragedy, Charles Segal examines Sophocles both as a great dramatic poet and as a serious thinker. He shows how Sophoclean tragedy reflects the human condition in its constant and tragic struggle for order and civilized life against the ever-present threat of savagery and chaotic violence, both within society and within the individual. Tragedy and Civilization begins with a study of these themes and then proceeds to detailed discussions of each of the seven plays. For this edition Segal also provides a new preface discussing recent developments in the study of Sophocles.
