Jem’s Heroics

Not long after I’d started my podcast, Eroiche Today, and before I knew if anyone was paying attention, BJ handed me a small note and said I might find it interesting. It read

εἰς τὰ ἡρωικὰ μεγέθη συνεμβαίνειν ἐθίζει.

Meaning, “It (or he or she) accustoms us to accompany it (or him or her) to the heroic heights.”

            “Oh wow, where’d you come up with this?”

            “It’s from On the Sublime by Longinus.”

            “How’d you come up with that?”

            “Extra credit,” he said in his soft, laconic way.

            “You read On the Sublime for extra credit.”

            “It’s short.”

            We were sitting at the green table outside at lunch. None of the others had made their way over yet.

            “I love the title!” I said, apparently more excited about it than he was. “Among all the things we could use more of, the sublime is one.”

            “I like your podcast!” he replied. “Today’s Heroics. So when I came across this, I figured you’d appreciate it.”

            “What does Longinus say about the sublime?”

            By this time Hugh and Carlos had joined us, and were getting started with their lunches. Carlos sat to BJ’s left and picked up BJ’s lunchbag to see what was in it. BJ put out a hand to stop him, but he wasn’t quick enough, and Carlos stuck his head as far into the bag as he could. That was typical of his humor. He was seldom subtle and often gross.

            “How come you never have any french fries?”

            BJ just looked at him and took the bag out of his hands.

            “Well in the first place,” he said, returning to our conversation, “hypsos in the sense of sublimity is rare. LSJ has only one other citation besides Longinus – in a papyrus fragment found at Herculaneum. Otherwise it’s used in the sense of ‘height’ or ‘summit’. And Longinus is only describing ‘sublime’ literature. But he gives a couple descriptions, like asking if it’s the ‘art of depth’. He says it’s an echo of elevated thought. It’s caused by collecting the details concerned with a subject and constructing a single body from the most important ones. That is, it’s a product of great conceptions, powerful and inspired feelings, well and nobly expressed. Something like that.”

            By now a couple others had joined us and were having their own conversations. Obviously they didn’t find this one engaging. Sensitive to that fact, BJ said, “If you really want to know, I’ll go through it with you. That way you’ll know what he actually has to say.”

            “That’s what Da says when I ask her what a word means. ‘Look it up, that way you’ll know.’”

            “Well, if you’re interested, Sunday afternoons are good.”

            “How much extra credit do I get?”

            “You can negotiate that with Miss DeLulu.”

            “She’ll be shocked to hear me asking about extra credit!”

*     *     *

So that’s how that little project got going. It was the first Greek I’d read besides Homer, Homer, Homer, and short excerpts from Plato and the New Testament and so on. It was great, and BJ was a good guide through it. There were a lot of unusual words. But at that time, all Greek words were unusual for me, so that wasn’t an issue. After chapter 10, and Sappho’s beautiful poem on love-fever, I had reached my limit and read the rest in English. As I expected, Basil’s mom provided delicious glucose snacks to energize us. Miss DL was so thrilled I was actually reading beyong the text book she gave me enough points to lift my perennial B to a B+ for the marking period.

            BJ was right – it was much better to find out exactly what Longinus had to say. It felt great to be working on ancient literature at that level, and those ten very short chapters – about ten pages – made me feel I had a special relationship with the sublime. It became part of my identity. Especially when I thought about it and found the things in Longinus I wasn’t satisfied with.

            First, I wasn’t satisfied with limiting the discussion to sublime literature. There is a very nice brief moralizing passage where he says, “Nothing is great if to disparage it is great – like wealth, honors, esteem, power, and whatever else consists of external trappings.” Which is fine, and it’s probably worthwhile to separate the wheat from the chaff. But I wished he’d spent more time discussing what is actually sublime rather than disparaging things that aren’t. I made a mental note to compose my own little treatise on the sublime and left it at that. As for BJ, Da wove him a lovely little workbasket of willow rods with a green and red design that harmonizes with the colors of his room. He blushed when I gave it to him, I think he felt overpaid. But even if the gift was actually from Da, I was glad to give him something nice.