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“The true hero, the true subject, the center of the Iliad is force,” wrote Simone Weil. And yet, she said that Homer’s poem is “the purest and loveliest of mirrors.” How can a poem that revels in the visceral description of death and that chronicles the destruction of a great city be so pure and lovely? Jonathan and Ryan take a look into this epic mirror and into Weil’s justly famous essay on it.

Simone Weil’s The Iliad, or the Poem of Force (free English translation): http://biblio3.url.edu.gt/SinParedes/08/Weil-Poem-LM.pdf

Simone Weil’s The Iliad, or the Poem of Force (bilingual French-English critical edition): https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780820463612

Homer’s Iliad: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780374529055

Aeschylus' Oresteia: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780140443332

Sophocles' Theban Plays: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780156027649

Ovid’s Metamorphoses: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780156001267

Virgil’s Aeneid: https://bookshop.org/a/25626/9780553210415

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Music: Save Us Now by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com