Ode on a Grecian hinge

Thomas CAHILL is the author of a projected seven-volume series called “The Hinges of History” that has already yielded two bestsellers: “How the Irish Saved Civilization” (they didn’t really; it was the Franco-German Carolingian Empire that did so) and “The Gifts of the Jews” (and it was a mighty spicy meatball the Jews offered as a gift). Lest we think Cahill was getting on the bestseller list by flattering the Irish and Jews in turn, he presents us with “Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea,” whose audience is by no means limited to ethnic Greeks.

The Victorians “discovered” Greece and portrayed it as the fount of civilization, and we too should pay heed. The ancient Greeks are not easy to comprehend, but Cahill makes a strong case for them. His book is well-informed, insightful and on the whole written in a sparkling style. It is the best introduction to classical Greek culture yet written, and it supersedes the 1950 masterpiece of H.D.F. Kitto, “The Greeks” (Cahill’s book is up-to-date and strong on the sexuality of the ancient Greeks).

Cahill’s method is to incorporate long quotations from literary or philosophical texts and then to explicate them. Ordinarily I am not in favor of this method, but Cahill carries it off by the sheer verve and passion of his writing. He also favors long sentences with subordinate clauses, and he handles these effectively. His allusions to current American imperial ventures in the Middle East and the extreme conservatism of the current pope, however, seem misguided. It is not that I disagree with these animadversions. But this book is liable to endure for 20 years, and, by that time, George W. Bush and John Paul II will be barely memorable to young people.

“Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea” offers fascinating snapshots of the literary writers, philosophers, sculptors and musicians of classical Greece. But it does not explain how classical Greek society came into existence. What were the forces of change that shaped the Greek world? Cahill does not explore that, and his book’s silence on historical sociology and anthropology is a weakness.

Readers learn, for instance, that 40% of the population of Athens in the classical era were slaves. But how did this slave society come about and what was it like to live in a society in which only 20% of the population had the vote? How did this situation affect the psyche of the ancient Greeks? Cahill tells us, in passing, about the laws of war -- a city captured could be and often was enslaved -- but he lets it go at that. Assuredly, day to day, a slave society had all sorts of implications. The Athenians ignored technological advancement because, for a long time, they could simply count on slave manpower.

Greek men did have wives (miserably treated) and sometimes concubines, but many preferred homoerotic relationships (among the Victorians, this revelation was taboo). In fact, some Greek men preferred sexual activity with 12-year-old boys, whose bodies were their ideal of beauty. Cahill is very good at describing this involvement, but what are we to make of a society that by our standards is widely engaged in serial child abuse? Have we got it wrong in law and ethics? Or did the Greeks have it right, and what were the implications of living in a society committed to pederasty? Cahill doesn’t tell us.

Cahill does not do justice to Aristotle either. Obviously an enthusiastic Platonist, Cahill says Aristotle is “very dull.” He tells us that from the 10th to the 14th centuries Aristotle dominated philosophy and science in the European and Arabic worlds but lets it go at that. As for an explanation of why very dull Aristotle was so inspiring in the Middle Ages, Cahill is silent. One reason why Athens lost to Sparta in the Peloponnesian War, which ended in 404 BC, was because smallpox killed at least 25% of its population, though Cahill does not mention this. In fact, greater attention to Aristotle’s empiricism among the Greeks could have resulted in medicine to counter the plague.

Readers are told, in passing, that about 140 colonial cities around the Mediterranean and in the Black Sea area were founded by the Greeks, but Cahill does not pursue the significance of this fact. The Greeks were a mercantile, middle-class people, and that contributed mightily to their vibrancy. Though Cahill recognizes that Greek sculpture was heavily influenced by the Egyptian models, his book would be more thorough if he also stressed the Babylonian contribution in philosophy and mathematics to the Greek mind. Asia Minor (Turkey) was a conduit of thought from the East.

In subsequent editions of this learned, stylish and inspiring book, Cahill should attend to these matters. Forget about commenting upon American presidents and the pope. In his concluding chapter, for instance, Cahill again cannot resist drawing parallels between the Athenian statesman Pericles and John F. Kennedy. I doubt that comparison very much. Just to begin with, Pericles accommodated himself to slavery and serial child abuse. JFK did not. *