A Very Odyssean Conversation, A Modern Retelling; You Are Odysseus; and The Other One

Join Liv and Laura Jenkinson Brown of Greek Myth Comix and You Are Odysseus to chat about each of their experiences retelling the Odyssey in distinct ways... aka all things Odysseus. And, yes, we talk about *that* trailer. Pre-order Liv's Odyssey adaptation (!!!), The Odyssey: a Modern Retelling. https://geni.us/TheOdysseyBook Learn more about Laura's You Are Odysseus https://greekmythcomix.com/. Submit your question for the next Q&A via email http://mythsbaby.com/questions or a voice note https://www.speakpipe.com/LTAMB. Get ad-free episodes and so, so much more, by subscribing to the Oracle Edition at patreon.com/mythsbaby http://patreon.com/mythsbaby. Enter ourpodcast guest https://www.mythsbaby.com/contact form if you'd like to be on the show as a conversation guest! CW/TW: far too many Greek myths involve assault. I try to provide direct warnings when there is reference to anything with overtly traumatic themes but be aware that Greek mythology regularly features assault, death, and many other potentially triggering events. Attributions and licensing information for music used in the podcast can be found here:mythsbaby.com/sources-attributions http://mythsbaby.com/sources-attributions. Learn more about Liv's next group trips https://travelbugxlivalbert.my.canva.site/ to GREECE! Application deadline is November 30 (Subject to change due to demand). Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy https://acast.com/privacy for more information.

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Liv Albert?

  Hey nerds, really quick note from me. I want to tell you that we now have the applications open for the next set of listener group trips. This is us going back to the original, the trips that we have held in the past that have been so much fun, so successful, and pretty affordable in terms of wandering around Greece with a bunch of nerds. So check out the details and get your applications in at mythsbaby.com group trip.

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• 1:59Liv Albert?

  Maybe we'll keep this in while I say this, but I'm going to try to make this as easy to edit as possible. So I'm just going to try to keep us on point. And I'm going to say to the listeners, I am here with the wonderful returning guest, the mind behind Greek Myth Comics, Laura Jenkinson Brown. But I don't, I realize I say that and I always use Laura, but do you, would you rather go by L? Or is it just sort of what you put on your books?

• 2:25Speaker 03

  Do you know, I've, I've dug myself into a hole now.

• 2:30Liv Albert?

  Relatable again.

• 2:31Speaker 03

  Because I'm a teacher, I was like, I'm gonna keep, I'm gonna keep this life.

• 2:35Liv Albert?

  Oh, yeah, yeah.

• 2:36Speaker 03

  And at, at school, I go by initials. So before I got married, my initials were L E J. I was literally ledge, which was, which was delightful. Um, and then I got married, now I'm L J B, which is still cool. But, uh, now I am Jenks online.

• 2:50Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 2:52Speaker 03

  Um, and then I was like, well, what do I put on the front cover of my book? Do I put Laura? No, I'll just put L. But then my website is Laura, and I just don't know anymore.

• 3:00Liv Albert?

  And I don't think you need to. So tha- that works. I'll call you Laura because we're friends and that's what I would call you. Uh, but, but also as somebody who did not think hard enough before putting the word baby in her podcast title, like I also, I live with this forever. And I just have to use the words myths baby a lot. And I, I don't love it. Mostly because sometimes people call me myths baby as if it's my name. And I'm also like, I, I know I did that to myself because all of my handles are that. But it's weird. So anyway.

• 3:35Speaker 03

  I'm trying not to giggle because I know you hate it. And I just think it's such a delight.

• 3:39Liv Albert?

  I live with it. It's fine. I know everyone loves it. It's good. It is funny though, when I have to tell people like what, like what my career is. And I say it and they like assume it's a hobby. And I'm like, I know it's not. I recognize it sounds wacky that I make a living off of this. I know it's super cool and weird.

• 3:57Liv Albert?

  But.

• 3:57Speaker 03

  You haven't, you haven't sung this song.

• 3:59Liv Albert?

  I know, and I won't, and I won't. I don't sing it in front of other people. No, it's fine. Okay. Okay. I do.

• 4:22Liv Albert?

  Hello. Hi, hello. Welcome. This is Let's Talk About Myths Baby. And I'm your host, Liv.

• 4:27Speaker 03

  Yeah. Oh, I ruined it by talking to him. So sorry.

• 4:29Liv Albert?

  No, it was perfect. It was perfect. Because I really do prefer to do that just to, to myself. No, I, I mean, this episode to the listeners is sort of a second attempt. We did record an Odyssey episode, but it just, we, this is a better one. Or will be, it hasn't happened yet. But basically, we had to kind of keep ourselves more on track because I think we talked for like three hours and didn't. We didn't achieve enough because we just were talking, just talking.

• 4:58Speaker 03

  We had a really nice time.

• 5:01Liv Albert?

  We did, it was great. It was a good hangout.

• 5:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:06Liv Albert?

  Yeah, it was just like, basically now that's just, uh, yeah, just a friend hangout. But this is, you know, you and I, all the listeners know all too well now that you and I have been both working on. I mean, you have been working on The Odyssey far longer than me in this context, but certainly for the last year, we have both been very heavily in it. And I wanted to do an episode about that, about The Odyssey broadly, but specifically kind of how you and I have gone about, you know, breaking down The Odyssey and adapting it in these unique ways with the bonus of, we are recording this like a day after the new Christopher Nolan trailer dropped. And so at the end, we will talk about that.

• 5:46Liv Albert?

  But until then, let me tell you about the full of color and delightfully fun and a little tongue in cheek Odyssey, AKA exactly what Homer's Odyssey is, that I have written for children.

• 6:00Liv Albert?

  Because I'm comfortable and confident in saying that my Odyssey is going to be a truer adaptation to the original than Christopher Nolan's.

• 6:11Liv Albert?

  And yeah, yeah, I'm comfortable with that. Obviously, what you've done is very different. So I don't know, I now I'm trying to, this is me trying to guide a conversation very poorly. But like, you know, maybe we start, yours is so unique. Do you want to talk a little bit about like? You know, how you went about making your, I, I don't, I know that there was issues around calling it a choose your own adventure, but I probably can just colloquially call it that.

• 6:40Speaker 03

  No, you're absolutely right. Um, so what I have not done is write a choose your own adventure book.

• 6:45Liv Albert?

  You've not, it's not.

• 6:46Speaker 03

  I have not done that.

• 6:47Liv Albert?

  No.

• 6:47Speaker 03

  Besides, I preferred fighting fantasy when I was a kid. No, I, um, so I'm a teacher, as we might know at this point. And I teach ancient history and I teach classical civilizations and I teach the Odyssey, or at least I did until recently, which is a whole bone of intention and I'm dying inside. But, um, one thing that I found really interesting was having taught it repeatedly for about 11 years. You start to notice different things about it and I was caught, oh my God, I still like go, oh my, how did I miss this?

• 7:18Liv Albert?

  Truly.

• 7:21Speaker 03

  Um, constant arguments with people on Instagram, but in a lovely way where we all learned something new. Um, so the idea of him thinking this way and that and having these choices, it suddenly occurred to me that like he's not. He, he doesn't always just do things. He thinks about it first and he's so unique in that aspect, like you see. Uh, like Achilles gets angry, tries to kill Agamemnon, immediately has to be dragged back by his hair by Athena. Literally the metaphor for second thought in this matter. Um, but Odysseus doesn't. And when I'm teaching it to my students, most of the time we're focusing on the question. What is Odysseus like? Like, what is his character shown to be? Which is a very, very open question.

• 8:02Speaker 03

  Of course, it's relating to in the chapters you have read, because they don't get to read every book of the Odyssey. We read about five. There's nearly always the narrative though. And then later chapters as well, which is a fascinating comparison because he's telling the narrative. And he's the only one who survived it. Hmm. And then in the rest of the story, it's much more. Uh, balanced between lots of different characters and we see him through a different pair of eyes. So. This idea that you could uh maybe consider what could have happened if you'd made the other choice was kind of where this grew out of. And as usual, it was my husband's idea. I have

• 8:43Speaker 03

  to give him credit for it. He's, he's so brilliant and so supportive. And um we share loads of really similar interests from when we were kids. We only met quite late in life, so um and we were

• 8:54Liv Albert?

  I wouldn't comfortably say quite late in life, given your age.

• 8:57Speaker 03

  No, I was just thinking that. Like, that makes me sound like I'm retired.

• 9:01Liv Albert?

  Yeah, I was like, you're not old enough to speak like that. But later in the life that you have accomplished at this time.

• 9:09Speaker 03

  Yes. Yes. And we met at a good time when we were both developed people.

• 9:15Liv Albert?

  Oh, gosh, isn't that the key?

• 9:18Speaker 03

  I think your brain finishes, I think they've worked out now, your brain finishes developing at the age of thirty five. So that was, that was

• 9:23Liv Albert?

  Really?

• 9:24Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 9:25Liv Albert?

  Wow.

• 9:25Speaker 03

  So technically, you are a teenager until that point.

• 9:28Liv Albert?

  I thought it was twenty seven.

• 9:29Speaker 03

  No, they've made it later now. It's brilliant.

• 9:31Liv Albert?

  Wow. I mean, as someone who just keeps getting older and keeps thinking, man, am I ever gonna feel like I'm older and not just like eh the same like childlike person who also somehow has way too much like lived experience? It's such a weird thing. Anyway.

• 9:46Speaker 03

  A sixteen year old with gummy knees and constant memory loss is basically

• 9:50Liv Albert?

  Yeah, and like menopausal symptoms, but I'm definitely only sixteen. I don't know what you're talking about.

• 9:56Speaker 03

  Oh, good grief. Let's steer back. Let's steer back. Um, so we were at a wedding and we were staying overnight in this lovely, and he, I can't remember what we were turning, talking about, but he said, huh, what, what if you did a choose your own adventure? No, I didn't say that. What if you did a choose your own path version of the Odyssey?

• 10:16Speaker 03

  Six years later, I finished it. But I, I literally sat down and started working out what that might look like. Um, oh, that was it. We were looking at another, like a, a grown up choose your own path book, which was called Choose Your Own Apocalypse by Rob Sears.

• 10:32Liv Albert?

  Oh, delightful.

• 10:33Speaker 03

  With uh, with uh, lots of um, men who are somehow still in power six years later. Shocking.

• 10:41Speaker 03

  So, um, yeah, and of course, because I am like this, I, I, it couldn't just be a simple Mitch decision, this decision, oh, you're dead, or you aren't dead. It had to be an incredibly detailed extravaganza of ancient world, ancient Greek culture, references to all the themes from the original Odyssey. It had to embrace all of the literary techniques that I teach. It's got to have similes in it. It's got to reference the ones that are there. It had to be like you were literally inside the Odyssey, making those decisions for Odysseus.

• 11:21Liv Albert?

  Well, and what I like, what I'm interested in, I just want to like rephrase because I think that's something that I've really noticed in yours, particularly as compared to working on mine. But I feel like you're, because of everything you've done, is that it's a lot bigger than the Odyssey. Like what you're really doing is working with Odysseus's character and like his experience, because I know you also like went well beyond the Odyssey. There's so many moments where you've gone to other surviving texts and things, right? Like when it kind of veers off, obviously, because you know, the Odyssey only covers this, obviously the choices that he makes, but you did go deeper even, right? So it's even more, it's bigger than the Odyssey, I guess, is what I've said twice now in a roundabout way.

• 12:03Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:05Speaker 03

  Yeah, so, I mean, technically, it is also longer than the Odyssey, because it has maybe like two Odysseys in it, really, in terms of length. But it, it goes through every single book of the Odyssey where Odysseus is. So of course, if he's not in the action, you don't see that bit, but it's implied and sometimes you hear about it. But then, when it comes to what else could have happened, I couldn't do the original structure, because if you're Odysseus, you start off on Ogidja with Calypso, and so you've already made the decision. So I had to go back and do the linear structure.

• 12:42Liv Albert?

  The thing that most adaptations do with the Odyssey, but with no good reason. You had a great reason.

• 12:48Speaker 03

  I had a reason. Oh, thank you, I vindicated. No, it, it hurt my heart not to do it justice in that way, but you had to get to that point. And it was really important.

• 12:58Liv Albert?

  And that's why I say it like that, is it's more about you've done, you've created like the whole of Odysseus's odyssey as compared to like Homer's odyssey almost, you know? Because you did go more with like the bigger Odysseus, obviously working within Homer's, but.

• 13:11Speaker 03

  I like that, the bigger Odysseus.

• 13:13Liv Albert?

  The bigger.

• 13:15Speaker 03

  Well, I liked this idea that there were all of these other intertwining stories, like from the epic cycle, which not much of it doesn't exist anymore, save for the Homeric Iliad and Odyssey, and all the bits in between, Cypria and Ethiopia, and all the different stories. And I, I actually, when, after I'd started writing it, I sat down with several very large books of mythography, and I made spreadsheets.

• 13:44Liv Albert?

  I was, I was literally just gonna ask, like, do you have like a web? Like, how did, how were you keeping track of all of this information?

• 13:51Speaker 03

  Well, I made spreadsheets, first of all, for literally every time Odysseus appears in a myth, so that I could build this in, which was great as well, because obviously, there's not a lot of detail in the epic cycle, and the Cypria covers all like the start of the war and, and how Odysseus is involved in that, and helping create the, the suitors for Helen's hand, how to, how they create that particular oath that they swear, so they all have to go to the war, and then he feigns madness and all this stuff. I've referenced that throughout, so that you hear bits of those stories in Odysseus's memory. But then it was also really helpful in sort of building a picture of how the start could be, what decisions you could make at the start, and I made it so that you, you as a reader, taking part in this, you kind of have to decide what kind of Odysseus you are, because

• 14:36Speaker 03

  there's lots of conflicting stories, for example, when he and Darmides go into Troy and they steal the Palladium, did you try and kill Darmides for it? It doesn't sound like a very Odysseus thing to do, but did you so? I tried to put in like choice gates at the start, just to really get you thinking about the choices you will make. And then, do you stay with Agamemnon, worshiping Athenic? Do you go off with Menelaus? Which of those will actually work better? Will you argue with your people after this? And then where does the story go? So it's, there is the ability to then not have the odyssey, and actually to get home safely, and it's fascinating, because about ninety percent of the people who tell me they've read it went, oh, I got home straight away.

• 15:22Speaker 03

  That's lovely. That shows you're a wonderful, caring person.

• 15:26Liv Albert?

  Unlike Odysseus.

• 15:31Speaker 03

  It is far, far too easy on his men. They, he lets them mutiny. Oh no, they're all dead. Um, you know, it, it was just kind of lovely that they were going, oh wow, I got home. Oh, I'll have another go and see if I can make terrible decisions. And the nuance is that they realize they're not all terrible decisions, but a lot of them are decisions that are very, very selfish. And all to do with getting that tasty kudos to give him Cleos, which is literally the story. The story is the, the, the Cleos, the, our singing of him.

• 16:01Liv Albert?

  The quest for glory.

• 16:06Speaker 03

  Fortune and glory. So, yeah, that's where it started off. And then it ended up with, wait, what if he went with Menelaus? And I spent a whole summer researching like Bronze Age myths of Egypt. And what it might look like there. And when does the Nile flood? Oh, it was delightful. I learned so much that I'd never had a chance to actually study. This is all a big excuse for me to do loads of research that I don't need to do for work. Trying to shoo one this into lessons to like year nines, you're only 12. Don't need to know this, but it's really cool. So here we go. Um, and that was so fun because it ended up like Menelaus loves him so much.

• 16:47Speaker 03

  It ended up being a little bit like a buddy comedy, but a buddy comedy where you're also third wheeling with the ex-wife who's come back into the picture and hates you. Well, not hates you, but like really doesn't want you here right now. Because you're not meant to be there in that story. And that's, there's a little bit of, um, uh, of, of the sort of the, the, the realization of that. But then that also allowed me to get a bit of the Aeneid in there because we touch on, oh, well, I just, I did. I, if anyone actually gets to those sections. Well, only because I wanted to like get Secaius and Dido and that linked in there as their.

• 17:28Speaker 03

  Menelaus and Helen are somehow around Egypt for seven years.

• 17:33Liv Albert?

  They sure are.

• 17:34Speaker 03

  I mean, it's, it's.

• 17:36Liv Albert?

  And they have minimal stories for those seven years. They're like. You know, th- this is, yeah, we got really rich. We got stuck on an island for a while. That's like the whole of the stories that come out of those seven years.

• 17:49Speaker 03

  Yeah, I had to justify that.

• 17:51Liv Albert?

  Fair.

• 17:53Speaker 03

  Well, well, yeah, not, not out of it, but you know, I had to justify that. And um, but that was fascinating, trying to make that work and also see what, what might have been also around at that time. And there's, there's a little bit of the Gillian references in there too. And that, it was fun, really, really fun. And then I thought, well, what if he completely messes up and loses everyone, but also doesn't get home in time? Because the whole second half of the Odyssey, as you know, is finally honed. He's getting home at exactly the right moment, exactly when the suitors are about to try murdering his son, exactly when Penelope is about to have to make her choice to whether to hand over the kingdom to her son and go back to her father or marry one of these suitors.

• 18:38Speaker 03

  If he misses that window.

• 18:41Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 18:41Speaker 03

  What could happen? So there are several of endings that go in that direction, including one which I did write essentially as a Euripides and tragedy in verse.

• 18:50Liv Albert?

  Ooh, I remember finding that one. Yeah.

• 18:54Speaker 03

  I was pretty proud of that.

• 18:55Liv Albert?

  I think that it, I mean, it's such, it's just all sounds so fun. And I can see myself wanting to do all of the same types of like really unhinged levels of research for this. Like, it reminds me, I'm working on right now, like, I want to do some kind of book project. Um, I mean, about women, surprise, who could have seen that coming? But like, it's like my, my version of Hesiod's catalog of women is kind of what I want to do. And so at this point, I'm, my, the, this, the bigger part is like a book proposal. And then the smaller, just like the nerd in me is creating a database of all women ever mentioned in myth.

• 19:34Liv Albert?

  And so it's very much like, okay, well, I guess I'm going to, you know, I look up one person and then I've spent an hour like detailing the like etymology or something of a name that appears twice. And so, yeah, it's just, I'll just say, like, I, it sounds so delightful. Lightful, you know, how you were able to go about it and also just like so satisfying in that like nerd part of the brain. It, I mean, it reminds me of just the ways I was able to to jam in little like facts and like learning, you know, just knowledge tidbits. Into my book, you know, it was a much more limited, but it's that same like excitement of like, oh, I learned this thing like, how can I? Frame it in such a way that I can teach it to you, you know, the reader.

• 20:18Speaker 03

  That is, I mean, uh, reading your book, The Teacher in Me and the Mum in Me as well. Was just going, oh, yeah, they would definitely ask about this. And here is a little sidebar. That's amazing. And all these details are here. That's something that's going to provoke discussion. Can't wait for that. I loved that so much additional detail. It's not just a retelling of The Odyssey for Children. It is an entire guide as to how to appreciate it.

• 20:43Liv Albert?

  I mean, I, I hope that that is how everyone sees it because I true, I mean, I'm so fucking proud of this book, but, but just generally like it. It was so fun to be able to teach all of this stuff and there is so much, you know, I think so often we come at these stories like. You know, a story and it's more of the. Examining it from like a literary perspective and like, there's nothing wrong with that, but obviously when it comes to the Homeric texts, these are things that are so much bigger than literature. And I think that that is the thing that we are constantly not, or like it's the thing that's most left out, I think of just like the basic education of the ancient world is.

• 21:25Liv Albert?

  Is this this, this reminder that like they weren't writing a story like we think of a story now, and that fundamentally changes like everything about the culture and how we learn it and everything. And. Yeah. So being able to like, explain those elements, just the actual origins and the bigger, broader world itself are like. You know, I stuck to Bronze Age kind of facts as much as possible in the book, but we obviously did touch on other things. And so many times there was just like, it was an excuse for me to jam in like either a bit of extra nerdery, or like, I also, you know, you mentioned in yours that one of the things you wanted to get in was like the similes and the same similes. And you know, that was another thing that I got really excited about,

• 22:08Liv Albert?

  especially because I had such a tight word count that like similes were unfortunately the first things to be cut. And there are a few that made it in because I was like, no, we, we have to keep like a handful of similes. Like other words can go in favor, you know, and, and like I, that is something that I'm very excited to have out into the world. And because it is, it is so often the thing that just gets kind of left behind in favor of like Odysseus the hero did all of these like heroic things. And of course, you know, going right back to the timeline and the, the like actual narrative structure. You know, you, you changed yours for every good reason because that of how you're going about it.

• 22:50Liv Albert?

  But I honestly think that's like the only good reason to change that structure when it comes to a retelling or reimagining. Because every, I mean, I have a bunch of Odyssey kids book. I was picking them up anytime I saw anything like, and I have yet to find, I mean, I would say almost any kind of retelling of the Odyssey as compared to of like an actual translation. Like almost all retelling, certainly everything I saw for kids, but even when you pick up like a book of, you know, just general Greek myths written by someone who tells this bit of the story. They will always rewrite the narrative to be linear. And like, I mean, I understand the basics of where that idea comes from, but I just think it takes

• 23:34Liv Albert?

  so much away from the actual epic itself to just present it as this linear thing that just happened. And so that, I mean, for me, that was one of the big things that I got in for the kids too, is this idea that we don't have to trust everything, Odysseus.

• 23:53Speaker 03

  Exactly, because you do immediately lose the sense of him as a narrator if you tell it as a linear story.

• 23:59Liv Albert?

  Exactly.

• 24:00Speaker 03

  It actually happens.

• 24:01Liv Albert?

  Yeah, yeah, but by making it linear, you are confirming everything Odysseus says when there is no reason in the narrative to do that. And it's more interesting to question what he says. And, you know, and yeah, I just, I just think that fundamentally it is what makes the Odyssey what it is, is the, this narrative structure and like the way that all of the fantastical things that are supposed to have happened, happened because Odysseus says they happen, not because we actually see them happening in the epic itself. And like, that's so much more interesting.

• 24:40Liv Albert?

  And, and also like, the fact that he basically starts off his story by saying like, hi, my name's Odysseus and I'm a liar. Like, that's basically what he says at the top. And yet, you know, all of these retellings are like, this is what happened. And you're like, it's not fun to just be like, this is what happened. Like, no, this man was potentially, probably lying through his teeth. And like, that's fine. But there is this, it's the same, it reminds me of the, the, the way the world did and continues, I think, to react to how Emily Wilson translates the first line. You know, complicating muse of a complicated man. And this word complicated, right?

• 25:23Liv Albert?

  And like, people get, and by people, I mean primarily men, get really triggered by this word of complicated. And it's so interesting to me that that has been taken as like inherently a negative about Odysseus. Like, people have said, you know, that it's like somehow like an insult to the character of Odysseus to translate it as complicated. And I think that's so bizarre and also like betrays, I think, like a complete, I mean, it betrays a lot of just how we are meant to understand men as a society. That like, saying you're complicated is assumed to be an insult. But like, for what reason? Like, I'm complicated. I would not, I don't want to be simple.

• 26:07Speaker 03

  A compliment.

• 26:08Liv Albert?

  Yes.

• 26:08Speaker 03

  You're a complicated person. You, you do a lot of different things. I mean,

• 26:12Liv Albert?

  Yeah, it's literal too. For, I, I think it's so valid. And even like, I've had conversations with Greek people who also really don't like that translation of compliment or complicated, but. Like, I love it, because I think it really does convey, I mean, polytropos was never gonna be a word that we can easily put into English. And people love to make an argument for like, just saying many turns or whatever, but like, complicated means that. Like, it's, it's a much more succinct, smooth way of phrasing this man who does a lot of fucked up stuff. He does a lot of good stuff. Like, he is complicated. And yeah, I don't know, I, I feel like I just rambled that into the conversation. But it is, it just blows my mind, the way people take that as like, a hit on Odysseus.

• 26:56Liv Albert?

  And I guess I'm just waiting for the, the men who will inevitably find my retelling and take issue with it. Because I did say, I did reuse complicated in it. Like, I think I said that he was brilliant and complicated. Because I was like, you guys need to chill on thinking this is a bad thing. Like, it's not. But, you know, it's just, it's so, I don't know. I, yeah, I'm, it's, I'm interested by people's reaction. And also, I'm fucking proud of mine. That was, yeah, a ramble.

• 27:27Speaker 03

  No, well, for fun, but it's, I think what's so important, and like you touched on, um, I'm a teacher, I'm a mom. I read a lot of kids' books. Uh, um.

• 27:39Liv Albert?

  I don't do either, any of those things, thankfully.

• 27:43Liv Albert?

  But I'll be glad to hear from you.

• 27:44Speaker 03

  Kids love weird books where odd stuff happens and they are absolutely fine with interesting narratives. They might need a little bit of explanation. So it is really a shame when you, you, you get a kid's book and it's so simplified, even for a higher age group. And then with, with the linear narrative. And it's so easy to include that. So yeah, I, I, I'm so glad. I mean, I knew coming from you that you would never lose on the narrative. But also in the leaving bits out, because that's something that happens with adaptations as well, especially with film ones. Um, but with book adaptations too, I've never seen a, a version of the Odyssey, especially written for children. Where they don't take out stuff or directly change things.

• 28:29Liv Albert?

  Yes.

• 28:30Speaker 03

  And it's never for the better. And I'm, I mean, I'm, I'm quite a purist. I do think it's kind of disrespectful and almost arrogant, to be honest, to change things in a way that is completely unnecessary.

• 28:43Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 28:43Speaker 03

  Like, just one random case in point, it is from neither of our books, obviously, but um, from the nineteen ninety six, seven uh, Odyssey miniseries, where they're trying to get out of Polyphemus's cave and Odysseus, instead of like doing the whole clever uh, nobody speech and getting the, uh, getting um, Polyphemus drunk and then, and then tying the men underneath the sheep and all of that. They just, he just, he says something like, "Oh, don't eat me, you'll eat all the magic in my head."

• 29:12Liv Albert?

  Oh, my god.

• 29:15Speaker 03

  And then he gets him drunk and they stab his eye out and then, and then they're all running around like morons and one of them is wearing a sheepskin and they all run out while the guy playing the flute is squashed. And it's just like, what was wrong with the original story that that is what you decided to do? Exactly. I mean, was it, was it the budget? Could you just not get sheep big enough? Or, or at least like, a, a, I don't know, a hobby horse you could just cover? I don't know. But I mean, you spent all the budget on, on fricking golden Hermes flying around in his delightfully camp manner. Um, but I, I don't know. It's just, it really interests me. In that version, they even leave out the sirens, which is just such a move.

• 30:12Liv Albert?

  This episode is brought to you by Quince. You know the drill. Quince makes elevated, everyday essentials using premium materials like Mongolian cashmere, organic cotton and premium stretch denim. I have been.

• 30:28Liv Albert?

  Speaking into a microphone about Quince for a while now, and I have no complaints. I have a bunch of their stuff. I've got a couple cute sweaters that, I mean, it's nearing sweater season, so those will be back in the rotation anytime now. And I have this leather bag that I absolutely love. It's like this braided leather and I use it like basically every day. Because that's the thing, they have really great basics. Like they have really great things that you can wear with so many other things. Just the options are endless. And as the weather gets colder, like all the sweaters in my closet, Quince has everything you need

• 31:09Liv Albert?

  to round out your wardrobe from warm, responsibly sourced down jackets and cozy cashmere scarves and gloves to beautiful 14 karat gold jewelry that adds the perfect finishing touch. And of course, everything at Quince is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen. So you're paying for quality, not brand markup. And if we haven't learned anything in the last 10 years, isn't it just getting rid of the middlemen, you know, making things more affordable? So find the fall pieces you'll reach for most at Quince. Download the Quince app for app exclusive offers or go to quince.com. Get free shipping on your order and 365 day

• 31:50Liv Albert?

  returns. Now available in Canada and the UK too. And when Quince asks where you heard about them, let them know it was me. Let's talk about myths, baby. It's the best way to support the show.

• 32:16Speaker 03

  So I know you and I both went, right, how much of this can we absolutely keep in? I didn't, I didn't have a word limit.

• 32:25Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 32:26Speaker 03

  I just kept going.

• 32:27Liv Albert?

  Your book's a little longer than mine. Yeah, it's a little.

• 32:29Speaker 03

  My, my book gives me carpal tunnel. My book is half the weight. My daughter was when she was born.

• 32:38Speaker 03

  Um, it, it, it, that was a bit silly to be honest, but I ju- I couldn't leave it alone. Amazingly, that is me having cut back on some of the sections.

• 32:46Liv Albert?

  No, but I think it, it's, yeah, it's only a good thing because it does. Yeah, like it, it, it shows the complexity and your book was always meant to be like, well, you just kind of have all of the options there and like that. Yeah, that's ideal.

• 33:00Speaker 03

  You literally do.

• 33:01Liv Albert?

  Yeah. So you can't make it small because the whole point is to have options. So it's like, well, it has to be long.

• 33:08Speaker 03

  And, and as you're reading it, you might find, even though you made different choices from last time, it sounds a bit similar, but there's something different. You can't put your finger in and then you end up three or four sections later on a completely different adventure that you didn't realize that you were heading towards by making a decision earlier. So it's a bit more like a computer game in that kind of level of complexity, although without some of the details that you could have if it was electronic, like remembering your choices and having an inventory and stuff like that, which would be ever so fun.

• 33:37Liv Albert?

  And that would be, but no, but I mean, I, I've played around a lot on yours over the years, especially because I am delighted to, to say to the listeners that I got access to this, what, like four years ago, I would say.

• 33:50Speaker 03

  Oh, you were one of my first readers.

• 33:52Liv Albert?

  Yeah, hell yeah. It was delightful. But, um, I know there's been so many times where I have like been clicking around into all the different options. And I'll, I've thought that I've made Odysseus is like it Homeric decisions in yours and still ended up where I'm like, oh no, there's something where I clicked something slightly off from the Homeric because I've ended up in like a totally different place. And I just think, I think that's such a fun, it's like a game in itself rather than just a straight, you know, reap. Reimagining or retelling.

• 34:25Speaker 03

  I kind of like the idea that some people might play it with a with a group. I say play it like literally like.

• 34:30Liv Albert?

  No, but it is very game like. Yeah.

• 34:31Speaker 03

  Yeah. And I know some people have said that they're they're reading it with their their gaming group, like their D and D group, which I also do. And I played it with my my class D and D group, which was so interesting because they'd also, some of them had read The Odyssey and some of them hadn't because they were in my class. And and this idea that also you could play it for how how many bad decisions you can make or how quickly you can get them home. You can play it for how well do you know The Odyssey?

• 34:57Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 34:58Speaker 03

  It's also, it's really hard at the start because unless you've read the Telemachian, you don't actually know what he did. How, when he left? You you get the idea he left and sacked the cocones, but like, when did he leave and with who and so forth? Um, so that's quite nice because even people who really know The Odyssey well might not make the right decision.

• 35:17Liv Albert?

  I think that there's details in that. This is definitely the ones that I got messed up on, even with my knowledge of The Odyssey. So, yeah. I mean, you've tripped up even the best of us.

• 35:28Speaker 03

  I have put on my website a downloadable spreadsheet, woo, um, which does have all the cor- correct sections, as it were, or like the ones that are The Odyssey.

• 35:42Speaker 03

  And as I'm making it, I decided I I it needed to be even more accessible. And I thought it'd be really fun for students who actually just need to know the main storyline. But also the aspect of making the choices helps them understand it is easier, it's better. Um, and with your help, I've turned it into this audiobook podcast with a lovely soundscape, so you're immersed in it. And I've I've I had to go back to my own list of which sections are correct to go, oh, man, which which bits do I read? So in that, I focus on that main Odyssey storyline. But you still get a moment to hear what the options might be at this time. And then it gives you a second or two to think about it. And then the story continues and you can go, what? He chose what now?

• 36:28Speaker 03

  What are you doing? Don't shout at the Cyclops.

• 36:32Liv Albert?

  But he makes such good decisions.

• 36:34Speaker 03

  Mo- mostly.

• 36:36Liv Albert?

  That one is the funniest moment. Literally, he's about to escape, completely unscathed from the Cyclops, and he's like, hey.

• 36:45Liv Albert?

  Tell your like dead eye that I just stabbed that it was Odysseus. Like literally, he's like, I'm gonna just tell on myself.

• 36:53Speaker 03

  Hmm. And then everyone will know it was me and I will get close. I actually do this bit in one of my, my, my lower school classes. Well, we don't get a lot of time to study the, the Odyssey, so we focus on book nine. And we do like, good decisions, bad decisions. So I'm giving them a precis of book nine and they have to write down whether this was a good decision or bad decision. And then I get to the bit where he's escaped and then I, oh, good decision. And then I tell them the bit where he shouts back and they're like, what? Okay, bad, bad decision. And then the, he gets, they get thrown back to shore by the tidal wave. And then, and then they set sail again and then, and then he shouts again and they're like throwing pencils on the floor and yelling. Cause they, why? What's he doing? And we're like, our children, we did talk about, kudos.

• 37:36Speaker 03

  Um, it's, it's so much fun. So I, I really hope people are doing the same thing and listening or reading and having, having that same moment where they realize that this isn't the decision he made and they're still alive. But will, will they be remembered? Was it worth it? What's it all about?

• 37:56Liv Albert?

  Oh, well, Odysseus certainly succeeded there. Oh, oh my God, mid yawn. Um, well, I just, no, it's so, I just love, I mean, I love talking about the Odyssey, if you can believe it. But it's so interesting to kind of imagine like how I've handled like such similar things. You know, because like there, I wanted, one of the big things I wanted to convey is this kind of, I mean, like it's an inherent, like not so much comedy, but this like there is, it is meant to be funny to a degree. It is meant to be like tongue in cheek. You are meant to think like, hey, Odysseus, that was a really terrible decision.

• 38:40Liv Albert?

  Like those things are meant by the Homeric tradition. I think it's pretty safe to say that, that like, it was never meant to be this like uber serious, like, you know, this moment where just this man is, just his like, Godly search for home or whatever, right? Like you were meant to think like, hey dude, that was stupid. Like you fucked up everything. And, and you know, and I think that is the thing that we, that gets left on the table so often. And, you know, to be kind to retellings that, that leave, that just make him into this perfect guy, you know, you, there is like a kind reading that that's just sort of, I don't even know what that kind of reading is. I guess that's

• 39:21Liv Albert?

  just culturally what we imagine these days, but like more honest, more accurately, like when we, when we retell that version, this like nonsense version where he's just this great guy who did these great things to get home, like, we are inherently, you know, perpetuating this idea of like, Western dominance and supremacy and just this idea that like, everything that this man did is good because he did it. You know, and I think that's so common with how we are meant to understand particularly ancient and historical, like mythological and historical men, right? We are only meant to see the side that benefited us as a culture and not the side

• 40:05Liv Albert?

  that, that like destroyed other people and their culture.

• 40:09Speaker 03

  If you want a nice version of Odysseus where he doesn't do anything wrong, you've got the Aeneid. And that is literally, that is literally a tool of, of Roman supremacy and a piece of propaganda, really, talking about how they are the best.

• 40:26Liv Albert?

  Yeah, because they didn't make all the mistakes that Odysseus did.

• 40:29Speaker 03

  But then like if you read Livy's history where he's describing how Aeneas founded Rome, like, they, they get to Italy and they just start stealing people's cattle because they don't have anything. That's piracy. So, and you get a much more level storytelling. I mean, Livy's just so cross about having to reference myths in the first place. It's hilarious. But it's, I, I, I main, yeah, I very much maintain that, um, uh, like, uh, Aeneas is, is that character. It's not Odysseus. I mean, Aeneas never does anything wrong, ever. And even when he does, it's not his fault. We're all meant to sympathize with him because he gets blanked by Dido in the underworld.

• 41:11Speaker 03

  But that's it. You can't be complicated and then just be perfect and bleached out.

• 41:16Liv Albert?

  Yeah, like the many turns, like that, that's what this is. And no, using Aeneas as that example is so perfect because it is exactly the difference of one was written as, like, whether intentionally propagandic or not, it was intentionally written by one person during this very specific time period. Whereas we don't have any of that when it comes to Homer. And so like, that, that is, that's the thing that gets forgotten most of all is like, Homer was not about writing like a good guy, bad guy story about good versus evil, whatever. Like, that's not what this was about. And that's okay. We don't need to pretend like it was.

• 41:53Speaker 03

  You really see that in the Iliad as well, where it's not like either side is bad. They're just both there.

• 41:59Liv Albert?

  And the Trojans are almost, almost always more sympathetic than the Greeks, despite, you know, the story being primarily about the Greeks. And I think like that too, yeah, is so important. And that's what makes them so interesting. And like the Odyssey, yeah, is fun because Odysseus is like a fucking loser. Who makes really terrible decisions a lot of the time. And like, that doesn't, I don't know, it's so interesting to, to navigate in this realm where we also like hear from the public. Because broadly, the public is just so weird about this stuff. I'm honestly kind of excited because I'm so comfortable now in my Odyssey and knowledge, my everything in that realm, like.

• 42:40Speaker 03

  You've done the homework.

• 42:41Liv Albert?

  I'm like, I'm very confident in what I have written and like the value of it. And, but also I know that it's going to piss some people off and I'm, I'm just so ready for them to mad. That's so fine. But no, like, I, I think, yeah, it's so easy to, to ignore the bad stuff. That was obviously a big thing that I wanted to get into the kids book is like all of the bad. I think, you know, we're talking about how neither of us wanted to cut anything, surely. And I think, I, I, I want to think like a little closer and just make, but I, the only, the only moment that I knowingly cut out of my Odyssey, and I do like saying this because I think it really impacts the point, that the only moment that I knowingly cut out, the only

• 43:26Liv Albert?

  actual like plot point thing that I cut out. Is when there's the story within the story about Aphrodite and Ares getting caught fucking under a net. And that is, that is a real travesty that I didn't get to include that. But I also think it says a lot that that is the only thing I cut out. And it's because it's a completely unrelated story that involves a lot of sex. And I just, I was not going to try to do that when I could cover everything in the Odyssey that matters.

• 43:52Speaker 03

  I suppose we should put that in context. That's a song Demodocus, the bard is singing in the Phaeacian.

• 43:58Liv Albert?

  Thank you. I also, I legitimately couldn't remember where it appears because I've cut it out. And I've now read my version through edits and the audiobook so many times that I'm like, I actually don't know where it was. I just know it's not in mine. So thank you.

• 44:12Speaker 03

  Again, just to point out that kids can handle stuff like this.

• 44:15Liv Albert?

  For sure.

• 44:16Speaker 03

  That's a story in the, in my Latin class textbook.

• 44:21Liv Albert?

  Oh, my God, that's delightful.

• 44:23Speaker 03

  Twelve year olds. I mean, it's very heavily euphemistic. They were very happy in the bedroom. But yeah, it's in there.

• 44:34Liv Albert?

  Well, and I could have. Yeah, that was really for me, it was a word count thing more than, because I also, you know, there's, it was interesting generally on the kid's side. There was a couple of moments at the beginning where it was like, okay, like, you know, there are rules about particularly regionality. Like I was told a lot of things and have promptly forgotten, but like each country can also have different rules about like what kids are and are not allowed to have. Like it's quite huge, especially for DK, because they are like, I think the most worldwide kids book publisher.

• 45:04Speaker 03

  Absolutely. And they have a real educational bent to their work.

• 45:07Liv Albert?

  Exactly, exactly. And so, yeah, they had some specific kind of rules. At the beginning, it was like, my editor was like, I gotta go double check that, you know, we can mention wine. And I was like, newsflash, I was like, that's, that's gonna be a deal breaker. I was like, the answer cannot be no. Like it can't, you can't, sorry. Like, that's literally all they drink. I actually can't write a book about Greek myth without, like, even, it was like when I put wine dark sea and I was like, oh God, no. But thankfully, obviously, and it was just like her needing to double check. Like clearly it was fine, but there was this brief moment where I was like, what do you want me to do if I can't mention wine?

• 45:46Liv Albert?

  But no, and there were, you know, it's interesting, just generally like those things. And I learned a lot about like actual like the printing process and like with full color books. Um, in order to be printed with any kind of reasonable price point, they're usually printed in China. I was like, great, they have the facilities to do it. Um, but what that mean, but they have some rules about maps. And so like the map was, there was the potentially issues around that, but that we ended up sticking with. We made it the most mythological map in order to sort of avoid any kind of sticky. But there, my editor was like, she was great because she just wanted to share this stuff with me.

• 46:28Liv Albert?

  So she was like telling me all this like kind of tea about what you can and can't include. And, you know, all of these like nonsense, you know, world leader bullshit like, right?

• 46:39Speaker 03

  You know, it's like. Who's got to have the biggest country and so and so country can't be bigger. I've heard that somewhere.

• 46:45Liv Albert?

  Is it, is it, this is me having a embarrassing lack of knowledge. Is it Taiwan? The, the, it's that like China, whatever the land is that China says is theirs and the people say it's not. I, I believe it.

• 46:57Speaker 03

  Oh, I don't know.

• 46:58Liv Albert?

  It's Taiwan. Um, and basically like there are places like that, like there are, there are places where like China doesn't, um, like acknowledge it. So you can't, you can't have them printed on a map like they won't or something like that. And then there was also like, I, I mean, I, I was ready for a fight because I had to have little Levant on my map. And I was like, you're not putting the word Israel on there. Like, we're not putting any, we're not, it is mythological and generally like we only have. But at the same time, I was also like, I'm putting tear on this map. Like there are places where it's relevant to the map. And also for me, that's my little like bit of aggression. Like Israel, you want to bomb the fuck out of this like Bronze Age city? Well, I'm gonna put it on my map anyway. But you know, there was these moments.

• 47:40Liv Albert?

  It's just such an interesting, it's just interesting. I love the logistics and like learning all this weird stuff. And yeah, it's just, and there was definitely some stuff about the states and like weird laws down there. I wish I remembered them more specifically because like, obviously.

• 47:54Speaker 03

  That's fascinating.

• 47:55Liv Albert?

  Yeah, just stuff you never think about, right? But it's just like what the country will or will not.

• 48:00Speaker 03

  This is the kind of thing you wouldn't know unless it suddenly came up.

• 48:03Liv Albert?

  Exactly. Well, and even just the idea, like, I, I know that, like, full color books tend to be printed in China and all the things that comes along with that because of my, like, I went to publishing school shit. But like, the actual, the map thing was like a whole other level of like, oh, okay, right. No, but China will also be weird about what maps. And like, I'm sure the states is similar, there's with different portions of the map. And yeah, it's interesting. And also, like, global politics are dumb. Um, probably shouldn't call them dumb, but the way that these world leaders are behaving, I don't know.

• 48:36Speaker 03

  I don't know. I think it's justified. No, I love that we both got maps into our books.

• 48:41Liv Albert?

  Hell, yeah.

• 48:42Speaker 03

  As an illustrator, I was like, right, well, this is a great chance to do some very interesting pictures, not stick figures for once, because it's not comics. And I, I had such fun researching and looking at different versions of the, the, the map of the world, the big flat disc of the world and where different people at different times, mostly Victorians, it seems, were obsessed with trying to work out what the map might have looked like. They weren't trying to map it necessarily onto modern day landforms, though, which is, I think that's really difficult trying to do that. I mean, obviously, those landforms weren't there, but they didn't necessarily know they were there. But it's just so interesting having a place where you can actually go to the underworld as well. It's just like, to the west.

• 49:28Liv Albert?

  Well, and I love the underworld one, because the Homeric entrance to the underworld is like a very different place from later, more archaic and classical entrances to the underworld, because there's a bunch, right? And like, you know, the, like, with my map, yeah, I went with this similarly, like, I, I would use yours as a decent starting off point, too, as like melded with all, with a bunch of others, but yours was heavier in mine. But I was really. I I really don't like the mapping it out onto the real world for a couple of different reasons. Like, I respect it and I understand why people want to generally, but like, I feel like it's so unnecessary because this is so explicitly mythical, you know?

• 50:13Speaker 03

  Especially as so many parts of it are in supernatural lands.

• 50:16Liv Albert?

  Exactly. And I also think you open a can of worms by trying to place certain creature type people or like violent certain type people. Like you really, you call, it's not okay to then just be like, I think this was in Africa because, because generally that's the way the winds might have pushed if this were at all real, right? Like the lotus eaters are, are often placed in, in Africa or like the cyclops is Sicily and you're like, which that one always, that one always drives me nuts generally because Charybdis and Scylla are also always put in the, like, the Strait, Italy and Sicily.

• 50:59Liv Albert?

  Why can't I think of what the Strait is called? Um, Messina, the Messina Strait.

• 51:04Speaker 03

  Well done.

• 51:05Liv Albert?

  Thank you. Um, but like, they're always put there, but then like, why would the Cyclops be the same island that separates Scylla and Charybdis? Like, it actually doesn't make any sense. So like, why are, why, why, why do we have to do that? Anyway, very long way of saying mine is very mythical. And so I don't have, I even tried to make it, you know, Greece is vaguely Greek shaped, but that's about it. And otherwise it's, it's much more of like this overall idea of, of where these places would be in this like wider ocean. Because yeah, it's like, I don't know. I, I think it's weird. And also they had not, they would not have been sailing the entirety of the Med back then. Like they, it was not ever imagined to be

• 51:47Liv Albert?

  in these explicitly real places aside from, in my map actually, or in my. Overall, like breakdown at the beginning, we have a lot of like informative stuff at the beginning of the book. And I did also make a point of of pointing at which places are real and which are mythical, which I also think is is important and like made a point of of making sure that kids knew the modern places for everything, you know, and I think that's so important. So often we use this term Mesopotamia and we never use the word Iraq alongside it. And you're like, that's crazy. And also, it contributes to like, the genocidal nature of the West. And yeah, naturally, I'm going to talk about a kid's book and

• 52:29Liv Albert?

  also use the word genocide, because I am me. And and I but this is actually like, is a little circle for my brain. Because I think that I thought of saying this earlier, but I think it's actually quite beneficial to have somebody like me write a kid's book in this type, because I think because I came at it not for kids, that it almost got, you know, you were saying the kids can handle the Aphrodite and Ares stuff, right? And all of these things, like kids can handle stuff. And there's this mentality that we have to sugarcoat it for them. And because I don't have that mentality, because I don't

• 53:10Liv Albert?

  like to be around children broadly, you know, I any kind of like, child friendly nature of my book is done by the editors, but mine, otherwise, I was just like wanting to tell a simple, the simple story of the Odyssey, like, it's not a kid friendly Odyssey, it's just a shortened version that also happens to be kid friendly and beautifully illustrated. But like, that's not, you know, my intention was just to tell the Odyssey, rather than to kids.

• 53:43Speaker 03

  The the beauty of a book like that is that it could be marketed for kids, but to be honest, anyone's going to get joy out of that. It's beautiful to look at, it's incredibly informative, it tells a story in a really good way, which doesn't and also, it doesn't take away from the potential to read the Odyssey itself, which is also something I didn't want to do. I'm not replacing the Odyssey.

• 54:04Liv Albert?

  God, no, no. We wouldn't dare.

• 54:06Speaker 03

  No, I mean, the Odyssey exists. So like, That's, that's an amazing thing. And I, I, this is why I think I used to get so upset when people would make versions of it. And it's like, this isn't as good. What were you thinking? I mellowed a bit now. But, um, you know, this idea that, uh, that, that every piece of classical reception, every retelling is kind of a, a mirror on the world of, of, of what, who it's being retold to and why. Um, and, uh, I think when people take ownership of a, of a text like that, they just have to be respectful to it. And they have to, it's a really big responsibility. Because it's, it's not something you want to create misunderstandings about.

• 54:51Speaker 03

  And, uh, and suggest it has a different purpose than, than what it has, even if you are doing a retelling. Um, you can take aspects of it and retell those, but it just, yeah, the, the, the idea of changing its inherent meaning is, is abhorrent to me. It makes me very upset.

• 55:10Liv Albert?

  There is something I'm thinking of that I'm not gonna say into this microphone because people would get really mad at me. So I'll just think it, but I think there's a pretty good example of that happening. It's pretty popular. Um, but that's fine. That actually is still the perfect way to loop back around. Cause I think we should talk a little bit about this trailer.

• 55:32Speaker 03

  Oh, go on then.

• 56:03Liv Albert?

  You know,

• 56:05Liv Albert?

  like, there is so much to be said for. Adaptations and how, you know, historicity doesn't, being a hundred percent historically accurate is not necessarily like the best way to go about these things. Like it's is a movie. It's always going to be an interpretation. Of course Hollywood this Hollywood that blah, blah, blah. I am just really disappointed in the way that they have somehow managed to leech all color out of Greece, even though they filmed it in Greece. And yet I watched those trailers and I think I have never seen such a colorless Greece in my life. And if

• 56:50Liv Albert?

  you can believe it, I've been there a handful of times. And it just, oh, it's such a bummer, like among so many other things, but just overall, like, I don't want to be that person who's just like, oh, it's not accurate, blah, blah, blah. But like, and it's, that's not the point. Like, the point is that it, they have removed the, like, some quintessential aspects of the ancient world that I just think do a real disservice. And it's just the trailer, I know. And I'm just going to become like the person who's constantly bitching about this movie. And I'm comfortable with that.

• 57:24Speaker 03

  I've, I've decided to, to try and be as constructive I can, as I can when I talk about it, because I, I have been.

• 57:32Liv Albert?

  You've taken the other direction.

• 57:34Speaker 03

  Not, not so much the other direction. I'm not like, I love it. Um, I have been waiting, I've been teaching for 20 years. I have been waiting for a good Odyssey film. The, the mini series is kind of the closest, I think. I mean, there are other films from other countries that are really good too, but they're maybe not as accessible in the classroom for children, or they're older, or they're just too long, like the mini series is, which also leaves out loads of stuff. And yet looks kind of right in places. Um, and then the return happened and like, well, that wasn't the film I wanted. So I know, I'm kind of desperate at this point. So I'm, I am a rosy eyed girl right now. I mean, what I'm glad about is that we got to be disappointed really early with how it looked.

• 58:17Speaker 03

  Because now I'm just happy that the trailer had bits in it that are in The Odyssey, because all we'd seen so far were was the Iliad. I mean, the the the horse is talked about at moments in The Odyssey, so it was

• 58:32Liv Albert?

  And not in the Iliad.

• 58:33Speaker 03

  Indeed, right? It's actually not in the Iliad, but like, it's more linked to, we see lots of, there were lots and lots of scenes being linked of clearly armies fighting at Troy.

• 58:43Liv Albert?

  The war, yeah.

• 58:43Speaker 03

  With the Iliad, which is just, which is the the massive irony that those are in bits of the epic cycle that don't exist anymore.

• 58:50Liv Albert?

  I know, every time that's shown, yeah, it's delightful.

• 58:54Speaker 03

  They did not survive.

• 58:55Liv Albert?

  No, everyone loves to focus on these moments that actually don't exist in the Asia Record.

• 59:01Speaker 03

  But it's, I mean, I mean, and it it made it very clear straight away that, yes, this is a film that is going to be, I suppose you could almost say they're trying to make it accessible to as many people as possible who haven't been aware of The Odyssey and the Iliad, who haven't seen it. That's the that's the positive view on it. However, they've gone with the lowest common denominator of visuals in order to make that happen. And when we're talking about the color, um, like, it it's it's fascinating that it doesn't seem to be doing anything historical, and yet it's using that sepia tone kind of color palette, which says history. And I've had so many people point out to me in the last few days that the the director is colorblind, and that's why he uses that tonal palette. That director hasn't

• 59:46Liv Albert?

  That's not a good excuse, actually.

• 59:49Speaker 03

  Like, what, why?

• 59:50Liv Albert?

  A lot of men are colorblind. That doesn't mean they have to take the color away from the rest of us.

• 59:54Speaker 03

  It it just smacks of being a bit of a an an excuse. Like, I'm sure, I mean, he's a, he's a very thorough director from all the films I've seen, and he's gone to great pains. They made a new camera to be able to film, and I'm like, they invented a camera. I mean, he's a, this is a guy with attention to detail. That that's not something that I think would, he would that slip by.

• 1:00:16Liv Albert?

  No, no, it's very intentional. I mean, I'll be like, I know that I'm such a broken record with this, and I I'm gonna have to find other things to complain about, but like, it just, all of it screams to me of a Western propaganda. Like, it really, and can I just point out that the, it's, it's like, I, it's, it's, it's not like tinfoil hatty, but like, it's also not not, but like, it's just quite the

• 1:00:45Liv Albert?

  Turn of events to me that the movie Troy came out in the first year of the Iraq war. And now this is happening in this year. And it just, I obviously it is coincidental because this has been in production. But like, it just feels like this cyclical thing that I can't unsee the way that like we are pushing this Western propaganda and even more pro-American than Troy even, at least in Troy. They pretended to have like some kind of accent that wasn't explicitly American. But now they've even got the Brits doing American accents in this Odyssey, which is a wild choice to me.

• 1:01:31Liv Albert?

  Um, but also just like it, it feel, it just screams of, of propaganda, unfortunately. In this way, it's this epic, I mean, we did see these moments of the actual plot in this trailer. But one, I will say, as we were talking earlier about narrative structure, nothing in this trailer suggests that they are keeping the narrative structure of the, of the Odyssey.

• 1:01:53Speaker 03

  I actually know that they are because that was in an interview that I, I'm, I'm, I then watched because I needed to know. And that they are using the narrative structure.

• 1:02:03Liv Albert?

  Thank God. Okay, good.

• 1:02:05Speaker 03

  That was my minimum request.

• 1:02:06Liv Albert?

  Absolutely. Good.

• 1:02:07Speaker 03

  And thank you. I have got that. I mean, it would also be nice to see some stuff that looked Greek.

• 1:02:15Liv Albert?

  Just even a little Greek. Just a touch.

• 1:02:18Speaker 03

  I will say that Ithaca does look very Minoan in places. I mean, complete lack of frescoes. There's no color in it, but like, you know how, how Knossos looks in the reconstructions?

• 1:02:30Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:31Speaker 03

  Of things and, but like, if you took away all the frescoes that have been repainted, that's what Ithaca looks like.

• 1:02:37Liv Albert?

  See, I thought Ithaca just looked like they'd kind of take in the Acropolis and just sort of digitally messed with it.

• 1:02:44Speaker 03

  Well, also it's enormous. Ithaca's not, is not, Odysseus is not a king of a massive, it's bigger than Mycenae.

• 1:02:51Liv Albert?

  The way people love to make Ithaca out into like this big thing because of Odysseus. And you're like, that's again, not the point. Ithaca is a backwater goat town.

• 1:03:01Liv Albert?

  Honestly. But no, it, yeah, the, I have to say in terms of like, More complimentary things. I actually kind of love that Robert Pattinson is playing Antonus. Um, I, I enjoy that a little bit.

• 1:03:17Speaker 03

  From what I've seen, I think that's a really good bit of characterization. I'm wondering if there will be any other suitors of name, because of course there's, um, uh, your Remucus, not your Remucus.

• 1:03:29Liv Albert?

  I know, but with those two names interchangeable.

• 1:03:33Speaker 03

  Far speaker, far warfare. Oh, no, wide, wide, Yuri is wide, sorry. Wide, wide speaker.

• 1:03:40Liv Albert?

  Far, far warer is Telemachus instead.

• 1:03:45Speaker 03

  And, um, yeah, I think, I mean, I'm sure there'll be, I mean, you do have to make changes from a text when you turn it into a film, especially a film that would never be long enough to include everything.

• 1:03:56Liv Albert?

  Nope.

• 1:03:56Speaker 03

  It would take what like when they did the, the, the reading at the BM and the Almeida Theater many, many, many years ago, and they read the entire Odyssey, Iliad, in fact, they did first. That took about 14 hours.

• 1:04:08Liv Albert?

  I was gonna say, it's usually, yeah. I mean, as somebody who has read the entirety into a microphone once and now a half of again, yeah, it's usually like a good 15 hours.

• 1:04:23Speaker 03

  And as someone who's making a podcast of it, it's only halfway through. Yes. Um, but, but it's what they cut will be really, really interesting. And which characters they cut or which characters they squish down into maybe being one character. Like I've seen people say, oh, we haven't seen Calypso, so maybe there's no Calypso. Well, maybe it's Cersei is Calypso.

• 1:04:44Liv Albert?

  Therin is Calypso.

• 1:04:45Speaker 03

  Oh, no, sorry. Cersei, Cersei, not Calypso.

• 1:04:48Liv Albert?

  Oh my God, imagine if they didn't have Cersei. That would be.

• 1:04:51Speaker 03

  I mean, but that is wild speculation. There's, I mean, the, if you look on IMDb, the cast lists don't have any names by them for the majority, which I was really excited because I thought there was an old man character who's so wildly made to look old. I was so convinced that was going to be Odysseus in disguise. I thought, that's totally Matt Damon. And he's putting on a, a slightly different voice. And there was.

• 1:05:12Liv Albert?

  That is, that is. It's just John Leguizamo. Oh, what?

• 1:05:16Speaker 03

  That's just what he sounds like.

• 1:05:18Liv Albert?

  He looks like he's wearing old man makeup, but I also think he's just like, they must have him in some. But like, I can't believe that's John Leguizamo playing Umius. I honestly, that's wacky. That's wacky.

• 1:05:27Speaker 03

  I know. I'm so annoyed because I thought that would be pretty. I don't know. Yeah, I thought they really have made him look unlike himself. No, idiot. Um, I went through a lot of.

• 1:05:37Liv Albert?

  Do you like that Telemachus called him dad? Do you like that? How do we, how do we like dad?

• 1:05:42Speaker 03

  Uh, yeah.

• 1:05:43Liv Albert?

  Did I ever tell you that I wanted to, this is actually, this is like a little peek behind the curtain of what I was not allowed slash I didn't actually ask because I didn't actually want in there. But my first draft of the line that Odysseus speaks when he like finally reveals himself, he's naked. He jumps on the table. He's about to shoot a guy through the neck. Um, Emily Wilson has it saying like, uh, oh, playtime is over is her line. And like, there's, it's quite like, I, I looked at all the other translators and you know, people are having fun with this line. So I was like, okay, I can have, I can have like fun with this. And what I really wanted to say was daddy's home. And I thought that would have been hilarious. And, and yeah.

• 1:06:27Liv Albert?

  Daddy is home. Like it just would have been.

• 1:06:30Speaker 03

  Playtime finishes when daddy comes home.

• 1:06:32Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:33Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:06:34Liv Albert?

  But again, I actually did not want that in the book necessarily. So I think I, I forget what I wrote, but it was fun anyway. But you know, it's just as an interesting. Yeah. This idea, like the, the dad of it all, I guess, is what I'm getting back to because I didn't want to put daddies in there because that sounded too colloquial and ugh.

• 1:06:52Speaker 03

  I mean, when, when there, there are two bits where dad or daddy are used. I think one is when, uh,

• 1:06:59Liv Albert?

  How is there two in one trailer? There should not be, I mean, I, I, I wouldn't put it past them. I know there's one because I heard Telemachus say dad.

• 1:07:07Speaker 03

  I might be misremembering it now, but there's a bit where, um, uh, Telemachus is being very much talked down to and taunted by, uh, and, and Tenueus, uh, played by Robert Patterson. And he is made to, it, it's like the, kind of the equivalent of when I think he's called in, in the original text, like a, a, a sniveling cur, like a, a puppy, a puppy, right? So you could argue that's kind of within tolerance if you were translating it in a more modern thing, but. I've I've seen so many people say the word dad just shook them out of.

• 1:07:39Liv Albert?

  Yeah, I was watching it with a friend.

• 1:07:41Speaker 03

  Too modern.

• 1:07:41Liv Albert?

  Yeah, I was. I was watching it with a friend last night, actually, who has absolutely no connection to Greek myth, except knowing me. And the second that word came out, he looks at me and he was like, Dad? Like, I was like, yeah, OK, so we do even like the most normal of normal, regular people. That sounded absurd. And they've got, they've just got Tom Holland doing an American accent to say dad. And it's just the combination of things. I just.

• 1:08:11Speaker 03

  Well, see, I.

• 1:08:12Liv Albert?

  I'm not confident.

• 1:08:12Speaker 03

  I'm convinced that what we're getting is. Instead of historical story, instead of a mythological story, we're getting a fantasy. We're getting an interpretation.

• 1:08:26Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:08:27Speaker 03

  Whereas like a dream and all like the things that.

• 1:08:30Liv Albert?

  I mean, it's very Christopher Nolan.

• 1:08:31Speaker 03

  You might, well, I mean, he's good at twisty plots, right? He but but here it's like, well, what if what if you? What if you told the story of the Odyssey to an audience who have ninety percent? Not no knowledge about the ancient Greek world. What are they going to envisage? In their minds, what are they going to imagine these people look like? What are they wearing? Um, based on just things they might have seen.

• 1:09:00Liv Albert?

  I know, I'm trying. Way too much credit because I. I understand where you're coming from, but then I'm also like, that's not an excuse. Can we talk about the Lystragonians?

• 1:09:11Speaker 03

  The the.

• 1:09:11Liv Albert?

  They just look like medieval suits of armor, just the walking medieval suits of armor. What are we doing? What what what do we what are we doing?

• 1:09:19Speaker 03

  I have this delightfully. I don't know, divey weird children's book that I found, uh, the Geraldine McCoury retelling of the Odyssey, which I think was from the nineties. And in one of the pictures, the Lystragonians, it's like Gulliver's Travels. This is like sitting in this girl's hand.

• 1:09:36Liv Albert?

  Yeah, they're they're they're supposed to be.

• 1:09:39Speaker 03

  They're not supposed to be that big, I think.

• 1:09:41Liv Albert?

  No, yeah, I'm not like that.

• 1:09:43Speaker 03

  A woman of mountainous size, sitting on a throne, I didn't take to mean she literally was the size of a mountain, because you'd see her from a distance.

• 1:09:50Liv Albert?

  I picture more like polyphemous size. Like, I think they should be equivalent. They're just generally giant.

• 1:09:56Speaker 03

  I mean, that that didn't take a lot to be a giant, I think, in the age of, I mean, I remember

• 1:09:59Liv Albert?

  Yeah, exactly.

• 1:10:00Speaker 03

  that the average height was worried about five foot five. So

• 1:10:02Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:10:03Speaker 03

  I like thinking of like, yay, you average person. Um, I'm five foot nine.

• 1:10:09Liv Albert?

  Ooh, you're fancy.

• 1:10:11Speaker 03

  We have, I don't know if you still have gladiators, because I think it came on in the, in the States originally. But we have the, the series gladiators where there's like amazing athletes and they all dress up in spandex with a different identity. And then regular people who were also very fit, but still like

• 1:10:28Speaker 03

  not gladiators, come up and play games against them. And it is basically, I think, the closest that we're gonna get to watching Gladiator. Except everyone's also really nice to each other. But there are like the personalities and there's the bad guy and the good guy. But when you look at the gladiators, there were these amazing specimens of physicality. And they're all like about a foot and a half taller than the, the regular people who go up against them, who are also like

• 1:10:53Liv Albert?

  Gives it away.

• 1:10:54Speaker 03

  The people who go up against it, they work out a lot, but they still look like they're made of matchsticks when you compare them to the gladiators. So I'm thinking Lyshaggonians are gladiators times five.

• 1:11:04Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:05Speaker 03

  You wanna be able to like, take a spear, uh, run it through about five people like they're on a spit and then start eating them straight away. That's what I want. But so this idea that they just immediately start killing them, I guess it boils it down to the whole like, well, they don't give hospitality. But I don't know, there's also, I noticed in that bit, there's snow whistling past. And I suppose it does come quite close in the story to when they go to the underworld and, and where the underworld is, is meant to be the, near the edge of the world and

• 1:11:33Liv Albert?

  And it's like a little north. It's like hyperborea-ish, but like

• 1:11:38Speaker 03

  And uh, uh, if, if a person was a shepherd there, they could do two lines of work because they could start in the morning and evening because the night is so short. That's the really interesting description that's given as a simile.

• 1:11:49Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:50Speaker 03

  To try and get the, the people who are shepherds to understand how the night and day is different here.

• 1:11:55Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:11:55Speaker 03

  So I thought, like, there's little moments where I go, okay, you're listening.

• 1:11:59Liv Albert?

  Why is it a sentient medieval suit of armor?

• 1:12:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, that, I don't know. I'm fascinated, but I, the thing is, it shouldn't be a fantasy because myth is important.

• 1:12:10Liv Albert?

  Exactly.

• 1:12:10Speaker 03

  Fantasy is made up.

• 1:12:12Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:12:13Speaker 03

  Myth tells us things about cultures, like we were saying at the start. It's culturally significant. These are heroes. These people were actually worshipped and some of them still are as being archetypes and specifically the Age of Greek archetypes and these, these amazing characters. And the reason why, out of all the epic cycle, the, the Odyssey and the Iliad survive is, in my humble opinion, is because they have

• 1:12:41Speaker 03

  a character. They are built around one specific character. The others, there's loads of stuff happening and it's just story this, then this happens, then this happens. But those stories are told about individuals. One is Odysseus and one is Achilles. They are fascinating characters because they are flawed characters who deal with their humanity. Um, but they also do it in a way which is incredibly important in terms of their culture of the time. Like, at the start of, of my book, when you're making your decisions, I have a list. Think about how Odysseus would have thought. You are looking forward to getting kudos, which will lead to Cleos everlasting glory. You, you want to have either, as in you want to not do shameful things. You want to be worried about shame.

• 1:13:26Speaker 03

  You want to do the right thing, but you, you know, you, you will also practice hospitality. There are these rules that you must partake in. And you do these things by the rules of the gods, and you know what I'm going to say next, right? Hashtag defy the gods.

• 1:13:44Speaker 03

  Now, I'm hoping this is like, defy the gods and see what happens, man, because Odysseus is coming for you, because that's what happens in the Odyssey. All the people who die horribly in the Odyssey have not given Daniel, or even worse, they've broken that rule. It is the rule of Zeus. You give hospitality. You don't eat your guests. You don't hit on their wife. You don't plot to murder their son and take over their kingdom. Right? You don't do that. You also just don't eat all their food and refuse to leave. Those are all the things that polyphemus does, that the suitors do.

• 1:14:15Liv Albert?

  I maintain that, uh, well, polyphemus does not do that. But he doesn't do that either. Odysseus does that to him.

• 1:14:23Speaker 03

  No, he, they would have given them cheese had he been a civilized person.

• 1:14:28Liv Albert?

  If they had stayed and asked, but instead they just ate all of his food. So, no.

• 1:14:34Speaker 03

  It's his fault for not being there to receive gifts.

• 1:14:37Liv Albert?

  Not. Nope.

• 1:14:38Speaker 03

  He didn't even leave the fire going.

• 1:14:42Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:14:42Speaker 03

  We are never gonna agree on this.

• 1:14:44Liv Albert?

  No, I know. But you know what? You know what? It's because for me, all I see, because after rereading it enough times, all I see is the colonial implications in that whole section and the way that, because the reason why polyphemus doesn't act exactly right is because he is not meant to be like of the same culture and Odysseus is making like a really nasty judgment about his culture.

• 1:15:07Speaker 03

  Oh, my gosh, yes, of course.

• 1:15:09Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:15:10Speaker 03

  But that is the same judgment otherness. We are, uh, like even Athenians would say that about the sparks. We are us. Everyone else is a barbarian. But can I just point out that Odysseus's men say, oh, look, cheese, sheep, shall we steal them? And Odysseus says, no.

• 1:15:27Liv Albert?

  He says, no, we should stay and wait to see if he gives us more gifts.

• 1:15:31Speaker 03

  Yes. I'm not saying that he was doing it. I, he's a total hound when it comes to kudos. He's like got a taste for it now. He's gonna get it anywhere he was, but.

• 1:15:41Liv Albert?

  Like, I don't think polyphemus did nothing wrong. I just don't think that, I think that they're equally at fault.

• 1:15:47Speaker 03

  I'm gonna make you a T-shirt.

• 1:15:49Liv Albert?

  Yeah, polyphemus was wronged.

• 1:15:52Speaker 03

  Not do nothing wrong. No.

• 1:15:54Liv Albert?

  He was, he was wronged by Odysseus, but he did wrong as a result of being wronged.

• 1:16:02Speaker 03

  He just doesn't follow Zenya. That's, it's not his world. He cares nothing for the gods, even though his dad is Poseidon. He doesn't live by those rules.

• 1:16:11Liv Albert?

  Yeah, and Odysseus punished him for not living by the same cultural rules, and that's why I don't like Odysseus.

• 1:16:18Speaker 03

  I mean, he did bring a gift and it's not like polyphemus didn't immediately eat his men, so.

• 1:16:27Speaker 03

  Do you know what I am interested in though? I see now, I think we can, we can put our differences aside and see what the film does with this. Because, because I am, I love-

• 1:16:37Liv Albert?

  Actually, though, why does, okay, and this is maybe too much, but, and I, I didn't, I haven't re-watched it again, but based on what I was seeing last night, and granted, I was a couple cocktails in and I was already annoyed at this trailer. But polyphemus's eye looked to me more like a vagina than an eye.

• 1:16:56Speaker 03

  Okay, um, I was watching on my phone and it was really small and it's very dark. And I, I'm saying I a lot, which is ironic. I did not, I did not make that leap. I, I, as a teacher, I'm constantly scanning images to check, do they look rude? Because they often do. Um, and, uh, you just have to be careful about that. But I, I didn't get that. I mean, I think what I do really-

• 1:17:25Liv Albert?

  It's not my goal to wrap things up by saying that polyphemus's eye looks like a vagina in the new movie, but here we are anyway.

• 1:17:31Speaker 03

  Sorry. But I, I, I, I'm worried about this moment where I see them all running away from polyphemus, not under sheep. And the, the bit at the very end of the trailer, which was, is hilarious, but like, does it have a place there? I think he's asleep. Spoiler, he was not asleep. Bam, bam, bam. Like, that's, have they changed the story? Do they, is that him reacting to them poking him in the eye while he is asleep? Or is that, is that a comedy moment where I think he's asleep and then he's looking at you? I'm, I think, like you said, there are moments of comedy in The Odyssey. There are moments of reality and there's also moments of like horrible heartbreak and then violence. It's got everything.

• 1:18:10Liv Albert?

  It does, yeah.

• 1:18:11Speaker 03

  So popular, so it's nice to see that there will be some moments of levity. Like, where are they, where? That's the important thing, where are they?

• 1:18:21Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:23Liv Albert?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:25Liv Albert?

  Yep. Well, who

• 1:18:28Liv Albert?

  I feel like I learned something last night about who's playing.

• 1:18:32Liv Albert?

  Was it, who is playing Menelaus now?

• 1:18:35Speaker 03

  I can see his face. Do you want me to look it up?

• 1:18:39Liv Albert?

  Hmm. I mean, I feel, I feel like I just overall the casting, I mean, I, I'll never get over them not casting a single Greek person. That's just heartbreaking. It's mean and like they filmed in Greece. They got Greek tax breaks. They didn't hire a single Greek person. They didn't hire a single Mediterranean person that I've seen. But definitely not even a Greek.

• 1:19:00Liv Albert?

  Like, what are we doing?

• 1:19:04Speaker 03

  The guy playing Menelaus, sorry, is.

• 1:19:10Liv Albert?

  Thank you for looking it up.

• 1:19:13Speaker 03

  Jon Bernthal, who I can't think of what he's been in.

• 1:19:17Liv Albert?

  Yeah. And he was in like, I didn't watch it, but The Walking Dead. I think is what he was like most. Wait, maybe not. Yes. Anyway, he was in, um, the Daredevil Marvel show.

• 1:19:30Speaker 03

  Right.

• 1:19:31Liv Albert?

  And I remember him in that. Interesting. Yeah. No, that kind of works. I could see, I could see that. I think the one, oh yeah, Elliot Page is playing somebody in the underworld and.

• 1:19:42Speaker 03

  You know, I heard they might be playing, uh, Achilles.

• 1:19:47Liv Albert?

  That's what I heard too. Yeah.

• 1:19:48Speaker 03

  I like, that's very interesting.

• 1:19:50Liv Albert?

  I would be down with Achilles or what did I think of last night? I mean, I'll, I could see them being Patrickless. But I, but Patrickus notably does not speak. So hopefully not. No, I definitely like, I think that was the one moment where I was like, I'm okay with that casting. I'm actually happy with that casting.

• 1:20:09Speaker 03

  I think in what he says in the, uh, in the trailer, I say, who is looking after your wife and child? I think that sounds, I can hindsight. I, I was watching on a really tiny screen. And I thought, because I'd seen images of the Nokia underworldy bit before that looked like everyone was a skeleton. And I thought, well, how are you meant to recognize him if they're a skeleton? So I immediately assumed it can't be that. Um, and we've seen bits of that before. So I thought, are these the sirens? Have they interpreted them a bit more like the gray eye, for example? Because I didn't realize it was Elliot Page. I thought it was Frances McDormand, mostly because the voice sounded quite like.

• 1:20:51Speaker 03

  Her voice of God in Good Omens. I don't know. It was, it was very early in the morning. And then I realized later, I'm like, hang on a minute. The other person that's seen is literally wearing a blindfold over their eyes. That's clearly

• 1:21:01Liv Albert?

  Yeah, that's Taurisius. Yeah.

• 1:21:03Speaker 03

  And they're covered in mud.

• 1:21:04Liv Albert?

  I do think visually, the visual of Taurisius was great. I will say that.

• 1:21:08Speaker 03

  Do you see? I mean, that's a great line for a man whose eyes are covered, which is great. Um, yeah, I, I'm, I'm gonna make a prediction that they will not include the, uh, catalog of great women from Book of Love and the

• 1:21:22Liv Albert?

  Oh.

• 1:21:22Speaker 03

  Women in the Kia.

• 1:21:23Liv Albert?

  Oh, but I would be so utterly shocked. I would be, I, I would be simply taken aback if the white American men making this movie thought that the women in the underworld were unnecessary. Oh, I've never heard of a man retelling The Odyssey who's done that before, and I definitely didn't.

• 1:21:48Speaker 03

  Dude, I hope no one.

• 1:21:49Liv Albert?

  Shad earlier.

• 1:21:50Speaker 03

  No one is driving, listening to this, because I think they just veer off the road.

• 1:21:55Liv Albert?

  Yeah, they should be used to be by now.

• 1:21:57Speaker 03

  I, I spent so long researching, I say researching, looking up again and trying to flesh out those stories so I could have every single one with even more context. The only thing I didn't do was put it in their own words and have them talking, which I still, I mean, it's not like that in The Odyssey, so I kind of stuck to that. I think it could have been very interesting if I had done that, and I kind of maybe, maybe I should have gone back and moved in it, but.

• 1:22:20Liv Albert?

  Because it's like, they're not just random women, but everybody loves to think that they're just random women, and then we just ignore them because they're just random chicks and.

• 1:22:29Liv Albert?

  Something very strong about this one. Very strong. No, I mean, honestly, I think this was like, a, a very fun way to wrap up this episode, because this trailer. Well, here we are. I mean, it's gonna come out. Happy birthday to me. Um, and yeah, it's gonna be interesting. At the very least, um, I got a book deal out of it. So everybody preorder my Odyssey so that I can make money off of Christopher Nolan's mistakes.

• 1:22:55Speaker 03

  And I got some free publicity because it came out exactly at the moment I published mine.

• 1:22:59Liv Albert?

  Heck, yeah. We're all just gonna take advantage of this Odyssey fame.

• 1:23:05Speaker 03

  And use it to teach people about the actual Odyssey so they can better appreciate the film in the way it is intended. And then maybe go and read one of the fabulous translations of the Odyssey that are available.

• 1:23:20Liv Albert?

  Perhaps a children's book or, uh, that you are Odysseus.

• 1:23:24Speaker 03

  And indeed, a, a, a version where you can truly immerse yourself in the Odysseus and imagine all the color that yours will be physically full of and mine is on the cover.

• 1:23:36Liv Albert?

  I, I mean, I think at this point, based on that trailer, I can also say that I have gotten in more Bronze Age frescoes into my children's retelling of the Odyssey than Christopher Nolan.

• 1:23:48Speaker 03

  It's an impressive boast. Honestly, it truly is.

• 1:23:52Liv Albert?

  Yeah, yeah. It's, I mean, I also think even my, the armor, which is delightfully funny because I gave the illustrator very few guidelines on armor, other than like, they have to be wearing armor in order for them to be wearing bracers. That's about it. Um, and I still think that it's going to be far more accurate than whatever bizarre, hyper-modern steampunk armor that Christopher Nolan has gone with. And I was trying to wrap it up succinctly instead of just bitching more about Christopher Nolan, but here we are. I'm a woman with opinions. This has been so much fun.

• 1:24:32Speaker 03

  Honestly, I, I can't think of a better thing to do than a Thursday night.

• 1:24:37Liv Albert?

  Me neither. Me neither. Uh, um, well, do you want to, I mean, obviously the listeners better realize by now that you are Odysseus. The podcast audiobook version is available wherever you get your podcasts as part of the Memory Collective Podcast Network.

• 1:24:52Speaker 03

  I'm very proud to be so.

• 1:24:54Liv Albert?

  Heck, yeah. Heck, yeah. Um, but is there anything else you want to share with listeners? Where can they find your book? What do you want to boast about?

• 1:25:03Speaker 03

  Oh, wow. Okay. No. Okay. No, you can find my book. You can find it by looking up the title. You can find it on most book retailers. You can also order it directly from my website, ljenkinsonbrand.cuduki. And you can find, as I say, the podcast pretty much anywhere, which is fantastic, or again, at the same website, Things I Want to Brag About.

• 1:25:29Speaker 03

  I, uh, I once, this is actually nothing to do there, but it kind of fits right. I once made a list of every single person who was in the Iliads, including all of their epithets and how they die, and then forgot. And then about three years later, I was like, I wonder if anyone has, has made a list of all the people in the, oh, I have, oh, I have.

• 1:25:54Liv Albert?

  Oh, somebody did. It was me.

• 1:25:58Speaker 03

  And then I did exactly the same thing with my spreadsheet of the Odyssey in myths. And I was like, wait, have I included every possible, I should make a spreadsheet of this. Oh, no, no, I did that three years ago. I haven't used it for the last year. What was I thinking? So, yeah. Um, I don't know why I'm bragging about that.

• 1:26:15Liv Albert?

  No, I love this. I find it so relatable. The way I've done like the same work four times because I've like forgotten that I've done it before. Yeah. No, I love that.

• 1:26:26Speaker 03

  But, uh, no, on a serious note, you can find loads and loads of comics that explain the Odyssey as close to the narrative as possible, and also explain the use of similes and other narrative techniques at greekmythcomix.com. I make them all for my classes. They've gotten through many, many exams. And there's loads of other comics there completely for free that you can download and stick in your lessons if you're a teacher, or just use to revise from. I've even got some Odyssey guides there to the structure and the key themes that you can just get, or you can pay pocket money prices for like a really nicely printable version. But it's all there at greekmythcomix.com for you to have a look at and hopefully learn something that will help you appreciate all these amazing pieces of literature from the ancient world that we're so inspired by.

• 1:27:12Liv Albert?

  Hell yeah. You know, you have so many good resources on that site. So I'm very glad that you mentioned it. And yeah, we will just both single-handedly teach you all. Well, not you all. You all listened to me. So you probably know, but the rest of the world, we will just, you and I will single-handedly teach them what the Odyssey really is. This is me trying to, I, I'd love to be a more positive person, but here we are. Um, no, this was so much fucking fun. Thank you so much. Uh, I'm so glad we both have our odysseys and I'm very glad that at the very least Christopher Nolan is going to get us a lot of eyes on our odysseys and that's delightful.

• 1:28:39Speaker 04

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• 1:28:57Speaker 05

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• 1:29:10Speaker 04

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