The ancient texts have become eerily modern in what they have to say about power relationships between men and women, gay men and war, superiors and subordinates. They have made Sappho our contemporary. They are rewriting the history of the novel. They raise again the issues of empire, democracy, alliances. When John and Robert Kennedy read Pericles' funeral oration, they took it as a commission to the best and brightest.
Modern scholars tend to see in it the ominous arrogance of empire.
The classics only become classics when they are relevant again. They are like the ghosts Odysseus met in the underworld. They cannot speak until Odysseus performs the sacrifice that gives them fresh blood to drink. Multiculturalism has supplied blood for the ghosts, and the ghosts are speaking again. All rights reserved.