The Purpose of Life as Cosmopoesis

In all literature, philosophy, theology, politics, and religion the goal of a life is to bring order to chaos. Whether this be done through a philosophical system, applying strict reasoning axiomatically from the highest principles to the lowest elements, or through giving the rule of habit and law to those who will be governed by one’s order, this motif moves throughout all history, time, and geography as a fundamental, though cryptic, truth. The best place to start, when speaking of cosmopoesis, or world-creation, as an opus magnum, therefore, will be in the richest and most robust worlds created by man, epic literature.

The reason that epic literature has here been chosen to serve as the vehicle of one’s highest design is simply the pride of place this genre receives in the minds of those who read and study it. E.M.W. Tillyard weighs the epic as the master-achievement of a poet laying his claim to greatness on one seminal work, and Louise Cowan simply calls it, “so monumental and grand a mode of poetic expression…” The epic, in short, is the opus magnum of a poet, or their master-work. But what exactly makes an epic the product of a life-time? Is it its form or narrative structure, as commonly argued by scholars like Tillyard above? No, not at all. The reason epic literature, like Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, or Dante’s Commedia, captures our imaginations and endures through hundreds, or thousands of years, is precisely because an epic is not simply a piece of literature at all, but the creation of a kosmos, the creation or making (poiein), of a world.

Now, a detractor will immediately remind us that only the Divine has created a world, and this world, of course, is eternal and everlasting. This, however, even if one reads one’s Old Testament, is not quite correct. Looking to Proverbs 8.27, one observes that the Divine does not create the water and the earth, but rather sets limits to it. And really, this helps one’s reasoning if the existence of imperfection and sin are an issue to one’s thinking–the form applied to the world was perfect, but the temporal and material nature of the earth and beings on it tends towards decadence–therefore imperfection. This goes a bit afield, however. The point is that the purpose of an epic poem is to create a world which both represents and improves on the world at large by applying the principles of the “outside” world, or the “Divine/Natural Laws” to a plot, characters, and world within a story, or by means of logos. This, if one follows, John, is precisely the same act of creation which the Divine in Christianity enacted–regardless of theological/mythological tradition: the initial Divine act is also an ordering from chaos in Greek mythology, following Hesiod, the Hindu faith, and all the Abrahamic religions. The major motion forward, and key to one’s life on earth, however, is the aspect of giving logos or the form and structure necessary to a world.

How, though, is the giving of form or logos/morphe to a piece of literature in any way the same as the Divine setting limits to the earth and giving nomos, law, morphe, form, and logos, meaning, to a world? Well, it is precisely the same, but on a microcosmic scale. The function of an epic is to apply the law of the Divine to a world which exists and thrives according to the same law as the world outside. An epic begins with conflict, and then strives towards order, and in so doing, it orders the soul of one who reads it to such an extent, if it is understood at its deepest levels, that one then becomes capable of ordering one’s own kosmos, or work of art, literature, politics, et cetera according to one’s own ability to comprehend the divine law. The epic, as the highest human achievement, then enjoys this status, because the epic is the creation closest in nature to the divine act of creation/ordering. Just as the creation of the world was not the generation/production of it, so is the creation of an epic not simply a production but a performative act. Just as the logos did not create the world and disappear, so does it not disappear in one’s epic either. In fact, so long as the epic exists, the logos infused within it maintains its performative and transformative power, and in this way, an author’s personal immortality becomes linked with the transformative and enduring effect of the epic-work–the Homeric Chain, and one’s linking to it, as it were.

One’s purpose in life then, one’s deepest meaning, would lie in two major events: baptism by water: or the pursuit of and acquisition of the wisdom necessary to acquire the insight into the fundamental purpose of one’s existence–that is, realization of the task of one’s life, and then baptism by the word, when one sets out and accomplishes this task, if one does; just as Dante in his Vita Nuova, realized that his master-work would be a poem, rivaling and surpassing his own master’s, Virgil. And then he achieved this in his Commedia. But of course, he owes a debt of gratitude to Virgil, as it was the sublime wisdom of Virgil (and several other philosophers, warriors, poets, and thinkers) which unlocked this potential in Dante himself. Just as Kant says in his Critique of Pure Judgment that increased exposure to works of Greek and Latin refine and sharpen one’s mind, so does then exposure to epics, naturally, begin to order one’s being to such a degree that if one were, say, a person of five talents, willing to double his or her talents, that perhaps with some divine help, one might add to one’s self just one more, and in the eleventh talent, one might leave a perpetual act, a work, which continues to influence those who live after one dies, in such a way as to order their beings in a universal and particular way, so that they, with tremendous work and luck, might continue the chain down the line through history, and that, rather than simply the generation of further humans, and production of value or conveniences, is the true purpose of human existence.

This is but the first general introduction to this subject. Stick around as this author makes a run at his own opus magnum, for better or for worse.

In Part II, we will look at connections between Westworld, Homer’s Iliad, and Dante’s Commedia for further evidence of this universal truth.

Conversations with Students X: The Sacking of Troy and Beginning of an Odyssey

In transitioning from Homer’s Iliad, his story of war, high emotion, and the toll that such emotion takes on mortal lives, to the far-blown fame and person of Odysseus in Homer’s Odyssey, we first took a moment to look at the summaries that still remain of “The Epic Cycle”, and then we moved forward through the first book of Homer’s Odyssey (Lattimore’s translation). Thus begins our second seminar series.

We discussed all that happened between the Iliad and Odyssey, with the sage help of Proclus who preserved summaries of the six lost epics of the Epic Cycle (found here or here) These lost epics: The Cypria by Stasinus of Cyprus (staged as immediately preceding Homer’s Iliad), The Aethiopis of Artinus of Miletus immediately afterward, The Little Iliad of Lesches of Mitylene, The Sacking of Troy also by Arctinus of Miletus, The Returns of Agias of Trozen, and eventually, after Homer’s Odyssey, The Telegony comprise the story called “The Epic Cycle”. Together they form the events which lead up to the Trojan War, the Trojan War, and the after-math of the war for the Achaians. Traditionally, they would have filled in many, many gaps left by the Iliad and Odyssey as a pair, but sadly, over time, and lack of reproduction, each of the other six epics was lost to time. This was not, however, the deepest tragedy, says Aristotle in his praise of Homer’s unity of plot and criticism of The Cypria and The Little Iliad in his Poetics (1459a-b)

“So in this respect, too, compared with all other poets Homer may seem, as we have already said, divinely inspired, in that even with the Trojan war, which has a beginning and an end, he did not endeavor to dramatize it as a whole, since it would have been either too long to be taken in all at once or, if he had moderated the length, he would have complicated it by the variety of incident. As it is, he takes one part of the story only and uses many incidents from other parts, such as the Catalogue of Ships and other incidents with which he diversifies his poetry. The others, on the contrary, all write about a single hero or about a single period or about a single action with a great many parts, the authors, [1459b] [1] for example, of the Cypria and the Little Iliad. The result is that out of an Iliad or an Odyssey only one tragedy can be made, or two at most, whereas several have been made out of the Cypria, and out of the Little Iliad more than eight, e.g. The Award of Arms, Philoctetes, Neoptolemus, Eurypylus, The Begging, The Laconian Women, The Sack of Troy, and Sailing of the Fleet, and Sinon, too, and The Trojan Women.”

For though we have lost the other six epics, apparently they were not of the same caliber as are the two epics we have remaining to us. So, confident that two masterpieces will do and summaries filling in our knowledge where it is lacking will suffice, let us move forward to consider the fates of several heroes we knew well during the interim between Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.

The students were shocked by the men who died during and after the war, and some felt emotion even for the basest Achaians. Achilleus, Paris, both the Aiantes, Antilochos, Priam, Astyanax, Deiphobos (many Trojans during the sacking, of course), Phoinix, Thersites, and even Agamemnon, but the deaths which are most shocking are each of the Aiantes, Agamemnon, and some students even showed sadness for poor hunched-backed Thersites. So we know, Achilleus died either by the hand of Paris and Apollo or Apollo alone. Not a surprise to the students given the several prophecies of Achilleus’ death the Iliad. That Paris should get the winning shot was a true moment of humility for all students, though the fact that Apollo helped him along helped to alleviate the sort of “Evil David vs. Good Goliath” effect.

Aias the Greater’s death was more of a disappointment to the students. During the Iliad, he was a brave and supreme hero. He went on the Embassy to Achilleus, was clear in his purpose, and twice almost killed Hektor. He, unlike Achilleus, Menelaos, Eurypylos, Machaon, Agamemnon, and Odysseus, was one of the few major champions who remained uninjured throughout the fighting. He was glorious and bold, and the fact that through his pride and folly that he took his own life in suicide was a bitter disappointment to the students. Naturally, they learned that it was because according to his code, he was disgraced, and by his code he died: he lost the speech-contest to Odysseus for the “arms of Achilleus” and proceeded to attempt to kill Odysseus, Menelaos, and Agamemnon, but he was thwarted by Athene “mazing” his vision so that he only killed cattle. Feeling disgraced and abandoned by the gods, Aias felt that his final dignity would be to deny his former friends the glory of ending his life, and thus was the fate of Aias the Greater.*

Aias the Lesser met with considerably less pity. In an attempt at raping the cursed prophetess daughter of Kassandra in the temple of Athene, Lokrian Aias defamed and damaged an image of Athene therefore earning her ire for himself and the rest of the Achaians. The students did not care for how quickly Athene turned on the Achaians, but in matters of sacrifice and honor to the gods, the students have learned that the gods come first to the gods. Aias, then, when accosted by a great storm sent by Athene is nearly drowned with his ship and men, but after Poseidon saved him, Aias lost his mind, and recklessly declared his supremacy to the gods. Poseidon then used his trident to break the rock onto which Aias was clinging and send him to a watery doom. The students almost universally said, “that was so stupid.”

Agamemnon will later receive an article essentially all his own, but for now it is enough to mention that the students remembered his betraying of Klytaimnestra by deceiving her into sending Iphigeneia to be sacrificed at Aulis under the pretence of marriage to Achilleus. Many students said that this was justice, but further conversation will be reserved until later.

Moving from the time between and the many, many questions which we will return to (like do the students feel OK with the fact that Troy was taken by cunning, not strength), we then considered the importance and difference between the proems (first few lines) of each of the poems and how their themes, tones, and manners of presentation may be different.

Homer’s Iliad (1.1-1.7)

SING, goddess, the anger of Peleus’ son Achilleus
and its devastation, which put pains thousandfold upon the Achaians,
hurled in their multitudes to the house of Hades strong souls
of heroes, but gave their bodies to be the delicate feasting
of dogs, of all birds, and the will of Zeus was accomplished
since that time when first there stood in division of conflict
Atreus’ son the lord of men and brilliant Achilleus.

Homer’s Odyssey (1.1-1.10)

Tell me, Muse, of the man of many ways, who was driven
far journeys, after he had sacked Troy’s sacred citadel.
Many were they whose cities he saw, whose minds he learned of,
many the pains he suffered in his spirit on the wide sea,
struggling for his own life and the homecoming of his companions.
Even so he could not save his companions, hard though
he strove to; they were destroyed by their own wild recklessness,
fools, who devoured the oxen of Helios, the Sun God,
and he took away the day of their homecoming. From some point
here, goddess, daughter of Zeus, speak, and begin our story.

We immediately notice some distinct differences between the two proems. The Iliad sings of the emotion of a semi-divine man and his feud with a “leader of men” and the many men on their side of battle who will die because of this. The Iliad is also sung (aeide). The Odyssey is the telling (ennepe) of the many struggles of a suffering man who fails to save his companions due to their own recklessness. The distinction between the Iliad being sung and the Odyssey told (though of course both would be sung in dactylic hexameter by rhapsodes) is one the students made a strong attempt at. Emotion, they say, is a higher theme, or at the least, song is more appropriate to conveying of emotion–it is more emotional the students say, and “gut-wrenching” does seem a word more aptly ascribed to painful dirges. (Viz. (or rather Aud.) Adele’s Hello).

Another important difference is that the focus of the book will shift from the interplay between the will of the gods and man to how man inevitably adds to his own suffering and destruction. In fact, this theme of wild “recklessness” (atasthalia) is repeated in the words of no smaller a figure than Zeus, king of the gods, not twenty lines later:

“Oh, for shame, how the mortals put the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, but it is they, rather, who by their own recklessness (atasthalia) win sorrow beyond what is given…” (1.32-35)

So, though the students gave a detailed list of times when the gods seemed to add to the suffering of mortals, the most provocative of which is likely during Book III of the Iliad when Hera and Zeus agree to let Ilion be destroyed and Athene convinces Pandaros to break the truce between the Trojans and the Achaians, we will remain sensitive to the statement that mortals create their own suffering and that their own lack of resiliency, perseverance, discernment, or fidelity lead to their destruction during the Odyssey.

In conclusion, as an extra treat, I will include here major themes we will consider, and which will be present all through Homer’s Odyssey and our seminars on it:

(1) Father and son relationships and their complexity;

(2) Concealed (kalupto) or veiled truths and the art of misdirection;

(3) Perseverance and the “hero’s” journey;

(4) Homecoming (nostos) and what makes a home (so important);

(5) The Xenia or guest/host relationship and its importance;

(6) Detainment, both mental and physical, and its hateful nature.

And bonus number two is a list of Relevant Quotes to the first Seminar which may well earn their own post soon:

1.347-349 Telemachos blames Zeus for all mortals’ troubles.

“They [the suitors] all would find death was quick, and marriage a painful matter.” (1.266)

“You should not go on clinging to childhood. You are no longer an age to do that.” (1.296-297)

“The gods have not made yours a birth that will go nameless…” (1.222)

“Nobody really knows his own father.” (my bold; 1.216)

“Your words to me are kind…what any father would say to his son.” (1.307-308)

“Do not detain me any longer, eager as I am for my journey.” (1.315)

“The daughter of Ikarios, circumspect Penelope, heard and heeded the magical song from her upper chamber, and descended the high staircase that was built in her palace, not all alone, since two handmaidens went to attend her. When she, shining among women, came near the suitors, she stood by the pillar that supported the roof with its joinery, holding her shining veil in front of her face, to shield it, and a devoted attendant was stationed on either side of her.” (1.328-335)

“But if she continues to torment the sons of the Achaians, since she is so dowered with the wisdom bestowed by Athene, to be expert in beautiful work, to have good character and cleverness, such as we are not told of, even of the ancient queens, the fair-tressed Achaian women of times before us, Tyro and Alkmene and Mykene, wearer of garlands; for none of these knew thoughts so wise as Penelope knew;” (2.115-122)

*Greater detail will be given to Telamonian Aias during our seminar on The Ajax of Sophocles.