Subject to Change

Armand D'Angour (Professor of Classics at Oxford University and Fellow of Jesus College) gives his take on Chrisopher Nolan's Odyssey and (more to the point) talks about the poem and the poet. Along the way we talk about Emily Wilson's blistering review (which is where the title of this episode comes from). And Armand gives some readings from the poem including this gem of a translation by Alexander Pope (lightly reworked by Armand):

Abandoned in neglect poor Argos lay,  
unhoused, uncared for, on the public way; 
and where the heaps of rank manure were spread  
a-swarm with fleas, he made his filthy bed.   
As they conversing to the city drew,
the faithful dog his ancient master knew:  
and recognising well his voice and tread,  
pricked up his ears and raised his heavy head.  
Seeing Odysseus, him he strove to meet,
and tried in vain to crawl and lick his feet;  
but strength alone he had to wag his tail 
to greet his master, though to no avail. 
Deep pity touched Odysseus to his soul, 
and down his cheek a tear unbidden stole;  
but unperceived he turned his head, and dried  
the falling drop, while silently he cried.  
"What sorry beast in this abandoned state,” 
he asks, “lies helpless at Odysseus’ gate?  
His bulk and beauty speak no vulgar praise.  
I warrant such a hound saw better days.”
To him the older man his head inclined 
and said: “He served one of a noble kind – 
now long since perished on a distant shore – 
who will, alas, behold him nevermore.
You should have seen dear Argos bold and young,  
swift as a stag, and as a lion strong!  
Now time has sapped him, with his master lost 
and many years on stormy oceans tossed."
So said Eumaeus, and strode on ahead;  
and faithful Argos dropped his tired head. 
Though twenty long and dismal years had passed,  
he’d lived to see his lord again at last. 
Now night descends upon his weary eyes: 
he wags his feeble tail for joy, and dies.

At the start of WW2 the U-Boat threat gave the British sleepless nights. But even during the Happy Time (of which there were two) when ships were being sunk at a terrific rate the German effort was too little, too late. And then the war in the Atlantic turned against them and their casualties soared and successes became rarer.

Roger Moorhouse has written a terrific book discussing all this (and much more), 'Wolfpack: Inside Hitler's U-Boat War' where he looks the campaign from the German point of view, using diaries, letters and other records from the time.

We got through a lot in this  episode. Amongst the horrible waste of it all there were some grimly amusing moments, not least the sinking of a U-Boat thanks to a malfunctioning toilet. 

Very interesting to me was how the U-Boat men generally tried to fight an 'honourable' war. That was very different to what I had understood to be the case and certainly very different to how the war was conducted on other fronts.

And above all the stink. The terrible, terrible U-Boat stink.

This one is about Gabriele D'Annunzio. Italian poet, born in 1863 . . . I can already sense your attention drifting. But hang in there! 
A more lurid description would be that he is the poet who seduced over a thousand women. It is still puzzling exactly what women saw in him. As one bewildered woman said:
"I have just met D'Annunzio. Can this be the man the great Duse loved? He is small, he is bald, and his teeth are in three different colours."
(The great Duse here being Eleonora Duse, the most famous actress of the age.)
When war broke out in 1914 Italy very sensibly stayed out of it. But D'Annunzio loved the thought of Italy at war and the blood sacrifice it would involve. So he wrote article after article and eventually returned to Italy, where he gave speech after speech demanding war and encouraging cheering crowds to lynch the peace-lovers in government. He got his way and Italy joined the war in 1915.
The war, of course, was a catastrophe.
 In fairness to D'Annunzio, he didn't just preach war, he participated. Despite being in his fifties he forced his way in (much to the concern of the government, who thought him more useful as a propagandist than as a corpse). As part of this he flew numerous bombing missions. And ever the poet, when they finally developed a plane strong enough to get him to Vienna he took the opportunity to drop pamphlets he had composed urging them to throw off the Austro-Hungarian imperial yoke and ending:
"Today I drop words; next time I will drop bombs."
One reason for his love of the war was his belief that Italy was incomplete. Unification had left outside it cities on the Dalmatian coast that many thought were basically Italian (their many non-Italian residents disagreed, of course). So when the Allies treated their Italy with contempt at the peace talks, D'Annunzio decided to act. With a few followers, swelled to thousands by deserting Italian troops, he marched into Fiume, which he ruled as a sort of dictator. The occupation was both comedic and tragic. But the really important thing was the style of the dictatorship. Almost every night D'Annunzio would appear on the balcony giving speeches in a style we'd now instantly recognise as fascist. Meanwhile the real fascists, Mussolini in particular, were watching and thinking ‘This is great, I could use this!’.
My guest was Lucy Hughes-Hallett, and her biography of D'Annunzio, The Pike, won the Samuel Johnson Prize. And this episode is terrific!

Professor Donald Rayfield picks up Crimea’s story in spring 1942, when Germany turns south for the Black Sea and oil. Some Tartars can't imagine anyone worse than Stalin. Some can't imagine anyone worse than Hitler. Tragically, they are both right though in different ways.

Donald explains the realities of the German occupation, from the early “orderly” phase to the arrival of SS units whose mission is extermination of the Jews. Astonishingly some Jews are spared as the ever 'scientific' Nazis rule they are not Jews at all. 

Then comes one of the great crimes of world history. Stalin decides to deport the entire Crimean Tatar nation to Central Asia. Donald tells the story of the cattle trains, the scale of death and the uncertain welcome for survivors in Uzbekistan. Crimea itself is stripped of Tatar presence through renamed towns and seized homes. 

We bring things up to date with the 1990s return and the brief cultural revival under Ukraine . But the post-2014 Russian annexation brings renewed repression. As Donald says 'History can always get worse'. 
It is a fascinating episode.

Donald Rayfield returns for the second of three episodes on Crimea — this time taking the long view, from the Mongol Golden Horde to Catherine the Great's annexation and the early Soviet period.
At its height the Crimean Khanate was a sophisticated and surprisingly humane state. It was also, as Rayfield puts it, the self-appointed freeholder of the former Mongol empire — and it collected its rents in the form of money, livestock, and human captives. Eventually, the leaseholders rebelled.
A story of revival after disaster, and disaster after revival, ending in the grim absorption of the peninsula into the Russian imperial project.

Along the way we admire the fighting skills of the Tatars and learn about a mysterious shop in Venice which would sell you poisoned almonds!