Andrew Lang

Homer and His Age Andrew Lang

In Homer and the Epic, ten or twelve years ago, I examined the literary objections to Homeric unity. These objections are chiefly based on alleged discrepancies in the narrative, of which no one poet, itis supposed, could have been guilty. The critics repose, I venture to think, mainly on a fallacy. Wemay style it the fallacy of "the analytical reader." The poet is expected to satisfy a minutely criticalreader, a personage whom he could not foresee, and whom he did not address. Nor are"contradictory instances" examined-that is, as Blass has recently reminded his countrymen, Homeris put to a test which Goethe could not endure. No long fictitious narrative can satisfy "the analyticalreader."The fallacy is that of disregarding the Homeric poet's audience. He did not sing for Aristotle orfor Aristarchus, or for modern minute and reflective inquirers, but for warriors and ladies. Hecertainly satisfied them; but if he does not satisfy microscopic professors, he is described as asyndicate of many minstrels, living in many ages. In the present volume little is said in defence of the poet's consistency. Several chapters on thatpoint have been excised. The way of living which Homer describes is examined, and an effort ismade to prove that he depicts the life of a single brief age of culture. The investigation is compelledto a tedious minuteness, because the points of attack-the alleged discrepancies in descriptions ofthe various details of existence-are so minute as to be all but invisible.