NOTES FROM APRIL 2, 2007

Ashley wins for having picked the best five lines out of the class...On page 73 from Europa and Jove:
Europa now is terrified; she clasps
one horn with her right hand; meanwhile the left
rests on the bull's great croup. She turns to glance
back at the shore, so distant now. Her robes
are fluttering-they swell in the sea breeze.

Only 5 people in the class have gone through adolescence.
Only 7 people in the class have ever had to leave their home.
Only 5 people in the class have ever known a person with power.

In the end---To invite the Gods is to destroy the relationship you have with them, but it will set history in motion. However, a life where the Gods are not invited is not worthy of living, possibly more quiet, but there will be no stories...and what is a life with no methos?? Not one worth living!

Oscar Wild- was said to be the decadent of decadence (which is not something dipped in chocolate, but really means immoral)

There are no immoral or moral books, but rather well written or poorly writ en books.

NOTES FROM MARCH 28, 2007

Redemptive Power of Art

--Protect the baby from sickness, death, and old age...who was the baby?? BUDDHA!

--Two other books with as much power as Ovid's:

1.) The complete works of Shakespeare

2.) Finnegan's Wake, by James Joyce

H.W.- Find five lines from Ovid's that I would take to the desert with me.

---Imagination bodies for things unknown and gives an airy nothingness to things unknown.

Dr. Sexson says go to Kirk Hill and look for these three birds: The nightingale who is actually Philomela.....The Swallow who is Procne, and The Hoopoe Bird who is Tereus.

In these days, we would play a game called" whats the worst thing that could possibly happen?" You wanna play??? No Thank you!

NOTES FROM MARCH 26, 2007

We beagn the class with having every person write up on the white board their pick of one of the stories from Ovid. Then Dr. Sexson gave us his favorites, however, he picked more then one...

The Rape of Io....pg 25
Syrinx....pg 31
Europa....pg. 71
Erache....pg 77
Pigmalian
Tereus, Procne, Philomela....pg 193
Daedalus....pg 255
Pythagoras....pg 515

Homework: Look up the paintings "The Rape of Europe" by Titian, and "Spinnets" by Valezquez.

Collisto: gets turned into a bear, her son is going to kill the bear that is his mom, but the gods take pitty and turn him into a bear too, and were turned into the stars.

Dr. Sexson read Ovid in ten minutes!!
At the end of the class Dr. Sexson made up his mind, hi favorite pick is The Sibyl...on page 277!

NOTES FROM MARCH 23, 2007

Live Fast....Love Hard....Die Young!

The Gardens of Adonis....More info on Elizabeth's Blog.

How do trees reproduce? They give birth of course! And as always the baby's father is the mothers father?? Yep, that's what I said. The baby is born, and its a little boy!! Named Adonis.

What is the most erotic activity a man and woman can engage in?? CHECKERS!! No...that's just silly. Its sex of course...wrong again...it is obviously telling stories :) After a long period of missing one another, Adonis and lover tell stories. Hers was of a crazy animal in the forest, which Adonis did not believe. Being the manly man, he went to hunt and was gored in the groan by slant tusks to death by a wild bore. She looked at her bleeding lover and says "ill change his blood into a flower" She sprinkled scented nectar on his blood. One hour later a blood red flower the color of a pomegranate emerges. The anemone, and winds shake its fragile petals and they fall.

Tiresias: the Obi-Wan Kenobi of his day.

Bread and wine....the body and the soul....the bread is from wheat which is from Demeter. And the wine is from Dionysis.

ANAGNORISIS---Recognition of their situation and their personal arrogance.

NOTES FROM MARCH 21, 2007

On the topic of Christians for the begging of the class we discovered that there are 2 out of 40 people in that class that are Christians, but I'm sure this is not true....

And also, we are certain that Elvis is not dead, he lives....he is very obese, but is not dead.

Ovivd's Metamorphoses:

The story of Pentheus, meaning greif. (also meaning mourning or sorrow)

---Not somthing to name your kid, they grow up to be a mad of constant sorrow.

----------HIS MOM EXPLODED!!---------

Thebes City Story: planted serpent teeth and out of the ground, from which there sprang a race of fierce armed men, called Spartes. By throwing a stone among them, Cadmus caused them to fall upon one another until only five survived, who assisted him to build the Cadmeia or citadel of Thebes, and became the founders of the noblest families of that city.

Cadmus had four daughters, and all were bad: Ino, Autonoe, Agave, and Semele

Autonoe was the mother of Acteon, who was looking at a naked woman with unpure thoughts and was torn apart...SPARAGMOS....by his own dogs. Semele wanted to see God as God in his natural form.

Lessonof the day from Dr. Sexson: When someone asks you to do them a favor, ask WHAT IS IT FIRST, never agree to do anything before you know what your agreeing to. Also: Rent the movie "Iris".

The Metamorphoses of Ovid is all about doing it again, much like ground hogs day, we must go through our day over and over again until we get it right.

Homework Assignments::

1.) For extra credit dress up as a Maenad, with a dress, wig, head band, and dance!

2.) Start a cult in Bozeman dedicated to Dionysis, must have lots of wine, snakes, cattle, costumes, and enough strength to lift trees.

3.) Pick a favorite story from Ovid's and blog why its the favorite, and add art of the story.

NOTES FROM MARCH 19, 2007

We read page 32 and 72,the very last page of the play Lysistrata, also read Sarah's essay on Athenian women in that back of the play. FOR THE TEST

---To the counselor, the women dress him up as a woman, he is the scape goat. By dressing him up as a woman they expel him from the group to no longer lead the men.
---He was then dressed up as a corpse, to show the death of manhood.
Aristophanes makes fun of the phallace, but while accepting its life force because without it none of us would ever exist.

Sereta is going to take one for the class. She will be expunged and the rest of the class will all
get A's.

The last page, all couples reunite and dance, paired, twp by two.
--Leda and the Swan, lays two eggs. Out of one pops the two boys, Castor and Polydeuces....and out of the other pops two girls, Helen and Clytemnestra, without Helen the Trojan war would have never happened.

Bacchae-
Hits the jailer on the head with his guitar and then runs, but plays the guitar as he is running. All the women are curious and swooning over him.
---Apollo, can not be Elvis because Apollo had no game, and got no women.
---Dianisis, not interested in smartness but all about "what comes natural" and would drive women out of their minds, literally.

NOTES FROM MARCH 7, 2007

"Who in this class knows a bad word?" 1 out of 3 right?? WRONG, The answer was 9 out of 40.
-Read Sarah, translator of Lysistrata, the essay on Greek women.
-Two things are said about comedy:
Comedy deals with people who are worse then they are, and tragedy deals with people who are better then they are.
Comedy deals with phallic profession.
Three kinds of comedy:
old comedy
new comedy
Shakespearean comedy

NOTES FROM MARCH 5, 2007

Verdigo: dizziness from infinite depths

Poesis: greek word for making something up

Logos: greek word for truth

Mythos: greek word for story

---put mythos ontop of Logos = mythologos = mythologies

Symbol-comes from symboline

SYMPOSIUM

-It's more important to be loved then to be the lover

-Levels of the Wizard of Oz

---nieve belief

---skepticism, disbelief, withdrawl, stage of terror

Imortality=the soul

Virtue= good

"The greatest lovers of all are philosopers"

LYSISTRATA

-Lewd and Crude

-Classical Smut

-Shameless

---Tragedy: the second is to die, the first is to have been born at all; its not even worth it. life is something that should not have been.

---New Tragedy is to not have lived......COMEDY..."MORE LIFE!!"

(RENT "7 Beauties" from Hastings)

The differences between old comedy and new comedy:

Old contains politics

New is bot wants girl...bot can't get girl....boy gets girl.

NOTES FROM MARCH 2, 2007

---Go to Elizabeth's Blog, it is very funny!!---

Dr. Sexson began the discussion of the Symposium by reading his prefered translation of the passage on page 27, about tally marks. Zeus took a coin and would part it in half and give it to his love. In these times, when your love would go to travel, it was likely that one would never nee them again, and if they ever did, there would have been great time that passed and therefore would look different. The idea was to each carry half of the coin, and when you found eachother again, you woud pul it out and know that you had found your real other half, the other tally!

"We are all only broken tallys" ---Sexson

Silenus Statue: if you were to break it open, you would find stuff inside!!! It is an extremly ugly statue; sator, fowl lips, lustfull glint in the eye. Great treasures found inside.

"the turn of the screw,"--changed to innosence.

Hermes and Aphrodite: got together and made a child, and named it Hermaphrodite(both organ genders)

NOTES FROM FEBRUARY 28, 2007

Frame: a story within a story
Isocratic Irony: Descrepency between what is said and what is meant.
SYMPOSIUM:
-Speeches of Love, eros love
-Philia: Love, home of brotherly love is philidelphia.
-Sophia: Wisdom
-What do you get when you put phill on top of sophie=philosphy, or love of wisdon!
-Rhetoric is erotic

1st speaker: Phaedrus
2nd speaker: Pausanias (the lawyer)
the first thing to do is kill the lawyers!!
3rd speaker: Eryximachus
he wasn't supposed to be next, but Aristophanes got the hick-ups
4th speach: Aristophanes (english major, comic playwright)
5th speach: Agathon (tragic playwright)

Homoerotic- towards the males
but even worse....young boys and older men=pedafile
-the lover and the beloved= Erastes and the Eromenos
-why do they celebrate homosexuality??
-becasue women are inadequate
-men are more intellectually equal and more stimulating
-women get in the way, cause distractions and have children.
Asthetic- pleasing to the eye, beauty!

On the physical level--Socrates is the lover, and Alcibiades is the beloved.
On the spiritual level--Alcibiades is the lover, and Socrates is the beloved.

-Alcibiades turns into the lover becasue he explains love as discovering knowledge.
-Knowing carries an erotic charge: for example- "adam KNOWS his wife"

And as for the story we heard in class...all I can say is that I havent stopped thinking about that un-opened package since I heard the story...it's driving me absolutly CRAZY!!!

Notes for February 14th, 2007

Eros/ Cupid
Aphrodite/ Venus
Cupid/ Psychy.
=LUV
Aphrodite Urania: Born from urinos, godess of pure spiritual love(non sexual/physical)
Aphrodite Pandemos: Godess of the people. Godess of "Physical Love"

November 7th: Platos Symposeum. Actuall Valentines Day.
Soulmate: the person who makes the other part of your soul complete.

Hetaera-?? Look up

Erotic Possesion- To be possesed by Aphrodite.
Read page 243 for the test.

Notes for Monday the 12th

Who recognizeses these people?

Manon-2

Violetta-1

Odette-4

Anna Nicol Smith- 34.......But why do we know more about this person then the rest??

Courtesan: Class definition- High class prostitute

Sexsons def.- Someone who disappears from our cultural memory. A kept woman. and a staple in Roman Comedy.

Scread? Find the meaning.

"You don't throw the dart, the Gods guide your hand"

Notes for Friday, February 9th

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimmed.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

Our assignment: To do something to someone else that they will remember twenty years from now.....it can not, however, put us in the police records!

-Squeaks the hamster was scared to death by "Uncle," from there he proceded to roll his own ball in fright down the stairs and died.

Antigone Charcteristics: familia affection, puts familt above law, and gets off to the idea of death.

Ismene Characteristics: puts law and rules before her familia obligations, doesnt want to have to fight city hall...or Creon. Very timid, has no gumption.

-Aescyliuse wrote a play called Lorestela
-Hubris- ego, falling back on himself, pride
-En-Theos: the god is inside you (appalo), from enthusiastic.
-Steiner says: his hypothesis is the principal greek myths are printed in the evolution of our language, and grammers in particular!

Notes From Wednesday, February 7th

Oue Extensive Homeowork Assignments:
-Read and comment on someone's blog.
-Find one page by choice or random and read it closely...then blog it.
-Read the introduction material for Antigones for the test!!
-Look at Carly's Page for a great summary and translation for Antigones.
-Pick on eof the five (men and women, age and youth, individual and society, living and dead,
men and gods) to read about in Antigones and blog it.

MYTHOS- A greek word meaning strory...a.k.a-myth
TRAGEDY- its all in the family.

NOTES FROM FEBRUARY 2, 2007

--How to immortilize any day: Find tge extraordinary in the everyday ordinary.

--We are all heros- it's simply heroic to wake up and face the days obsticles.

--June 16, 1904 is Bloomsday in Dublin.

--Today was groundhogs day, as well as the aztec new year, for the catholics it is the purification of the virgin, Dr. Sexson's 43rd wedding anniversery, and my birthday! Which for those of of you weren't in class today, on the tesy will most likely be that I was born on Feb. 2nd, 1987 in Grandjunction Colorado at 7 am.

--Holiday= holy day

--From the Homeric Humns: DEMETER

--Barley water and pennyroyal are the food and drink of the gods.

--To change life something must be said, shown, and done. But we will never know, or shouldn't want to know what they were becasue then is wouldn't be a secret.

--The greek word...DROMENON- something that is done. Sounds like drama, which is all that greek houses are about, all about drama!