Hi Jon,

Thanks for your responses, interesting that they all have to do with subversion. Some comments:

-- most of her poetry seems to inhabit an
>almost sealed-off feminine world, and even the one poem in which she
>explicitly contrasts the male and female spheres to the detriment of the
>former (the one beginning "Some say a host of horsemen and others of
>infantry...") assumes their separation.  When I try to think about whether
>her position can then be in any way subversive, I start to get confused.

Yes, I think there is a subversive quality in this dismissal of "a host of horseman" and "others of infantry," a quality of preferring the world of feeling even if it is "almost sealed-off (and) feminine" over the more public realm of war and political power. Similarly, in one of her few nearly complete poems, "he is more than a hero, he is a god, that man," I think there's a subversive element. At least I cannot hear it without hearing it ironically.  The poem so elevates him in order to entirely dismiss him, his only significance as god and hero is that he "sits beside you," so that he becomes a mere tribute to the you, a mere hinge into the feeling of the speaker. So, yes, though it is little evidence, I think there is a subversive element, an awareness and undercutting of what holds one bound in that "sealed-in world" as you describe.

>But I must take exception to Rebecca's saying that Sappho was  "apparently
>connected to a cult of Aphrodite, mentored young women, prior to their
>marriage..."  This is the old myth of Sappho as the headmistress of a sort
>of girls' school under cover of a cult of Aphrodite.  It was invented by
>disapproving classical scholars as a means of explaining away the erotic
>coloring of Sappho's relationships with the women who appear in her poetry,
>and is pretty thoroughly discredited today, though you'll still sometimes
>see it in print.


Oh, ye gods! I don't think I said "headmistress" did I? or girls' school?! I must have corsed, crossed, my wires, sorry, I think I was linguistically on my way to corsetted.

Seriously,

I was referring to Women in the Classical World, Oxford University Press, 1994 where they're talking about "Archaic rites of women's initiation into adulthood," the sources for which are the Panrtheneia of Alcman and the poems of Sappho and which the authors describe "In these two Archaic societies at least, the poets show a close association between young women on the verge of marriage and more mature women who served as mentors and, it appears, often as lovers to the initiates. In this sense, the initiatory stage for women resembled to some extent that of young men of the period, although the goatsl were different; while young men were prepared for war, leadership, and diplomacy, young women were prepared through dancing, singing, and other religious events for marriage and motherhood."

And all I can say is, it was a whole other world, then. Who would think today of dancing and singing as preparation for marriage and motherhood, the rueful housewife in me wonders.

Though they also do mention Aphrodite, in all fairness, the authors do note, "Why women joined or departed from Sappho's circle remains unknown...The most likely explanation is that the girls were departing for marriage."

>Alison Croggon points out that some people argue for Shakespeare as a
>political subversive.  No doubt they do, but surely the plays all overtly
>support the status quo -- if they hadn't he would have ended up in the
>Tower.
>
Well, I think Alison has already replied to this more particularly? But I don't understand the assumption here. One of the characteristics of great writing is, to my thinking, that it inhabits such a profoundly, merely human level, that it is inevitably subversive. No one can read Lear for instance and not question the father-blasted world. Political complaint is a lesser lament than human woe. Sappho is subversive because of the intensity of her feeling, because that intensity cannot be matched or bound by any particular social or political confinement. So perhaps it depends on how one defines the political.

Best,

Rebecca

Rebecca Seiferle
www.thedrunkenboat.com
---------- Original Message ----------------------------------
From:         Jon Corelis <[log in to unmask]>