26 Books

War Music is described as “an account” of books 1-4 and 16-19 of Homer’s Illiad. It’s certainly not a translation, and people who criticise it on the basis that it is not faithful to Homer are completely missing the point. It’s a sort of extended riff on the ancient text with contemporary references peppered all over the place.

Here we are treated to the start of Achilles’ sulk over a woman (a “she” in Logue’s account), gods squabbling and Patroclus’ death. There are two further instalments already published (All Day Permanent Red and Cold Calls), and there is a final part on the way. It’s not clear to me whether this will end up covering all of the material from the Illiad, but I certainly hope so. It’s difficult to get enough of this wise, funny, beautifully written poem.

My favourite episodes from the Illiad (Patroclus’ funeral games and the death and desecration of Hector) are missing from the material so far published. I sincerely hope that Logue will provide us with his versions of these parts of the epic.

It’s almost impossible to describe what to expect from this wonderful book. The opening stanza can only give the smallest inkling of what is to come:

Picture the east Aegean sea by night,
And on a beach aslant its shimmering
Upwards of 50,000 men
Asleep like spoons beside their lethal fleet.

The homoerotic is suggested (”Asleep like spoons”), as is the coiled violence of the events to come (”lethal fleet”). It’s a very cinematic image (”beside its shimmering”): we’re even told to “picture” the scene. Logue regularly uses cinematic jargon (cut, reverse etc) as a dramatic device.

It is crude too. Here is Agamemnon addressed by Achilles:

‘I hate your voice, claw King. I hate its tune.
Lord of All Voices is God’s fairest name.
Your voice defiles that name. Cuntstruck Agamemnon!’

Here he picks up on his title “War Music” (”tune”). In addition to the cinematic vocabulary, Logue emphasises the musical (and originally spoken) nature of the text. No lesser poet than Virgil highlights the music of the epic poem in the first line of the Aeneid (”I sing of arms and of a man”).

Here’s another, irresistible example of Logue’s crude humour:

… ‘who was the last man to hear
Lord Agamemnon of Mycenae say: “Have this” -
Some plate – “brave fighter” or “share this”
A teenage she.
One thing is sure,
That man would be surprised enough to jump
Down the eye-hole of his own knob.’

It’s not often that a poem can genuinely make you laugh out loud.

This is a wonderful, wonderful retelling of a great classic. If you want a straight, plain-verse translation, then you should look no further than Robert Fagles’ superb version, but if you want to discover Homer as a contemporary poet, in all his bloodthirstiness, crudity, irony, compassion and grandeur, Logue is your man.

Possibly related posts:

1. Cold Calls by Christopher Logue (James’s book 47, 2009)
2. Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino (Shane’s book 22, 2009)