Text from Homer’s Odyssey and the Orphic Hymns, translated and adapted by Julia Scarborough and Kate Soper
I. Dawns 1–7
II. Athena: Shape-Shifter
III. Dawns 8–19
IV. Man Woman God Thing
V. Dawns 20–28
VI. Athena: Who Cannot Be Spoken Of
VII. Dawns 29 & 30
VIII. The Hated One
IX. Dawns 32–37
X. Athena: War Trumpet
XI. Dawns 39 & 40
An epithet is a descriptive word or phrase that can stand in for the person or thing it describes. Some epithets brim with poetic meaning (rose-fingered dawn), some don’t (fishfull sea), and some are a bit odd (beautiful, immortal, golden sandals). Those are all from Homer’s Odyssey, in which the epithets are so thickly strewn that their function starts to seem muddled. They may carry an eternal truth about what they describe—or they may simply be tools to fill out the syllables of a line of poetry, to jog the memory of a reciter, or to help a listener keep track of the characters. After all, mere words can’t convey the authentic nature of a person or a thing. But what else can?
Epithets comprises almost all the abundant appearances of Dawn in The Odyssey, presented consecutively in six non-consecutive movements, as well as three facets of the much-epitheted goddess Athena, from the ancient Orphic Hymns; most of the epithets in The Odyssey (movement IV), categorized by the kind of object to which they are attached; and the particular epithets of Odysseus (movement VIII), whose name is given to him by his cranky grandfather and later spoken with reverence by his loyal swineherd.
Wet Ink Ensemble. Photo: Wendel Patrick
Alex Mincek Nomadic Science (2024)
1. The Geometry of Meditative Cranes
“Like a formation of very meditative cranes, stretching out of sight, whose sensitive bodies flee the chill of winter when, their wings fully extended, they fly powerfully through silence to a precise point on the horizon, from which suddenly a strange wind blows, precursor to the storm. The oldest crane, flying alone ahead of the others, shakes his head like a reasonable person on seeing this. . . . Having calmly looked in all directions with his experienced eyes, the crane prudently gyrates to change the direction of the geometric figure (perhaps it is a triangle, but one cannot see the third side which these curious birds of passage form in space). . . . Then, maneuvering with wings which seem no bigger than a starling’s, because he is no fool, he takes another philosophic and surer line of flight.”
— Comte de Lautréamont [Isidore Lucien Ducasse]
2. Lines of Flight 1: Maps and Grids
“These nomads chart their course by strange stars, which might be luminous clusters of data in cyberspace, or perhaps hallucinations. Lay down a map of the land; over that, set a map of political change; over that, a map of the Net, especially the counter-Net with its emphasis on clandestine information-flow and logistics—and finally, overall, the 1:1 map of the creative imagination, aesthetics, values. The resultant grid comes to life, animated by unexpected eddies and surges of energy, coagulations of light, secret tunnels, and surprises.”
— William Gibson
3. A Traveler/A Fractured Line
“Or else: A gust of wind shuffles the two manuscripts. The reader tries to reassemble them. A single novel results, stupendous, which the critics are unable to attribute. It is the novel that both the productive writer and the tormented writer have always dreamed of writing.”
— Italo Calvino
4. Lines of Flight II: Purpose/Repurpose
“There are different types of abstract machines that overlap in their operations…. Every abstract machine is linked to other abstract machines…. Their various types are as intertwined as their operations are convergent.”
— Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari
Untitled. Photo: Thomas Fichter, with superimposed image of cranes. Reiner Bernhardt / Alamy stock photo
