Victory Odes
Pindar (-522–-450), 1840
Ancient victory odes that turn athletic wins into myth, ethics and memory—fast, strange, and built to be heard aloud. Awe and freedom run through these fast, strange odes, whose public, lyrical voice turns athletic wins into myth, ethics and memory.
Feels like awe and curiosity. About freedom, memory and morality.
Who it’s for
You may like it if you enjoy choral poetry, Greek myth, or hearing praise shaped into argument and image. The 1840 English verse is archaic and thick with unfamiliar names and myth, so parts can feel demanding rather than quick.
Why read it
These are poems of risk, death and public honour, and their compressed stories still land with force. Read them for a bracing encounter with an ancient voice at its most direct.
Pages from the book
What it costs to choose a life that might be remembered.
In the path doth a mighty peril lie;To the craven soul no welcome it gives.But, seeing a man must needs once die,Wherefore should I unto old age screenFrom peril a life that only lives,Sitting nameless and fameless in darkness unseen,In the deeds of the valiant never sharing?Nay, lies at my feet the challenge now:I will accept it for doing and daring!Good speed to mine heart’s desire grant thou!”Not fruitless the cry of his heart’s desiringWas uttered. The God heard gracious-souled,And crowned him with honour. Winged steeds untiringHe gave, and a chariot of gold. Why the unsung hero loses half his glory.
Even so, Agesidamus, when from emprise nobly wroughtA man descendeth all unsung to mansions of the dead,Scant pleasure all his toil hath won, his breath was spent for nought.But upon thee the sweet-voiced lyre and dulcet flute have shedThe grace of all their winsomeness: like some wide-spreading treeBy those Zeus-born Pierian Maids thy fame shall fostered be. Where aspiration ends and presumption begins.
To chant a triumph than all more sweet,Inspiration-wafted, as one that fliesIn a chariot, on paths of utterance meet,Till I win unto Kronos’ Hill sunbright.O yea, in my Muses’ quiver liesA song-arrow winged for stronger flight.By diverse paths men upward aspire:Earth’s highest summit by kings is attained.Thou therefore look to attain no higherThan earth. Be it thine on the height thou hast gainedTo pace mid splendour of royal achievingThy life through: mine be it no less longTo consort with victors, from Hellas receivingThe world o’er praise for my song. Pindar.When Alexander the Great razed Thebes in 335 BCE, he spared the house and descendants of Pindar, the city’s most famous poet.
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Questions readers ask
- Is Victory Odes for me?
- You may like it if you enjoy choral poetry, Greek myth, or hearing praise shaped into argument and image. The 1840 English verse is archaic and thick with unfamiliar names and myth, so parts can feel demanding rather than quick.
- What is Victory Odes like?
- Awe and freedom run through these fast, strange odes, whose public, lyrical voice turns athletic wins into myth, ethics and memory. Feels like awe and curiosity. About freedom, memory and morality.
- What should I read after Victory Odes?
- If you liked Victory Odes, try Oedipus Rex (Sophocles), Paradise Lost (John Milton) and Dialogues (Plato).
A taste of the feed
What stays unforgiven when a crime becomes the price of peace?
My lot be still to lead The life of innocence and fly Irreverence in word or deed, To follow still those laws ordained on high Whose birthplace is the bright ethereal sky. No mortal birth they own, Olympus their progenitor alone: Ne’er shall they slumber in oblivion cold, The god in them is strong and grows not old.
Oedipus Rex · Sophocles
The logic of a king who would rather rule a wasteland than bend the knee.
What matter where, if I be still the same, And what I should be, all but less than he Whom thunder hath made greater? Here at least We shall be free; the Almighty hath not built Here for his envy, will not drive us hence: Here we may reign secure, and in my choice To reign is worth ambition though in Hell: Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.
Paradise Lost · John Milton
What if the terror was never in the thing itself?
Men are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of things. Thus death is nothing terrible, else it would have appeared so to Socrates. But the terror consists in our notion of death, that it is terrible. When, therefore, we are hindered or disturbed, or grieved, let us never impute it to others, but to ourselves—that is, to our own views. It is the action of an uninstructed person to reproach others for his own misfortunes; of one entering upon instruction, to reproach himself; and one perfectly instructed, to reproach neither others nor himself.
The Enchiridion · Epictetus
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