Modern interpretation of Pindar: the Second Pythian and Seventh Nemean Odes

Abstract

Since I was taken, thirty-five years ago, to hear E. R. Dodds lecture on theBacchae, his work has been one of my chief sources of inspiration. My Sather Lectures form a kind of commentary on his; and if I sometimes disagree with him, or see things from a different point of view, that will not prevent the understanding reader from seeing how greatly I admire him and how much my work owes to his. His inaugural lecture at Oxford was called ‘Humanism and Technique in Greek Studies’; and no great scholar of our time, except perhaps Rudolf Pfeiffer, has kept so perfect a balance between the two. In that lecture Dodds, as the circumstances of the time required, pleaded for more attention to the content, as against the form, of ancient writings; and throughout his career he has applied his masterly technique to just those problems of the ancient world which are of most interest and importance to the modern. But he has always borne in mind that a scholar who hopes to throw light upon such problems must do all he can to master the technique of his profession. Both in his humanism and in his technique, he offers an example from which all classical scholars of our time can profit.To me Pindar seems one of the greatest Greek and also one of the greatest European poets. But some would dispute this proposition; and I believe that many even of those who would assent to it in reality admire him less than other great poets who seem to me to be his equals. There are two main reasons why Pindar has received less than justice. One is that he is believed to have a narrow and restricted outlook, which is often unfavourably compared with that of the great tragedians; the other is that he is difficult. The question of whether Pindar's outlook is narrow I shall treat comparatively briefly here; I shall not try here to describe that outlook at any length, though I may do so later. In comparing it with that of the tragedians, I shall be able to save space because of having already, in my bookThe Justice of Zeus, written about theWeltanschauungof the early Greek poets. Next, I shall pass to the difficulties which Pindar presents to modern readers. The difficulty with which I shall be most concerned will be that of eluding the dangers inherent in the romantic and historicist approach to Pindar which until eleven years ago was adopted in virtually all modern treatments and which still comes most naturally to most readers, including several distinguished scholars.