Combat and Classics Podcast

With Scott Hambrick

Brian is joined by guest Scott Hambrick, founder of Online Great Books, to discuss the questions about war raised in Book 6 of Homer's Iliad, and Brian will teach a seminar through Scott's website starting in January.

Philoktetes, a soldier left wounded on an island, is recovered because he possesses the famed bow of Heracles, which Odysseus and Neoptolemus believe is necessary to win the Trojan war; the hosts ask what role lying plays in strategy.

Hector is dead, and Achilles mourns Patroclus by organizing funeral games with chariot and foot races, boxing and wrestling; the Argives compete, and the hosts ask why Homer's description of the chariot race takes up half the book.

In the last book of the Iliad, Apollo intervenes after Achilles tries to disfigure Hector's body, and the gods help Priam retrieve his son from Achilles' tent; the hosts weigh whether the ending is decline or tragic insight.

Apollo disguises himself as Agenor to lure Achilles from Troy, then Athena tricks Hector into facing him; Achilles kills Hector and drags his corpse behind his chariot, raising the question of why Hector chose to fight.

Paris and Menelaus duel over Helen and the fate of Troy, and Menelaus wins, so the hosts ask why the war does not end there and who is the better leader among Priam, Agamemnon and Hector.

Achilles gets new armor from his mother and rejoins the battle, facing Aeneas and Hector as Zeus tells the gods to take sides; the hosts ask why the combat with Aeneas is the centerpiece of the book.

Agamemnon wakes in the night and convenes a war planning committee, Nestor calls for spies, Diomedes and Odysseus volunteer, and on the Trojan side Dolon volunteers; the hosts ask whether the goal of war is to kill or to defeat.

Helenus tells Hector to send the women to sacrifice to Athena after the Trojans are beaten badly, and Hector visits his wife and newborn son; Diomedes and Glaucus exchange armor and agree a personal truce.

Achilles kills so many Trojans that the river Scamander protests, so Achilles fights the river and nearly dies while the gods war among themselves; the hosts ask whether Zeus enjoys the suffering of the gods.

Achilles is crushed by the death of Patroclus, and Thetis helps him revenge himself on Hector by asking Hephaestus for new armor; the hosts ask whether the famous shield conceals the world of the dead.

The Trojans push the Greeks back to their ships, so Agamemnon and Menelaus send an embassy begging Achilles to rejoin the fight, and it fails; the hosts ask how Achilles wants to be remembered.

Patroclus is dead, and the Greeks and Trojans fight over his body across a whole book; the hosts explore the image of the stretched bullhide and ask whether Patroclus is his body or something different.

Zeus wakes and gives a spoiler of the rest of the Iliad then sets his will in motion, and Apollo fills Hector with chutzpah to lead the Trojans among the Greek ships; the hosts ask about the smile of Zeus.

The hosts wonder what is on the minds of both sides of the conflict and ask whether military prowess gives other virtues, using the example of sports to ask who should command the Greek army.

The gods assemble on Mount Olympus after the Trojans defeat the Greeks, who build defensive fortifications for the first time in the nine year war, and Zeus gives a speech warning the other gods about going against his will.

Diomedes stabs Ares himself in Book 5, and the hosts ask what it means for men and gods to fight one another, wondering whether the Homeric gods are really not radically different from human beings.

Shilo, Jeff and Brian continue reading Homer's Iliad and ask why Book 12, the midpoint of the story, is so short, and why the book is so full of similes about war and the natural world.

The hosts trace the hierarchy of Greek heroes on the battlefield and ask who counts as the good guys and the bad guys, while Achilles sends Patroclus to learn who a wounded Greek soldier is.

Poseidon interferes with the will of Zeus after Hera seduces him with a sexy belt, while the battle between the Greeks and Achaeans escalates; the hosts return to the question of who should be in charge.

Nine Greeks volunteer to duel Hector and Ajax wins the lottery; Ajax seems to be winning, but the fighters make a truce and take a day to bury the dead. The hosts ask who the Greeks are without Achilles.

The hosts begin their journey through Homer's Iliad, described as humanity's longest surviving poem on war, asking why human rage makes a good subject for a war poem, and the wrath of gods does not.

Agamemnon gets a dream from Zeus telling him to test his troops before Troy, while the Trojans hear from a disguised messenger; the hosts ask whether Agamemnon is crazy or has a plan after nine years of war.

Brian, Shilo and Jeff start reading Xenophon's adventure story of Cyrus the Younger's army of ten thousand Greek mercenaries, asking whose ascent the title names since Cyrus dies at the end of Book 1.

The Greek army has been beheaded, with all its generals dead, and the soldiers lie down in despair until Xenophon has a dream that leads him to revive the troops and start the march north out of Persia.

Schisms continue within the Greek army in Book 6, as some soldiers befriend the locals, some seek help and some go raiding, while Xenophon turns down the generalship of the whole army.

In the last book of the Anabasis the hosts look back at the three challenges Xenophon faced: going to war alongside Cyrus, marching the Greeks through enemy territory, and reaching the sea; they explore his idea of leadership.

The rebels reach the Black Sea, but the ships they wait for do not show up, so Xenophon leads an expedition for provisions and later toys with founding a city where the army is camped.

Cyrus is dead at the start of Book 2, yet the Greeks are victorious, and by its end every Greek general is dead through the treachery of Tissaphernes; the hosts examine the piety of Clearchus.

With Andrea Radasanu

Andrea Radasanu returns as the guest for episode 40 to discuss the Sicilian Expedition as Thucydides tells it in the History of the Peloponnesian War.

With Andrea Radasanu

Jeff, Lise and Brian continue their close read series on Aristotle's Politics, tackling his discussion of slavery, which raises questions about nature, law and virtue in this fourth installment.

With Shilo Brooks

Brian, Shilo and Jeff discuss the difference between sexual and political love in Book VI, and the connection between love and gratitude, while the army of Cyrus, complete with siege engines, prepares to attack the Assyrian host.

Brian, Lise and Jeff dig deeper into Aristotle's Politics in part 3 of their discussion, asking what slavery is and what slavery has to do with the household or the state.

Jeff, Lise and Brian dig into Aristotle's Politics, asking what good political rule looks like, what it means to be just within a political system, and what problems politics can and cannot solve.

With Shilo Brooks

Cyrus' empire ends badly in the final book, so the hosts ask whether Cyrus was happy, whether it is possible to rule human beings like a god and stay happy, and why such a cold king had two sons.

With Shilo Brooks

Shilo Brooks returns for Book IV of Xenophon's Education of Cyrus, where the hosts discuss Cyrus' attack on the Assyrians, consolidation, cavalry, and the return of Cyrus' first boyfriend from earlier in the story.

With Shilo Brooks

Shilo Brooks returns to continue the exploration of Book II, where Cyrus goes to war against the Assyrians, and the hosts try to tease out what fundamentals of warfare Cyrus discovers versus what the Persians teach him.

The hosts discuss Aristophanes' Birds, a farce about banishment that raises questions about what can be learned where politics, nature and religion collide with the absurd.

With Shilo Brooks

Shilo Brooks returns to discuss Book V of Xenophon's Education of Cyrus, the love book, weighing the differences between sexual and political love as Cyrus' special friend and his boyfriend return and the book ends with another kiss.

Socrates and Alcibiades reappear at a party where several characters take turns praising Eros, often called in English the god of love, and the conversation moves from sexual desire to politics, law and philosophy.

With Shilo Brooks

With Shilo Brooks

Lise, Jeff and Brian open a conversation on Book I of Plato's Republic, first asking how to approach the Great Books when starting from scratch with no background or without a group.

With Shilo Brooks

Shilo Brooks returns for another episode on the Education of Cyrus by Xenophon, in which the hosts discuss moderation, virtue and risk, with a brief mention of the ugly boyfriend.

Lise, Jeff and Brian continue their conversation about Book I of Aristotle's Politics, addressing the famous line that man is by nature a political animal and how a city comes to be.