WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:05:330 Daniel, Hugh, you've just been recording the Odyssey for us, and I wondered: 00:00:05:330 --> 00:00:12.330 how have you turned that complicated Odyssey that's in a book into a story that you tell? 00:00:12.330 --> 00:00:16.240 Well, it's a process really of finding pictures, 00:00:16.240 --> 00:00:18.670 seeing the story as a sequence of pictures, 00:00:18.670 --> 00:00:20.790 one picture following another, 00:00:20.790 --> 00:00:26.230 and the words wind in and out of the pictures. 00:00:26.230 --> 00:00:30.750 So, as you're working on a story, 00:00:30.750 --> 00:00:35.440 some bits fall away because you can't quite see them; 00:00:35.440 --> 00:00:37.630 some bits become clearer, 00:00:37.630 --> 00:00:43.680 and you find yourself making your own particular journey through the story. 00:00:43.680 --> 00:00:45.360 And of course, Daniel, 00:00:45.360 --> 00:00:48.710 this story's been told for over 3000 years. 00:00:48.710 --> 00:00:53.000 It was written down about 2700 years ago. 00:00:53.000 --> 00:00:57.260 How have you tried to keep that ancient feel to the Odyssey? 00:00:57.260 --> 00:01:01.690 Well, we've tried to keep a lot of details that come from the original story, 00:01:01.690 --> 00:01:08.050 but we've also tried very hard to make it into a told tale. 00:01:08.050 --> 00:01:15.370 We want it to have the sense of something that's happening right now, 00:01:15.370 --> 00:01:16.710 in front of the audience, 00:01:16.710 --> 00:01:20.550 that it isn't something we're reading when we're recording it, 00:01:20.550 --> 00:01:24.870 we're trying to tell it to the microphone as we would tell it to an audience, 00:01:24.870 --> 00:01:28.820 in the hope that that will make it more exciting to listen to. 00:01:28.820 --> 00:01:31.590 So, it's quite a long process to record it, 00:01:31.590 --> 00:01:33.460 because we make a lot of mistakes: 00:01:33.460 --> 00:01:34.690 as we're telling the story, 00:01:34.690 --> 00:01:37.320 we're kind of searching for the right words to use, 00:01:37.320 --> 00:01:40.820 to make it as exciting as we possibly can. 00:01:40.820 --> 00:01:42.310 And of course this story, 00:01:42.310 --> 00:01:44.150 whilst it was written down, 00:01:44.150 --> 00:01:45.440 before it was written down, 00:01:45.440 --> 00:01:49.010 it was mainly just told from person to person. 00:01:49.010 --> 00:01:55.340 So we're returning it to its original, ancient beginnings. 00:01:55.340 --> 00:01:59.530 And is there anything about the language that you use, 00:01:59.530 --> 00:02:02.590 or the patterns in which you tell, 00:02:02.590 --> 00:02:05.300 that is Homeric or Ancient Greek? 00:02:05.300 --> 00:02:11.040 Yeah, Homer uses certain phrases again and again across the story, 00:02:11.040 --> 00:02:12.840 and we try and use those phrases: 00:02:12.840 --> 00:02:15.990 for example, if we refer to the goddess Athene, 00:02:15.990 --> 00:02:17.620 the goddess of war and wisdom, 00:02:17.620 --> 00:02:21.120 we always call her "Owl-eyed Athene", 00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:24.800 which is the way Homer refers to her in the original text. 00:02:24.800 --> 00:02:27.820 And we like that because, as Hugh mentioned just now, 00:02:27.820 --> 00:02:30.460 we try and concentrate on images in the story so that, 00:02:30.460 --> 00:02:33.360 as you're listening to the story, you can see a picture in your mind's eye. 00:02:33.360 --> 00:02:35.440 So the idea of a goddess with the eyes, 00:02:35.440 --> 00:02:37.960 not of a human being, but the eyes of an owl, 00:02:37.960 --> 00:02:39.520 is a wonderful image. 00:02:39.520 --> 00:02:43.340 So we try and draw back on those Homeric descriptions. 00:02:43.340 --> 00:02:46.960 And likewise, for example in the blinding of the Cyclops, 00:02:46.960 --> 00:02:48.600 a lot of the descriptions, 00:02:48.600 --> 00:02:49.940 a lot of the details, 00:02:49.940 --> 00:02:53.230 come from an original written source: 00:02:53.230 --> 00:02:54.750 the descriptions of the Cyclops, 00:02:54.750 --> 00:02:56.270 the things he says to the people – 00:02:56.270 --> 00:02:59.290 the trick, for example, is straight out of Homer, 00:02:59.290 --> 00:03:01.280 the idea of him calling himself 'Nobody', 00:03:01.280 --> 00:03:03.760 and the Cyclops saying "Nobody has blinded me!", 00:03:03.760 --> 00:03:06.000 that comes straight out of the Homeric story. 00:03:06.000 --> 00:03:07.140 So it's wonderful, because 00:03:07.140 --> 00:03:12.430 it's a 3000-year-old trick that still works even now and entertains an audience even today. 00:03:12.430 --> 00:03:13.280 And of course, 00:03:13.280 --> 00:03:15.180 if you read out the Odyssey, 00:03:15.180 --> 00:03:16.720 it would take forever – 00:03:16.720 --> 00:03:19.190 it's actually a very long story in the written version – 00:03:19.190 --> 00:03:21.110 so as well as deciding, 00:03:21.110 --> 00:03:22.480 as you just described Dan, 00:03:22.480 --> 00:03:23.910 what you've included, 00:03:23.910 --> 00:03:25.060 what have you left out? 00:03:25.060 --> 00:03:28.420 Hugh, have you had to leave bits out of the original? 00:03:28.420 --> 00:03:29.350 Yes, we have. 00:03:29.350 --> 00:03:40.220 The original is a little bit complicated because it starts off with Odysseus' son going off in search of his father, 00:03:40.220 --> 00:03:51.140 and then it tells the story of how Odysseus starts to make his journey back to Ithaca, 00:03:51.140 --> 00:03:57.910 and then at a certain point Odysseus stops and tells his story to King Alcinous. 00:03:57.910 --> 00:04:04.000 And we thought that the story would be simpler if it goes in a straight line, 00:04:04.000 --> 00:04:07.670 if the timeline through the story is 00:04:07.670 --> 00:04:12.300 one event that follows another event that follows another event that follows another event 00:04:12.300 --> 00:04:14.620 in kind of a straight line. 00:04:14.620 --> 00:04:17.300 So we've pared back, 00:04:17.300 --> 00:04:23.680 we've cut out some of that journey of Odysseus' son and some of that early part of the story, 00:04:23.680 --> 00:04:29.800 and we add it a bit later on so that things happen in their proper time, 00:04:29.800 --> 00:04:32.840 as they would in someone's life. 00:04:32.840 --> 00:04:36.780 So, yeah, we've reconstructed it a bit. 00:04:36.780 --> 00:04:39.910 And one or two of the islands as well – 00:04:39.910 --> 00:04:41.340 there are lots and lots of islands – 00:04:41.340 --> 00:04:44.600 there are one or two islands that we've cut out because 00:04:44.600 --> 00:04:52.880 we wanted the really exciting adventures to keep people gripped. 00:04:52.880 --> 00:04:57.500 It is the story of Odysseus, basically, the Odyssey, 00:04:57.500 --> 00:04:59.260 and I wondered: 00:04:59.260 --> 00:05:01.310 you've been sort of living with Odysseus, 00:05:01.310 --> 00:05:02.580 both of you, for quite a while, 00:05:02.580 --> 00:05:05.360 and I wondered what you thought of him? 00:05:05.360 --> 00:05:09.400 Well Odysseus is very much liked by the goddess Athene. 00:05:09.400 --> 00:05:11.660 And Athene is the goddess of wisdom, 00:05:11.660 --> 00:05:13.070 as well as war, 00:05:13.070 --> 00:05:16.730 and Odysseus is a very interesting character because 00:05:16.730 --> 00:05:22.060 he differs from a lot of the Greek heroes in that he has to use his wits. 00:05:22.060 --> 00:05:29.930 He uses his cleverness to overcome problems as often as he uses his strength. 00:05:29.930 --> 00:05:36.240 So he's a fascinating character because he can outwit a giant rather than trying to kill the giant. 00:05:36.240 --> 00:05:39.850 He uses his brain in a very creative way, 00:05:39.850 --> 00:05:42.910 so he's an exciting character to spend a lot of time with, 00:05:42.910 --> 00:05:44.300 to tell the story of, 00:05:44.300 --> 00:05:46.610 because of his cleverness. 00:05:46.610 --> 00:05:50.900 And I think one of the interesting things about the Odyssey, 00:05:50.900 --> 00:05:54.100 the story of Odysseus after the Iliad, 00:05:54.100 --> 00:05:55.980 is that, in the Iliad, 00:05:55.980 --> 00:06:00.700 everybody is at the mercy of the gods and goddesses 00:06:00.700 --> 00:06:02.390 whereas, in the Odyssey, 00:06:02.390 --> 00:06:04.480 you have Odysseus using his wits, 00:06:04.480 --> 00:06:06.000 using his cleverness, 00:06:06.000 --> 00:06:07.550 to make his own journey, 00:06:07.550 --> 00:06:09.800 get out of scrapes himself. 00:06:09.800 --> 00:06:13.260 He's not so much at the mercy of the gods and goddesses, 00:06:13.260 --> 00:06:16.610 he's making his own passage through life, 00:06:16.610 --> 00:06:24.450 and it's kind of a shift in the way people understand human life, I think. 00:06:24.450 --> 00:06:30.020 We know that Homer's great stories of the Iliad and this story, the Odyssey, 00:06:30.020 --> 00:06:34.810 were performed by storytellers like yourself at grand events in Ancient Greece, 00:06:34.810 --> 00:06:38.940 there were feasts and festivals and storytelling competitions. 00:06:38.940 --> 00:06:40.280 This is a question for both of you, 00:06:40.280 --> 00:06:44.270 I just wondered if you ever wonder what it might have been like, really, 00:06:44.270 --> 00:06:47.830 to have been a storyteller in Ancient Greece – 00:06:47.830 --> 00:06:50.430 or anywhere else, really, for that matter. 00:06:50.430 --> 00:06:56.500 Yes, well, storytellers throughout history have been treated in different ways in different places, 00:06:56.500 --> 00:06:57.970 in some places, 00:06:57.970 --> 00:07:00.710 in Ireland, Ancient Ireland, 00:07:00.710 --> 00:07:05.440 storytellers were very, very high-status people – 00:07:05.440 --> 00:07:08.660 not much short of some of the kings – 00:07:08.660 --> 00:07:11.010 very, very highly regarded; 00:07:11.010 --> 00:07:13.160 at other times, in other places, 00:07:13.160 --> 00:07:16.820 they've been little more than beggars. 00:07:16.820 --> 00:07:18.240 It's difficult to know – 00:07:18.240 --> 00:07:19.380 I don't know – 00:07:19.380 --> 00:07:21.900 what their status was in Ancient Greece, 00:07:21.900 --> 00:07:25.490 but we have some clues from Demodocus, 00:07:25.490 --> 00:07:31.950 who's the storyteller at the court of King Alcinous at the beginning of the story of the Odyssey, 00:07:31.950 --> 00:07:34.500 and he seems to be quite highly regarded: 00:07:34.500 --> 00:07:42.740 the king brings him in as an entertainer for this guest who's just been feasted and feted. 00:07:42.740 --> 00:07:47.900 And Demodocus begins to tell his story and of course Odysseus, 00:07:47.900 --> 00:07:50.300 when he hears the story, begins to cry. 00:07:50.300 --> 00:07:54.330 So I don't know, 00:07:54.330 --> 00:07:56.210 it seems that a storyteller, 00:07:56.210 --> 00:07:57.290 if he was any good, 00:07:57.290 --> 00:08:00.730 would have been treated pretty well in Ancient Greece. 00:08:00.730 --> 00:08:02.670 What I like about the story is that, 00:08:02.670 --> 00:08:05.140 over and over again in the original book, 00:08:05.140 --> 00:08:07.580 the warriors cry. 00:08:07.580 --> 00:08:15.590 So when Odysseus loses some of his men after they've been eaten by the dragon Scylla, 00:08:15.590 --> 00:08:17.760 they all sit there crying on the ship. 00:08:17.760 --> 00:08:25.080 And I love the idea that the storyteller would have stood up before an audience of hardened warriors and soldiers 00:08:25.080 --> 00:08:30.760 and started to tell a story and tears would have coursed down their cheeks and dropped from their beards. 00:08:30.760 --> 00:08:35.750 I love the idea of these old, battle-hardened warriors 00:08:35.750 --> 00:08:40.070 who are so moved in the story by the death of the dog, for example, 00:08:40.070 --> 00:08:43.000 that they start crying themselves. 00:08:43.000 --> 00:08:50.770 Another thing that a storyteller would've done would've been to sing the praises of whoever it was that they were staying with, 00:08:50.770 --> 00:08:54.190 or whoever it was that was keeping them and feeding them. 00:08:54.190 --> 00:09:01.170 And they would've had to know all the history of the family of the person who was looking after them and 00:09:01.170 --> 00:09:05.800 sing the praises of his father and his grandfather and his great-grandfather and 00:09:05.800 --> 00:09:09.570 all the stories and the battles that they might have been associated with. 00:09:09.570 --> 00:09:19.270 So a storyteller would have had to be a historian as well as someone who knew the tales.