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® A publication of the American Philological Association Vol. 7 • Issue 1 • Spring 2008 From Sicily with Love: Book Review: Breaking The Myth of Galatea and Polyphemos in Ground. Pioneering Ian Fleming’s MOONRAKER Women Archaeologists by Ingrid Edlund-Berry by Patrick Callahan “After all you must have had some Breaking Ground. Pioneering Women education?” Archaeologists. Getzel M. Cohen and Bond laughed. “Mostly in Latin and Martha Sharp Joukowsky, Editors. The Uni- Greek. All about Caesar and Balbus and versity of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor so on.”-You Only Live Twice, 86. 2004. Pp. 582; 24 pp. of b&w photo- ith the release of the film graphs; 9 pp. of maps. Clothbound WCasino Royale in November of $80.00. ISBN 0-472-11372-0. 2006 and the upcoming release of Quantum of Solace in Novem- Fig. 1. Statue group from the Museum at ntecedent, adventuress, or archaeolo - ber of 2008 revitalizing the Bond film Sperlonga. © Marco Prins and Jona Lender- A gist? These were the labels used to industry, there has been an enthusiastic ing. From Livius.org with permission. characterize some of the pioneering return to Ian Fleming’s 007 novels and women in anthropology and archaeology short stories. As old readers return and education, his Greek is a bit rusty when young readers begin to discover the fun in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963) in an exhibit at the library of the University in reading these works, they will find the Corsican Mafioso and Bond’s future of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology with unanticipated pleasure a depth of father-in-law, Marc-Ange, must explain and Anthropology in 2000. In Breaking thought and subtlety in the 007 literary to Bond what he meant by keeping Ground we find twelve biographies of ερκος` works which are often lost in their film secret information within his ’ women who mostly fit in the third category, versions. This literary sophistication is οδοντων’ ` (“the hedge of the teeth,” 37), ranging in time from the mid 1800s to the of particular interest to those familiar a play upon a common Homeric phrase with the Greeks and Romans, since the to describe the mouth (e.g., Iliad 4.350: late 1900s. In her introduction to this col- novels are replete with the classical allu- “Son of Atreus, what word has escaped lection Margaret Cool Root highlights the sions and themes with which Fleming’s the hedge of your teeth?”). Large por- framework of society in which these Eton schooling – the British secondary tions of plot are remodeled on classical women were educated and how the limita- education emphasizing the classics – myth as well. For example, in Dr. No tions imposed on them by their own fami- made him familiar. (1958) the final sequence where the lies and the field of archaeology, just Often these classical allusions are heroine is tied up on the rocks of the quite explicit in the text. For example, island and Bond must fight off a giant beginning to emerge at this time as an aca- though we find out in You Only Live squid – which Fleming calls “the demic discipline, affected them individually Twice (1964) that Bond had a classical continued on page 2 and personally. Yet each of them made important contributions to the areas they studied, and their lives provide an insight Book Review: “atticus of rome”. 3 IMPERIUM KONFLIKT MYTHOS: into how they achieved what they did in THE BIMILLENARY OF THE BATTLE A TALE OF TWO BROTHERS: IN THE TEUTOBURG FOREST . 12 spite of outside obstacles. CARACALLA AND GETA . 4 The biographies of these pioneering Ask A Classicist. 14 CLASSICA JAPONICA: GREECE AND women are written by their colleagues, ROME IN THE JAPANESE ACADEMIA A Cornucopia of Artists: The APA AND POPULAR LITERATURE. 6 Comics Contest 2008 Debuts in their students, friends, and family members. Chicago . 14 The following list, a sort of table of contents, Book Review: “The Labors of Aeneas: What a Pain It Was to Found the Book Review: “The Unknown provides the best glimpse of the history and Roman Race” . 7 Socrates” . 18 influence of these women: ANCIENT OUTREACH: HONEYCOMBS, Book Review: “Roman Women”. 22 continued on page 5 Inside BANQUETS, AND FLOWERY FIELDS OF KNOWLEDGE. 8 Poetry Inspired By the Past. 23 “Common is the word ‘friend’; Did You Know. 10 GUIDELINES FOR CONTRIBUTORS . 24 rare is true friendship.” Capital Campaign News . 11 – Phaedrus, Libellus 3.9.1. From Sicily akin to that of Polyphemos as portrayed in the Odyssey. He is, as Bond describes Fig. 2. "Cover," With Love to M (the head of MI6), something of a copyright © 2002 continued from page 1 loner (17), much like Polyphemos by Penguin Group (Odyssey 9.188-9). Like the Cyclops (USA) Inc., from mythical kraken” (201) – is reminiscent described by Homer (Odyssey 9.189, 215), MOONRAKER by of the myth of Andromeda, who is res- he thinks that he is “a law unto himself” Ian Fleming. Used cued by Perseus from a sea monster (79). And as if Fleming were winking by permission of (Ovid’s Metamorphoses 4.663-739). perpetually at Homer, he speaks again Penguin, a divi- Yet the most sustained and prevalent and again of Drax’s “deplorable man- sion of Penguin classical myth in a Bond novel appears in ners” (86, 96, 148) and presents us with Group (USA) Inc. Moonraker (1955). Here the villain’s name, the contradiction of a host (103) who is Sir Hugo Drax, is a bit deceptive about his trying to kill his guest. Even after Drax This is only a temporary victory for mythological antecedent. His actual name has shown his hand and has Bond and Fleming’s Odysseus. Soon he finds him- of Graf Hugo von der Drache might sug- Galatea Brand – a Scotland Yard agent self drawn to Drax’s complex on the cliffs gest that he is some sort of dragon, since posing as Drax’s assistant – tied up in his of Dover. This seaside lair of Drax bears Drache is German for dragon. However office, Drax still refers to them as his an uncanny resemblance to the seaside his physical descriptions paint a different “guests” in that manner that now has cave of Polyphemos. The Moonraker – monster at work in Fleming’s novel. For, become the cliché of cartoon villains an Inter-Continental Ballistic Missile as becomes clear both in Drax’s character (203). This same theme of the relation- equipped with a nuclear warhead (see and his place within the plot, Drax is actu- ship between guest and host is equally Fig. 2) – itself is housed in a cave cut ally another Polyphemos, the Cyclops of prominent in the Odyssey, most especially forty feet into the white cliffs, while the Odyssey (Book 9) and later Greek and in 9.266-71, where Odysseus begs Drax’s house is described as being sur- Latin authors such as Euripides, Theocri- Polyphemos to treat him and his crew rounded by a remarkably high and thick tus, and Ovid. well and to beware the wrath of Zeus courtyard wall (100-1), matching the During 007’s previous adventure in who is guardian of hospitality. monstrous stone courtyard Homer Live and Let Die (1954), Bond had Fleming first placed Bond in this role describes as surrounding Polyphemos’ expressed the wish to find in his adversary as guest at the beginning of the novel in cave (Odyssey 9.184-6). Moreover, the cave “a giant, a Homeric slaying” (21) and that a game of bridge, where by a drunken serves the same sort of purpose for Bond is certainly what he now gets in Drax. deception he beats Drax at his own game as for Odysseus. Bond must hide as Drax The remarkable characteristic, indeed the of cheating. Even the element of mistak- blasts each ventilation shaft with steam in first Bond notes upon seeing him, is his en identity is present in this representa- a vain attempt to flush him out (224-6). huge and ogre-like physique (101, 103), tion of Book 9 of the Odyssey. To Drax Thinking that this has put an end to 007, exaggerated by his overly broad shoulders and the rest of the members of Blades Drax leaves to attend to the launch of the (38). Every part of the man is monstrously (M’s club), M and Bond pose as just an Moonraker. But sure enough, Bond has proportioned so that Fleming speaks of ordinary Admiral and Commander who survived, though in such bad shape that his hands as big (37, 39), his face as great had once seen action but now have some they must carry him out of Drax’s cave on and hairy (120, 133), and his nose as large vague job at the Ministry of Defense (33- a stretcher (239). This exit strategy, (66). Fleming even goes so far as to say 34). Drax, unaware of the danger posed, though somewhat askew, has its parallel that Drax has “ogre’s teeth” (206, 213). dismissively calls Bond “Commander in Odysseus’ own method of escape on Drax’s exposure to a bomb at the end Thingummy” (40) – an English~ equiva- the underside of a ram (Odyssey 9.444-5). of the Second World War made his face lent to that famous joke of Ουτις’ Thus far, the parallels have been in even more monstrous than his huge, ogre- (“Nobody,” Odyssey 9.366). But it is the plot and character, but Fleming makes like figure would have first suggested. moment of victory for Bond that finds the allusion explicit when he refers to This same blast left Drax’s right eye “a Drax most like Polyphemos (70): Drax’s Moonraker rocket as “a new toy surgical failure” (38).