The Odyssey
BOOK 12: CATTLE OF THE SUN
pg. 282
Eurylochus - "All ways of dying are hateful to us poor mortals,
true, but to die of hunger, starve to death--
that's the worst of all...
I'd rather die at sea, with one deep gulp of death,
than die by inches on this desolate island here!"
Kurt Cobain (from Neil Young song "Hey Hey, My My", in his suicide note) -
"It's better to burn out than to fade away."
Eurylochos is speaking of the temptation to not suffer, if the same fate is inevitable either way. It's ironic because his fate is sealed once he kills one of Helios's cattle. There is always temptation to "just get it over with", so the slow decline of whatever the case may be, either fame or life, isn't being endured. In both cases, they chose the indulgent way out, something fundamentally selfish, but somewhat understandable in desperate situations.
Sunday, November 8, 2009
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No one wants to suffer, it is a fear ingrained in society. Everyone wants to die quickly and painlessly if they can, even those who wish to kill themselves before their time. Even so many years ago, decades and centuries, men still did not want to suffer. They wanted to go out in a blaze of glory and be remembered, but not suffer. This is continued to this day as Emily has highlighted in Cobain's excerpt. He most certainly burnt out, no fading away for the grunge icon.
ReplyDeleteI really like the correlation you made between an ancient text and a modern icon.
ReplyDeleteI love Neil Young!
I wonder if this particular lyric only has to do with suffering. To me, burning out and fading away immediately made me think of the process of death. Is it better to go swiftly, gloriously, and unexpectedly, inflating your legacy through pure shock value, or to slowly wither, allowing time for acceptance of the inevitable? Is it preferable to die in the prime of your life, so that you will always be remembered as the finest being you would ever be, or to die at the end of a long life, with mistakes and tribulations perhaps tainting your existence?