In the Dolphin's Wake by Harry Bucknall

Author:Harry Bucknall [Harry Bucknall]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781903071380
Publisher: Bene Factum Publishing
Published: 2011-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Popular legend has it that Homer is buried on Ios. It is alleged that the blind poet died on his way from Samos to Athens, an unforeseen event which forced the ship carrying him to put in at the tiny harbour below Plakotó that is now just a forlorn bay – a story upheld by both Herodotus and Pliny and further supported, nearly 1,000 years later, by Pausanias the prolific second century travel-writer. The poet’s grave was said to have been opened up in 1771 by the Dutch adventurer Count Pasch van Krienen, who was attached to the Russian Naval Brigade. Van Krienen claimed to have discovered it with a coin inside inscribed with the name ‘OMEROS’; a similar grave nearby may have been that of Homer’s mother, Klypomene, who supposedly came from Ios. The claim is considered quite well staked, unlike the location of the poet’s birthplace of which there are seven different possibilities.

The blind bard’s grave sits alone on a bluff, miles from anywhere, overlooking the bleak northeast coast. Parking the gourouna at the end of the brand new track that had just been cut from the unforgiving landscape, I made my way past some smart marble columns and up a grand sweep of substantial steps, eventually coming to a granite-walled pen with a thick marble door frame, suitable for a small dwarf. On entering, I found piled high in one corner the shattered and graffiti-spattered remains of Homer’s new tombstone: someone had taken a sledge hammer to it. What kind of satisfaction, I wondered, could vandals derive from breaking up a remote site in the middle of nowhere, which had been so lovingly restored? And what incentive would there be to repair it in the certain knowledge that the perpetrators would no doubt repeat this barbaric act? It made me livid.

The quiet beach below Chora was a tonic to the morning’s disappointment; I watched a herd of depredatory goats climb into a fig tree and strip away every inch of its heavily leaved and fruited branches. In the refreshing water, I got stung by a jellyfish, which made me jump and feel a bit sheepish as I am sure I cried out when it happened. It was no worse than a stinging nettle but for days after I was covered in interesting scratch-like wheals that looked as if I had just endured a night of ferocious passion. The following day a large lady ran screaming out of the sea with one stuck between her breasts.

The High Speed’s big red wedge-shaped hull stopped just long enough to drop the Spaniard off; it was good to see him again as he lopped down the gangway however, when I introduced him to the gourouna, he dismissively said, “You drive it.”

I could see he felt the conveyance was well beneath him, which was surprising as usually he has such a high regard for his own safety that I am not even allowed so much as to look at a vehicle’s controls.

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