Mystify by Artist Arthur

Author:Artist Arthur
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kimani Press
Published: 2011-03-26T16:00:00+00:00

fifteen

“The first written literary work of ancient Greece is the Iliad. It was written by Homer around a thousand years before Christ.”

“So this Homer’s like really old, huh?”

My thoughts shift back from my crappy weekend to the topic Mrs. Powell just introduced and Jaeden March’s smart-ass remark. Jaeden is super smart, so much so that he really doesn’t need to sit in these classes to pass. He just, like, knows everything. That means he’s bored most of the time and figures we all need his comic relief to get us through.

This time, even though some of the other kids in the class chuckle, I’m actually interested in what Mrs. Powell has to say.

“Yes, he would be by today’s count,” Mrs. Powell concedes. She’s a tall woman, with a butter yellow complexion. Her hair is like this funny red color, and she always wears it in one thick braid down her back. “But more importantly, what I want us to look at in this study of Homer’s work is how old the earth is, how long mankind has been around and some of the issues they faced back then that we’re still facing today.”

“We don’t have to walk around being afraid of pissing Zeus off and him shoving a lightning bolt up our—”

Mrs. Powell holds up a hand at the precise moment Jaeden is about to take his joking to another level entirely. The class giggles. I just shake my head.

“As usual, you’re jumping ahead of me, Jaeden. Let’s start at the beginning,” Mrs. Powell says and passes out a packet of stapled papers. The title is “The Iliad of Homer.”

It’s not too thick, maybe about thirty pages. Surely this isn’t the whole book. We’ve never read anything this small in this class.

“Now, before we start reading, I want to give you a little background.” She moves to her podium and flips a few pages, slipping on stylish gold wire frames and looking down for a minute. Then she peers up over the rim of her glasses. “I know I don’t have to tell you to take notes.”

But yeah, she had to, because right after she says that, I flip open my notebook to a clean sheet of paper and grab a pen from my purse. The shuffling of papers behind me says that the other kids are taking her hint as well.

“Now, has anyone ever heard of the ‘Greek miracle’?”

The question goes unanswered.

Mrs. Powell just keeps right on talking. “This phrase can be translated to ‘Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.’”

“Not very good English, Mrs. Powell.” Again with Jaeden’s remarks.

“Not a very good idea for you to continue interrupting me, Mr. March.”

At that I do laugh.

“As I said, the plan for this assignment is to make comparisons of how the ‘old things passed away,’ namely the timeless tales of gods and heroes, manifested into the ‘all things become new.’ To do that we’re going to read Homer’s Iliad and learn all about the ancient Greeks’ ideas about the battle between good and evil, light and dark.

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