And this is my epic…
Listening time: under 4 minutes.
A marvelous account of a butcher bursting in to Lawrence Durrell's office during...
Polyskarthmos
‘Used to describe Myrine, a dancer, ‘much-skipping’ as the word means literally, even ‘very frisky’, as it is a phrase...
A load of old bull
Here Patrick Leigh Fermor tests the veracity of a much touted myth about Maniots in the Peloponnese being bull wrestlers. ...
Career choices
Here Zorba points out the choices his boss has to make, since you can't prattle about socialism and be a...
Pard-like stubble
I can only imagine this refers to a patchy or spotted colour combination, as 'pard' means leopard or panther, or...
Here comes Hera
One goddess you should never cross, quick to rouse to wrath and terrible in her exactions. Divinely, drop-dead gorgeous, of course.
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Barefoot erudition
Patrick Leigh Fermor wore his vast learning lightly, as real scholars often do. Here he more than meets his match...
One for the microbe
A charming variant of 'one for the road' justifications for one more drink. May you enjoy all the optimism, vigour...
Insubstantial rock-hard durability
The durability of things and of cultures intrigues me; and particularly when those artefacts are themselves physically fragile or insubstantial.
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Wasps quick-bending
One of the many stretch metaphors used by Homer. When you see a comma followed by 'as ...' it can...
Fast and strong
Three triologisms to describe the fine, fast, strong ships that brought the Greeks to Troy. I particularly like 'sea-wandering'. May you be...
Wonder-working juice
A Greek myth concerning a wonder-working juice which confers immortality. However, when asking that Tithonus be granted eternal life they...
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