We often assume love and war are opposites. We tend to think we should maintain unconditional love for our romantic partner, families, and friends, who are like other selves, and we should hold an absolute, unyielding disdain for those on the other side from us.
But if we look closer at love’s apparent bond, we see a thousand conflicts that estrange lovers even while their love remains alive. Or, if we look at war’s reality, we see the vast similarity and even kinship of enemy soldiers on the battlefield who, on either side, know fear, suffering, and unspeakable loss.
We’re led to wonder:
- Why do some couples or families, by turns, love and hate each other?
- What motivates soldiers at times to help their enemy in danger?
- What makes love and war so passionate?
- What makes love and war so enduring?
In reading the stories and lyric poems of the ancients, we can understand this mystery more. We’ll feel the grief that connects Priam and Achilles, as Priam begs for the corpse of his son, killed and desecrated at the hands of Achilles, who’s also amidst grief. And we’ll probe the animosity fermenting beneath the love poems of classic ancient poets like Sappho, Catullus, and Ovid, in hopes that we can recognize, beneath the passions of love or war, a pattern in the chaos.
Come join our lunch reading and discussion as we unravel the intricacies linking love and war. No prior reading or literary background required.
Led by James Prather
Email jprather@houstoninstitute.org, if interested.
