BOOKS
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charged materials that Pavese would assay; they ask us to read past reason,
for they concern, at one level, the late emergence of reason from the
autonomous play of chthonic forces.
Pavese's procedure is to give a short situating preface and then to
plunge
in medias res,
trusting that the reader will pick up the necessary
context. Weare not required to be versed in the mythological particu–
lars, though every reading further confirms that Pavese's own imagining is
deeply referential - a good handbook of mythic lore will open unsus–
pected vistas.
"The Chimera," the second of the dialogues, can be taken as repre–
sentative. Pavese's preface notes:
It was with high hearts that the youth of Greece set out for the East in
quest of glory and death. Here their courage and daring took them
through a sea of fabulous atrocities, in which some of them failed to
keep their heads. There is no point in citing names. Besides, there
were more than seven such Crusades. It is Homer himself who - in
Book VI of the
Iliad
-
tells us of the melancholy which consumed
the killer of the Chimera in his old age, and of his young grandson
Sarpedon who died under the walls of Troy.
The speakers in the dialogue are Sarpedon and Hippolochus. Hip–
polochus is the son of Bellerophon; Sarpedon, who was slain by Patro–
elus at Troy, is sometimes represented as the son of Zeus and Laodamia,
the daughter of Bellerophon. The exchange, then, is between a son and
a grandson. As for Bellerophon, it may be remembered that after his suc–
cesses in slaying the Chimera and pacifYing the Amazons, he deemed
himself a god and tried to mount up to heaven. Zeus, outraged at his
presumption, caused him to fall to earth, blinded. Thereupon,
Bellerophon avoided all contact with mortals and passed his days wan–
dering aimlessly in the Aleian fields.
Sarpedon begins by reporting to Hippolochus that he has seen
Bellerophon, that he is "a terrible sight." Bellerophon has said to him,
"If I were your age, boy, 1'd go drown myself ... If you want to stay
just and merciful, stop living." Hippolochus is shocked, unable to believe
that his heroic father has succumbed to bitterness. Sarpedon tells of the
old man's belief - that he has been deserted by the gods, that he must
now make atonement for the slaying of the Chimera. He had spoken to
Sarpedon as follows:
From the day I stained myself with the monster's blood, I haven't had
a real life. I have looked for men to fight, tamed the Amazons,
