Nervous Hunter

What’s it like to perform the Iliad? It’s hard to imagine- a single poet/rhapsode, performing for between 18-25 hours. How many breaks did they take? How did they divide up the poem? How did the audience keep track of such a long, complex story?

Each week, Lynn Kozak performed a new, partially improvised English translation of a bit of the Iliad, all the way through the epic. These events were part of an FRQSC-funded research-creation project, Previously On… the Iliad, which explores the Iliad’s serial poetics through performance practice and comparative serialities. Performances took place every Monday at Bar des Pins at  6pm between January 15 and August 6, 2018.

Building on Kozak’s 2016 Experiencing Hektor (Bloomsbury, available open-access here) on the Iliad’s serial poetics, and working closely with professional performance practitioners and dramaturges, Previously On The Iliad seeks to answer these questions through a weekly, serial performance of the whole epic and its subsequent analysis within a broader research context on comparative serial poetics in long form narratives.

This is the week I directed, with many tomatoes to create a battle scene. The entire project is on Youtube here.