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For roughly 2500 years people have studied, debated, heralded, and denounced the poet known as Homer and the works Western civilization attributes to him. Through academia's ever-evolving manifestations Homer stands as the center of authority and stability for any student of literature. It is no wonder then that Homer survives and indeed flourishes in the current post-structural, postmodern, ideological-ridden world of the academy. Therefore the true testament does not reside in the particular dogmatic light that one shines upon "Homer" and other such works, but the ability of these works to absorb and refract so many lights from so many regions of the scholarly world. Nevertheless, there are those who fear that Ancient Greece and particularly Homer are losing their influence on contemporary cultural thought due to the increased push for diversity in literary studies. Such fears seem premature because even the opponents of the canon still return to Homer for parting shots. Regardless of the attacks from various camps, Homer pervades culture both within and outside of the university; and despite the dirges for the old bard, his clarion song continues to resonate and reverberate at the center of the Western world.
In their article entitled "Who Killed Homer?" professors John Heath and Victor Davis Hanson paint a bleak and unflattering picture of Homer's place in our contemporary society.1 The two men lament, "the Greeks who started it all are so little known in modern America" (Heath and Hanson 1998). The "it" refers to everything from government to philosophy to science. Heath and Hanson place blame for this condition squarely on the shoulders of the classicists. "Our present generation of classicists helped to destroy classical education . . . our generation of classicists, faced with the rise of Western culture beyond the borders of the West, was challenged to explain the importance of Greek thought and values in an age of electronic information, mass entertainment and crass materialism. Here they failed utterly." In response most classicists would argue quite the contrary, claiming they have reinvented themselves and their departments as a way of staying current while still providing the essential exposure to "Greek thought and values." In fact, by broadening their horizons many Classics departments, both in North America and in Britain, are seeing...