I've been navigating the mytho-historical shoals of Sir Francis Drake, Sir Henry Morgan, and Captain Jack Sparrow, all on behalf of one of those novels I don't expect to write. Such plodding and plotting lead naturally, for me, to Beowulf, Brecca, and Unferth; to Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser; and to Corum, Elric, and the Eternal Champion. The Green Knight, Gawain, and Arthur the Bear join the crew of my mind's flagship; Shelley, Keats, and Byron, stepping lively, limping lively, as well.
Never far from thought: Theseus and the bull-leapers. Archilochos, Euripides, and Sappho crowd onto the deck. Would there be room for Medea, Ariadne, and Dido? How not?
And what about the Colossus of Rhodes? Are his feet of clay?
I could never really be a trickster or a pirate, but what's the enduring, recurring appeal then? Appeal? Fascination and yearning, more like, belike. Still, it's not that simple, never that simple.
Frankly, I'm more Law than Chaos (Thank you, Michael Moorcock), and I recoil from James Joyce's stubborn "non serviam" (being a steady student of Virgil and my father's son), and yet, and yet, and yet, and yet, and yet, and yet . . . .
What are those famous lines of St. Augustine?
Why do I see him at the helm of a swift ship with black sails?
Is that Robin Hood beside him or just Errol Flynn?
