Sappho

Melvyn Bragg and his guests discuss the Greek poet Sappho. Born in the late seventh century BC, Sappho spent much of her life on the island of Lesbos. In antiquity she was famed as one of the greatest lyric poets, but owing to a series of accidents the bulk of her work was lost to posterity. The fragments that do survive, however, give a tantalising glimpse of a unique voice of Greek literature. Her work has lived on in other languages, too, translated by such major poets as Ovid, Christina Rossetti and Baudelaire.

With

Edith Hall
Professor of Classics at King's College, London

Margaret Reynolds
Professor of English at Queen Mary, University of London

and

Dirk Obbink
Professor of Papyrology and Greek Literature at the University of Oxford
Fellow and tutor at Christ Church, Oxford

Producer: Simon Tillotson.