Reception Radio: Song for a Young Girl, from Assassin's Creed: Odyssey
Queer love and longing, ancient Greek style
There’s a lot to like about Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. There’s also a lot to analyze about Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey. One day I’ll share more about this video game with you, and discuss how it portrays life in Greece during the Peloponnesian War. For now, here’s a little sliver of the game’s soundtrack.
Odyssey features a lot of exciting ways to explore ancient Greece; perhaps my favourite thing to do in the game is explore the Aegean by ship, with a crew who sing sea shanties. Song for a Young Girl is one of said shanties. Its lyrics are an abbreviated ancient Greek poem, sung by a chorus of a cappella women’s voices. (There’s also a men’s chorus version of the song, but I prefer the female one, for reasons I’ll get into soon.)
Like most Assassin’s Creed games, Odyssey draws a lot of attention to historical warfare and to famous figures from the past. However, this instalment in the franchise also highlights the lives of ordinary people in ancient Greece, and the sea shanties are one of the most interesting ways it engages with everyday life. Sadly, there are no surviving sea shanties, work songs, or other ordinary people’s music from ancient Greece. The Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey shanties overcome this gap in the historical record by taking various ancient poems and setting them to melodies. Plenty of ancient poetry was sung, so I’m pleased with this method of composition: it adds some historically accurate flavour to the game on a few levels. The words to Song for a Young Girl are adapted from the Anacreontea, a collection of poetry that dates from the 1st century BCE to the 6th century CE.
As its title suggests, the poem is a love song, directed at a young female subject. We don’t know the identity of the poem’s author: however, by having a female chorus sing it, the Odyssey creative team draw attention to love between women in the ancient Mediterranean. They subtly imply that a woman could have written this poem, or at least that it would have resonated with women in the ancient past. The male ship’s crew can sing this shanty as well: however, there are other shanties that only one gender gets to sing in this game. I have a feeling that giving this song to the female crew was a deliberate choice on the game developer’s part. There are other places in Assassin’s Creed: Odyssey that highlight queerness in ancient Greece: you can put your player character in same-sex love affairs, and there are several openly queer characters you can encounter throughout the game. Some of these characters can even join your crew and participate in singing sea shanties.
I could go on about how ancient queerness gets portrayed in modern pop culture, but for now, I’ll leave you with the music. As always, here are the Spotify and YouTube links. Happy listening!
Lyrics:
In ancient Greek:
ἐγὼ δ’ ἔσοπτρον εἴην,
ὅπως ἀεὶ βλέπῃς μοι·
ἐγὼ χιτὼν γενοίμην,
ὅπως ἀεὶ φορῇς με.
ὕδωρ θέλω γενέσθαι,
ὅπως σε χρῶτα λούσω, ὅπως σε χρῶτα λούσω.
μύρον, γύναι, γενοίμην,
ὅπως ἐγώ σ’ ἐλείψω.
καὶ ταινίη δὲ μασθῷ
καὶ μάργαρον τραχήλῳ
καὶ σάνδαλον γενοίμην·
μόνον ποσὶν πάτει με, μόνον ποσὶν πάτει.
English translation:
If only I could be a mirror,
so that you would always look at me;
if only I could be a robe,
so that you would always wear me;
I wish to become water,
that I might wash your skin;
I’d become perfume, lady,
that I might anoint you;
and a band for your breast,
a pearl for your neck,
a sandal I’d become --
only you get to trample me underfoot!
The original poem, from the Anacreontea:
Εἰς κόρην
ἡ Ταντάλου ποτ’ ἔστη
λίθος Φρυγῶν ἐν ὄχθαις,
καὶ παῖς ποτ’ ὄρνις ἔπτη
Πανδίονος χελιδών.
ἐγὼ δ’ ἔσοπτρον εἴην,
ὅπως ἀεὶ βλέπῃς με·
ἐγὼ χιτὼν γενοίμην,
ὅπως ἀεὶ φορῇς με.
ὕδωρ θέλω γενέσθαι,
ὅπως σε χρῶτα λούσω·
μύρον, γύναι, γενοίμην,
ὅπως ἐγώ σ’ ἀλείψω.
καὶ ταινίη δὲ μασθῷ
καὶ μάργαρον τραχήλῳ
καὶ σάνδαλον γενοίμην·
μόνον ποσὶν πάτει με.