Sybil-a prophet, female, found in Cumae and Delphi, among other sites. Since knowing a bit of history makes this book more interesting, I have included a short reference list to save readers the trouble of having to look up details.Īrgos -Jason’s ship in which he led his Argonauts to Colchis to retrieve the golden fleece it means “speed” in ancient Greek. Readers will recognize bits of McCall and relate to Idaho life.
This is a dense book and there are a few tangents, but they are neatly tied up and the book is very enjoyable to read. At times it is difficult to decide who has it worse, Doerr’s characters or Apulius’! Throughout the book, the story of the shepherd Aethon who is turned into a donkey, a fish, and finally a bird, carries them through their crises. In the past, Anna in Constantinople waits for the Ottoman Turks to smash the 1000 year old walls while the Omeir waits in the Ottoman camp for the walls to fall in the present time, Zeno survives a Korean War POW camp but faces death from a troubled small town guy turned activist in the future, Konstance must face a plague (Covid?) and indefinite solitary quarantine aboard the spaceship Argos. His main characters face life and death decisions. Using elements from Roman author Lucius Apulius’ The Golden Ass and Greek playwright Aristophanes’ plays as his thread, Anthonny Doerr stitches the past, present and future together to create Cloud Cuckoo Land, a fable he attributes to Antonius Diogenes, an ancient Greek (circa 2nd century AD).
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