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It has become impossible to sustain the fiction that the BBC is merely reflecting the country as it is rather than seeking to create the country as it wants it to be.

It is very good.

The two examples you give are of people referencing Aeschylus’ “fidelity” to the (elevated?) style of Homer rather than anything to do with the narrative content - it’s not quite the same thing. Amusingly in this context what we do see a lot of is discussion of “what Homer didn’t get quite right”.

I’m pretty sure that “You were not sufficiently faithful to Homer” ever entered anyone’s conversation. Though you are of course quite right that it was dangerous to be a transgressive playwright. Ask, er ... all the playwrights that we know of.

I am the mangy dog who eagerly reads the LRB.

I very much doubt it.

”Clay Harris slams the LRB for being gimmicky.”

The Nazis too did this with Greece and Rome.

The English (and the Americans) love “the glory that was Greece and the grandeur that was Rome” because (among other reasons) they feel it sanctifies their imperialist arrogance. We cherry-pick from the past that which we hope excuses and ennobles our vices.

I was, foolishly, being sarcastic.

Imagine if even just this one were read ... at all. Still reading what someone else said that it said is an improvement over the fate of most other LRB articles ever written.

Indeed. But without survival there isn’t even dreaming. Slashing the future is the best way to end everything.