Performing Homeric islands: Homeric receptions in (post-)Hellenistic Asia

Abstract

Introduction

In 2003, Greek epigraphists and archaeologists from France discovered a Greek epigram, ultimately from Kandahar, Afghanistan, in a private collection.¹ The epigram is carved on a square block of limestone in learned archaic Greek idioms. This inscription dates from the second century BCE to the beginning of our era. The acrostic formed by the initial letters of each line reads ΔΙΑ ΣΩΦΥΤΟΥ ΤΟΥ ΝΑΡΑΤΟΥ: by Sophytos, the son of Naratos. This poem recounts Sophytos’ efforts to rebuild his ancestral Indian house after its decline, his mastery of the techniques of the Muses and Apollo, and his mercantile travels from one city to another city. Readers versed in Homeric epic will recognize this epigram as a rewriting of the Odyssey.

On 27 January 2023, TXT, a K-pop male band from HYBE (the parent company of BTS), released their new song ‘Sugar Rush Ride’. In its music video, the five members of TXT arrive on an island as refugees.² After waking up near their ship, they find an abundance of flowers and other plants. TXT then use dance to express their organic interaction with the natural environment, and their bodies also transform into plants. Moreover, one member of them becomes too addicted to nature, particularly pink and white flowers, to leave, and others have to drag him away. Those familiar with Homer may recognize motifs from the Odyssey, such as the island, shipwreck, and lotus-eaters.

This article presents critical interpretations of the Sophytos inscription in comparison with ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ while situating the latter within the context of the cultural politics of sugar production in modern colonialism. It posits that both pieces individually engage with discreet episodes concerning Homeric islands in the Odyssey: Odysseus’ fabrication of his Cretan background in book 14 and the lotus-eating story in book 9. Meanwhile, both refer to the Phaeacian episode in book 8. In doing so, this article not only underscores the significance of this Homeric epic as a rich mine from which people across different time periods and geographic areas (such as ancient Kandahar and contemporary Korea) draw inspiration, but also contributes to a re-evaluation of the epistemic foundation of research on Hellenistic Central Asia and its legacy.

The field of study on Hellenistic Central Asia or Hellenism in ancient Asia in general, stemming from modern British and French colonialisms, seeks to uncover Greek culture and Hellenism in the Far East through archaeological excavations. Scholars in this field have already initiated critical reflections.³ There are two potential areas where further reflections might be undertaken: (1) further discussion of relevant scholarly practices from the perspective of critical classical reception studies; (2) a comparison between Hellenism in Hellenistic Central Asia and India and the reception of Greco-Roman culture in contemporary Asian visual culture. This article aligns with the latter approach.

Whereas the accidental discovery of the Sophytos inscription may seem to further glorify the achievements of Hellenism in Central Asia,⁴ this article seeks to counteract a triumphalist tone by comparing the epigram with Homeric reception in K-pop. As I will demonstrate, the value of this comparison lies in its potential to illustrate how Hellenism adapts to foreign contexts when our understanding of Hellenistic Central Asia and India remains limited. Through a dynamic reading method,⁵ I aim to showcase how a discussion of Homeric reception in K-pop, with its numerous thematic parallels to the Sophytos inscription, can be a step towards decolonizing Hellenistic studies.⁶ As I will show, this endeavour becomes significant when we consider the impact of modern colonialism, which not only underlies research on Hellenistic Central Asia but is also epitomized in the framing of the overall imagination in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’.

To demonstrate the implications of classical receptions in K-pop for Hellenistic scholars, some background information is needed. As part of the title of the article, the term ‘(post)-Hellenistic Asia’ is deployed to chronologically address Homeric receptions in the Sophytos inscription and ‘Sugar Rush Ride’. While the Sophytos inscription can be related to Hellenistic Central Asia or its aftermath, applying this term to contemporary South Korea is metaphorical, when we consider contemporary Korea’s vision of its antiquity. Whereas it is beyond the scope of this article, as part of increasing Greco-Roman receptions in Korean popular culture,⁷ it is worth noting an early notable example: the 2009 Korean historical drama Queen Seondeok that attributes the unification of the Korean Peninsular for the first time in the seventh century CE to a Korean queen proficient in ancient Greek and spoken Latin who values Hellenistic political philosophy as recounted in Plutarch’s Lives, which she accessed in Central Asia through a Roman merchant.⁸

This historical drama can be seen as a snapshot of how, as a post-WWII national state rooted in American imperialist intervention in East Asia during the Korean War,⁹ contemporary South Korea virtually represents its past to the public by replacing its Sinitic past with a Hellenistic one, in tandem with its present Americanized identity.¹⁰ Understanding South Korea’s position within the American system is crucial for comprehending the nature of K-pop, which, being rooted in Korean musicians entertaining American soldiers in the 1960s and 1970s, creatively imitates and recreates Euro-American popular culture in East Asia.¹¹

In this light, the references to twentieth-century American popular culture in recent K-pop songs highlight the resurgence of pre-social media American culture in K-pop music videos on platforms like TikTok or YouTube. They not only evoke nostalgia for the Cold War-era Pax Americana but also showcase how American culture manifests in a new form in the social media age.¹² The increasing number of Greco-Roman receptions in K-pop should be viewed within this broader context.

This article thus critically explores the socio-economic foundations underlying the aesthetic form of a K-pop song which employs the guise of a Homeric reception. In doing so, the central message in this article is to emphasize the potential pitfalls of constructing an idealized version of Hellenistic Central Asia based solely on a limited selection of Greek literary sources and artefacts featuring Hellenic themes from Central Asia, specifically Bactria and Arachosia.¹³ An analogy that I will draw upon here is how future media archaeologists might rely on various classical receptions in K-pop to envision a ‘Hellenistic Korea’, or using these receptions to define the entire intellectual enterprise of studying Korea during the early twenty-first century.¹⁴

More specifically, the first section engages in a close literary examination of the Homeric reception of the Cretan island in the Sophytos inscription, highlighting how it revises the anti-mercantile ideology in the epic. In analysing ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, I argue in the second section that within a Homeric framework where island, shipwreck, and lotus-eating come into focus, the song transcends the twentieth century by delving into earlier trans-Atlantic modernity by referring to a crucial element in this dynamic: sugar — its production by Black slaves in the Caribbean, and consumption by Europeans in metropole, particularly a British one. In my argument, the song constructs a meta-musical vision of the global production and consumption of K-pop in the social media age by implicitly revisiting modern globalization. This song emphasizes how the intensive training and labour of K-pop idols, epitomized in their performance via their eroticized bodies, offers something akin to ‘sweetness’ for global audiences, particularly those in the West, to visually and acoustically consume. Furthermore, I demonstrate that this song exposes internal contradictions and ambiguities within K-pop, particularly between post-colonialism/orientalism and neo-colonialism/orientalism.

My interpretation of ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ thus serves as a reminder that understanding the Sophytos inscription should consider its unique sociocultural context in Kandahar, a realm still shrouded in limited evidence.¹⁵ When faced with a lack of corroborating evidence to comprehend the real socio-economic conditions surrounding the learned Homeric reception in the Sophytos inscription, the analysis of ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ becomes a contemporary comparandum. It demonstrates how a Homeric reception from contemporary Asia reflects Korea’s techno-post-modernity. Overall, the connection between these two discussions revolves around the intertwining of economy and aesthetic form, whether manifested in a poem or a music video, as they engage with similar episodes in the Odyssey. In essence, the juxtaposition of interpretations of the Sophytos inscription and ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ constitutes an intervention in the field of Hellenistic studies through the lens of classical reception studies. This juxtaposition suggests that Hellenism must hold a highly unique meaning in Central Asia, just as it must in classical receptions in contemporary Korea.¹⁶

In this light, the term ‘(post)-Hellenistic Asia’ in the title of this article carries two meanings. First, in line with traditional periodization, it acknowledges how contemporary Korean media construct a foundation myth for post-1945 Korea by drawing on Hellenism in post-Hellenistic Central Asia, as revealed through Queen Seondeok, while the Sophytos inscription may fall into the post-Hellenistic period if we follow a low dating.¹⁷ Secondly, the ‘post’ is metaphorically used to explore how we may move away from a traditional understanding of Hellenism in Asia, a dynamic that has been referred to as ‘Hellenistic’.

Homeric reception in (post-)Hellenistic Asia: Kandahar

Following the end of Mauryan rule in Arachosia in today’s southern Afghanistan, the political history of the region, from which the Sophytos inscription originates, unfolds through its governance under the Greco-Bactrian kingdom, likely within a broad Seleucid framework, and its involvement in the conflicts between Parthia and Central Asian nomads from the early second century BCE to the end of the first century BCE.¹⁸ Depending on the dating, the Sophytos inscription can be associated with either Indo-Greek rule or Parthian rule. Given the scarcity of evidence, the most appropriate interpretation of this inscription is to view it as a Homeric reception in the post-Mauryan north-west.¹⁹ As I will presently show, the Sophytos inscription represents a subaltern reception of the Cretan tale in the Odyssey by linking Sophytos’ personal experience with that of Odysseus.

The Cretan tale in book 14, in which Odysseus deceitfully presents himself as a Cretan beggar, stands as one of the most intriguing episodes in the Odyssey.²⁰ Building on Patrice Rankine’s insight into the subaltern experience of Odysseus as a slave,²¹ I argue that Sophytos emerges as a unique ancient reader of this particular episode. In particular, the Sophytos inscription overturns the explicit anti-mercantile ideology found in the Odyssey, most prominently expressed in the Phaeacian prince’s accusation of Odysseus as a Phoenician merchant:

In this ideological framework, a wanderer is easily linked to a merchant, a figure often looked down upon, thus creating an intrinsic dissonance between being a hero and being a merchant. As Carol Dougherty contends, Odysseus functions as a proto-wandering poet who sells his poetic skill while revising aristocratic ideology.²³ It is thus crucial to connect the accusation against Odysseus as a Phoenician merchant with his apologoi in books 9–12, where he recounts his post-Trojan experience.²⁴ While we typically perceive the apologoi as truthful by dismissing Cretan tales as false, Odysseus’ apologoi in front of the Phaeacians share a similar narrative structure: despite Odysseus’ current wretched situation, he once enjoyed a noble past.²⁵ This parallel becomes especially apparent when comparing the apologoi with the second Cretan tale, where Odysseus pretends to be a beggar in front of the traitors at his house: Odysseus’ experience in the island of the Phaeacians is consistent with his experience in Ithaca.²⁶

As acknowledged, the epic we now call the Odyssey comprises not only one ‘Odyssey’ but many ‘Odysseys’, raising questions about the authorship responsible for weaving these diverse narratives together.²⁷ Odysseus’ rejection of Demodocus’ authority to sing the story of Odysseus points to a competition between different narrative registers.²⁸ Particularly in book 14, concerning Odysseus’ self-declaration that he is well-travelled (ἐπὶ πολλὰ δ᾿ ἀλήθην), the swineherd Eumaeus responds as follows:

This comment from Eumaeus highlights competition between low-class travellers vying to narrate the stories of Odysseus in Ithaca. It meta-poetically reveals the interconnection between travelling, storytelling, and profit-making. The island of Ithaca transforms into a space where various storytellers compete to share their distinct ‘Odysseys’.³⁰ This dynamic is foundational to Odysseus’ subsequent Cretan tale to Eumaeus. In essence, the notion that the epic Odyssey, in its current form, is an outcome of collective negotiations between different narrative registers — both high and low — is a plausible one.³¹

Sophytos emerges as a distinctive reader and interpreter of this subaltern layer of the epic by emphasizing the entwining of long-distance trade and literary experimentation, as reflected in the epigram (SEG 54.1568):

As mentioned, the lack of a clear context for this inscription makes it challenging to pinpoint it to a specific historical setting. If dated to the second century BCE, it could be linked to Bactria’s conquest of Arachosia between the late third century BCE and the early second century BCE.³³ In this case, it is plausible that Sophytos was involved in trans-Hindu Kush commerce or commerce between Arachosia and India.³⁴ However, if dated to the beginning of our era, it might be intriguing to associate this inscription with Indian Ocean trade.³⁵ Nevertheless, instead of engaging in speculative scenarios, it is more prudent for our analysis to focus on the dialectical relationship between long-distance trade and Sophytos’ self-identity as an itinerant mercantile performer within the overall framework of Homeric reception.

The inscription commences by appropriating a tragic theme, invoking the destruction of a distinguished family by the Fates.³⁶ The third line introduces Sophytos, the son of Naratos, as a constructed author and protagonist of this inscription.³⁷ While displaying his authorship, lines 3 and 4 depict how Sophytos’ lack of family support renders him resourceless. This opening bears a resemblance to the background of the Cretan Odysseus. According to the Cretan tale, Odysseus, born into a distinguished Cretan family as the son of a purchased maiden, inherits only a small portion of the family wealth after his father’s death. In contrast, his legitimate brothers receive the majority of the property (τοὶ δὲ ζωὴν ἐδάσαντο παῖδες ὑπέρθυμοι καὶ ἐπὶ κλήρους ἐβάλοντο, αὐτὰρ ἐμοὶ μάλα παῦρα δόσαν καὶ οἰκί᾿ ἔνειμαν).³⁸ Although the first three lines of the inscription explicitly detail the decline of Sophytos’ ancestral house, they implicitly suggest Sophytos’ much less advantaged status due to a lack of ancestral resources (τυννὸς κομιδῆι βιότοιό τε πατρῶν Σώφυτος εὖνις). The participle αὐτὰρ suggests that Sophytos inherits nothing from the family when the household resources are already limited. Furthermore, lines 3 and 4 of the inscription echo the sentiment of the αὐτὰρ ἐμοὶ μάλα παῦρα δόσαν καὶ οἰκί᾿ ἔνειμαν phrase in the Cretan tale.³⁹

As Odysseus’ Cretan tale unfolds, he engages in plundering before the Trojan War breaks out:

While the world of the Odyssey is post-Trojan War, Odysseus deliberately sets his Cretan tale at an earlier time. In echoing the Trojan War, Cretan Odysseus engages in plundering foreign lands to accumulate wealth. In particular, his plundering becomes laudable in Crete. The phrase δεινός τ᾿ αἰδοῖός τε μετὰ Κρήτεσσι τετύγμην evokes poetic imagery about a pre-Trojan Odyssey by glorifying Odysseus’ accomplishment in Crete.⁴¹ Before these lines, Odysseus distinguishes between two modes of wealth acquisition: agriculture and plundering. He expresses dissatisfaction with both agriculture and child-rearing (ἔργον δέ μοι οὐ φίλον ἔσκεν οὐδ᾿ οἰκωφελίη, ἥ τε τρέφει ἀγλαὰ τέκνα).⁴² However, an irony emerges as Odysseus’ family ultimately benefits from his plundering life, as revealed in the line αἶψα δὲ οἶκος ὀφέλλετο. In essence, though Odysseus does not inherit the bulk of the family wealth, his entrepreneurial spirit and warrior activities contribute to building a new family.

The Sophytos inscription mirrors this narrative mechanism by adapting a warrior’s tale to a merchant’s tale. While Odysseus prioritizes military prowess attributed to Ares and Athena (ἦ μὲν δὴ θάρσος μοι Ἄρης τ᾿ ἔδοσαν καὶ Ἀθήνη καὶ ῥηξηνορίην),⁴³ Sophytos practices the virtues of Apollo and Athena with prudence (ὡς ἀρετὴν Ἑκάτου Μουσέων τ᾽ ἤσ(κ)ηκα σὺν ἐσθλῆι φυρτὴν σωφροσύνηι). This adaptation parallels the way bodily strength benefits Cretan Odysseus, while Sophytos possesses cultural capital despite initially lacking economic capital.

I interpret the line ὡς ἀρετὴν Ἑκάτου Μουσέων τ᾽ ἤσ(κ)ηκα σὺν ἐσθλῆι φυρτὴν σωφροσύνηι as a critical hint to Sophytos’ identity as a performer, particularly when the references to Apollo and the Muses are considered. The adverb ὡς is particularly revealing in showing how Sophytos’ economic hardship motivates him to learn performance techniques as a form of cultural capital.⁴⁴ The conjunction (τ)ῆμος then bridges economic and cultural capitals by highlighting Sophytos’ rationality, as indicated by the cognitive verb ἐπεφρασάμην and the indirect question marker πῶς. In this epigram, the house symbolizes literary composition; as will be discussed below, this meta-poetic aspect has been present in the first seven lines by indicating a link between performative skill and house-rebuilding.

Narratively, this connection is portrayed through long-distance mercantile performance, covered in lines 8–12. Despite Sophytos’ economic disadvantage, he gains cultural capital (embodied in performance skill) through diligent practice. Before transforming his cultural capital into economic wealth, he acquires a temporary economic capital by borrowing money.⁴⁵ The inscription vividly characterizes the borrowed money as τεκνοφόρον (‘child-bearing’), hinting at a form of proto-capitalism where money can generate more money.⁴⁶ From a formalist perspective, this child-bearing metaphor can also be interpreted more literally: the borrowed money will be instrumental in Sophytos’ rebuilding of his house, and his sons/grandsons mentioned at the end are indispensable for this enterprise.⁴⁷

Sophytos thus outlines two prerequisites for his future overseas success, leading to the reconstruction of his house and literary creation: the skill of Apollo and Muses as aretē and his borrowed silvered money as teknophoron. As an echo, Cretan Odysseus gains a marriage with a wealthy daughter. After narrating his disadvantage in family inheritance, he adds:

Here, Odysseus emphasizes that his military prowess, defined as aretē, leads to his marriage to a girl from a family possessing many lands. The support from Cretan Odysseus’ father-in-law is conceivably important for his subsequent career in plundering, even though the narrative does not highlight this aspect.

In this context, the Sophytos inscription rewrites Cretan Odysseus’ military prowess into Sophytos’ subliterary paideia, while contrasting Sophytos’ silvered money with Odysseus’ landed wealth.⁴⁹ A clear indicator of Sophytos’ involvement in a long-distance mercantile career can be found in line 11: he visits many cities en route.⁵⁰ What accompanies this mercantile journey is an accumulation of an enormous amount of wealth. Line 12 (ὄλβον ἀλωβήτως εὐρὺν ἐληισάμην) is the most characteristic of mercantile ideology: Sophytos does not feel shameful or embarrassed in his mercantile activity, as the adverb ἀλωβήτως legitimatizes Sophytos’ commercial activities around various cities.⁵¹

Here, the Sophytos inscription reverses the explicit message in the Cretan tale again by challenging anti-mercantile ideology. As demonstrated, Odysseus’ apologos in Phaeacia aims to prove that he is not a Phoenician merchant, as the prince suggests. Similarly, in another slave-telling-tale narrative justifying Odysseus’ wretched situation, the Cretan tale blames Phoenician merchants for Cretan Odysseus’ status as a wandering beggar in Ithaca. Though Odysseus praises plundering as a legitimate means of acquiring wealth, he thinks little of the Phoenicians’ mercantile activities, including their slave trade based on trick and cunning instead of bravery and muscle.⁵² The Sophytos inscription thus intends to dispel this anti-mercantile ideology by legitimizing long-distance mercantile travelling, including itinerant performance.

Furthermore, as discussed, Odysseus uses the word aoidos to indicate the existence of a pre-Trojan Odyssey. Likewise, the phrase ὑμνητὸς δὲ πέλων in line 13 more directly displays that Sophytos’ enterprise is not only without shame, but should be praised. This phrase meta-poetically suggests the possibility to add monumental form to Sophytos’ existing fame by erecting this inscription. The final lines of the inscription then come to Sophytos’ nostos. While the Cretan tale is the first major narrative Odysseus recounts after his return to Ithaca, the mention of a pre-Trojan Odyssey in Crete entails Odysseus’ vision about his reputation in post-Trojan Ithaca.

In the same vein, Sophytos adds a monumental form to his mercantile enterprise. The rest of the inscription between lines 15 and 20 is about Sophytos’ rebuilding of his house, including composing and erecting the inscription. The inscription uses three verbs to portray Sophytos’ rebuilding of his house: συντέλεσα, ἔτευξα, and ἐπέθηκα. The first verb συντέλεσα is about reviving the rotten paternal house; ἔτευξα shows the erection of another tomb, since the original tomb has fallen apart⁵³; and ἐπέθηκα has to do with erecting this inscription. The erection of this inscription thus goes hand in hand with Sophytos’ rebuilding of his house.

Sophytos also sets an agenda for his inscription’s interaction with audiences. The phrase ἐν ὁδῶι defines the audiences’ spatial relationship with the inscription by displaying its public character. While the inscription requires a certain proficiency in literary Greek to apprehend, the adjective λάλον (‘speaking’) defines his readers’ experience of reading aloud the inscription that narrates Sophytos’ biography.⁵⁴ Above all, the word στήλην, which appears in the heading of the inscription, consciously presents its materiality.⁵⁵

By relating the second half of the inscription to the first half of the inscription, we can detect three parallels:

• (1) Sophytos’ house has fallen — Sophytos rebuilds the house;

• (2) Sophytos borrows money — Sophytos earns wealth;

• (3) Sophytos acquires the arts of Apollo and Muses — Sophytos erects the inscription.

These three parallels demonstrate the three facets of Sophytos: Sophytos matures to be the head of a patriarchal household, Sophytos grows to be a mercantile performer, and Sophytos manages to be a performer-turned-author. These facets are interlocked: the reconstruction of the house is Sophytos’ primary goal, the acquisition of wealth through long-distance mercantile performance facilitates this objective, and the erection of the inscription adds an aesthetic form to these two aspects.

The inscription, in its formalist aspect, is a twenty-line epigram utilizing Homeric idioms to narrate a Homeric nostos story, effectively compressing the content of the twenty-four books of the Odyssey into an epigram.⁵⁶ While uncertainty surrounds whether Sophytos composed the epigram, it is evident that Sophytos consciously positions himself as the author.⁵⁷ Despite his ability to accumulate wealth through economic means, Sophytos also engages in Greek performative traditions by practicing the arts of Apollo and the Muses with prudence, showcasing his participation in cultural aspects despite not being ethnically Greek.

In returning to the three parallel verbs in lines 16–18 recounting Sophytos’ rebuilding of his house/tomb and erecting the inscription, the participles σεσηπότα (‘rotten’) and πεπτωκότος (‘fallen’) in the phrases οἶκόν τε σεσηπότα πάτριον (‘reviving the rotten paternal house’) and τύμβου πεπτωκότος (erecting another tomb since the original tomb has fallen apart) carry meta-poetic implications. These participles suggest Sophytos’ engagement in acts of renovation and renewal by portraying his efforts in revitalizing his ancestral structures. The third parallel with Sophytos’ erection of the inscription thus entails an ambition to revive certain literary writing styles. It showcases a strong self-conscious sense of authorship. This implies that, beyond the socio-economic aspects of rebuilding the house and earning wealth, the inscription serves as a statement about renewing the Homeric style. Sophytos, by composing this epigram, aligns himself with the literary traditions of Homer and seeks to breathe new life into these stylistic elements based on his personal experience.⁵⁸

In this light, in addition to the obvious message that Sophytos’ sons/grandsons will inherit his house and wealth, the final line υἱέες υἱωνοί τ᾽ οἶκον ἔχοιεν ἐμοῦ entails a literary vision. This suggests that the Homeric style, which could be linked to Sophytos’ performative activities, would be revived and emulated by his successors. Despite the paucity of evidence from Arachosia and neighbouring areas, the Trojan scene from Gandhara implies a familiarity with Homeric motifs in a region not too far away from Arachosia.⁵⁹

The information about long-distance mercantile performance in this epigram thus has a meta-poetic implication: Sophytos’ engagement in this enterprise not only provides an economic condition for composing his inscription but also contributes to a genuine story derived from his real experience. This vision aligns with Carol Dougherty’s interpretation of Odysseus as a profit-driven wandering storyteller, whose stories are rooted in personal experience rather than poetic memory associated with aristocratic families.

Overall, Sophytos emerges as a reader of the Odyssey, and the Sophytos epigram, by delving into the Homeric narrative, contributes to the exploration of hidden transcripts within the epic. Efforts by contemporary scholars to uncover whether Odysseus presents himself as a merchant or slave find resonance in the Sophytos epigram, which fleshes out an oppressed narrative within the Odyssey. Rankine’s suggestion that Odysseus might be viewed as a slave finds support in the Sophytos epigram. This aspect should prompt a reconsideration of the entire narrative structure of the Odyssey. The insights of post-classical reception as a lens for rethinking overlooked aspects of original texts are exemplified in the Sophytos epigram’s role in recovering subaltern experiences underlying the Odyssey.⁶⁰ This reception piece echoes post-colonial engagements with the epic, shedding light on marginalized and seemingly trivial aspects.⁶¹

In particular, books 14 and 15 tell of information exchange between members of the lower classes.⁶² This aspect finds a parallel in the Sophytos epigram, which helps re-evaluate Odysseus’ apologoi. It suggests that his narrative in Phaeacia may not be truer than his later lies in Ithaca.⁶³ Despite the elite veneer present in the current form of the epic, which masks diverse subaltern traditions about Odysseus by portraying him as a returning hero of noble stature, the Sophytos epigram serves as a reception that unveils the subaltern mercantile experience by taking off the mask and presenting a different perspective on Odysseus and his world.⁶⁴

Homeric reception in virtual (post-)Hellenistic Asia: Korea

Whereas the Sophytos inscription appropriates the Cretan tale in the Odyssey, it also delves into the Phaeacian episode, where mercantile and aristocratic ideologies are negotiated, when it presents an image of proto-capitalism. Similarly, the K-pop song ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ immerses itself in a neo-liberal capitalistic fantasy, drawing parallels with the dancing scene on the Phaeacian island and directly engaging with the lotus-eating motif in the epic. In doing so, the song, centred around sugar production and consumption, offers a utopian image of an empty island by implicitly addressing modern colonialism in the Caribbean.

Meanwhile, just as Homeric reception in the Sophytos inscription prompts a re-evaluation of certain aspects of the Odyssey, Homeric reception in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ encourages a reconsideration of the Sophytos inscription as a cultural artefact of ‘Hellenistic Central Asia’. The following elucidation of the idiosyncratic socio-economic system underpinning the Homeric reception in this K-pop song will remind us that the Sophytos epigram speaks to another idiosyncratic cultural system vastly different from its original Greek context, about which we possess limited knowledge, despite its learned Homeric veneer.

While Odysseus’ Cretan tale is a major intertext of the Sophytos inscription, the dancing scene in Phaeacia is an implicit intertext of ‘Sugar Rush Ride’. As discussed in the previous section, the Phaeacian episode in the Odyssey presents anti-mercantile ideology when Odysseus is invited to participate in an athletic agōn. Meanwhile, as part of the competition between Odysseus and the Phaeacians, the utopian image of the Phaeacian island holds a kinesthetic dimension, which is tied to the meta-poetic role of the Phaeacian dancing bodies in book 8.⁶⁵ As this episode has been extensively discussed. I will briefly highlight how Phaeacian dance shapes a utopian image of this Homeric island.⁶⁶ The Phaeacian dance scene emerges in the dynamic agōn between Odysseus and king Alcinous.

Alcinous initially seeks to impress Odysseus through sports by emphasizing the Phaeacians’ prowess as the best athletes (ὥς χ᾿ ὁ ξεῖνος ἐνίσπῃ οἷσι φίλοισιν, οἴκαδε νοστήσας, ὅσσον περιγιγνόμεθ᾿ ἄλλων πύξ τε παλαιμοσύνῃ τε καὶ ἅλμασιν ἠδὲ πόδεσσιν).⁶⁷ However, after Odysseus displays his talents across various sports, which challenge the anti-mercantile discrimination he had received, Alcinous pivots to dance and boasts that the Phaeacians excel in this domain by using the same formula (ὥς χ᾿ ὁ ξεῖνος ἐνίσπῃ οἷσι φίλοισιν οἴκαδε νοστήσας, ὅσσον περιγιγνόμεθ᾿ ἄλλω ναυτιλίῃ καὶ ποσσὶ καὶ ὀρχηστυῖ καὶ ἀοιδῇ).⁶⁸ The dance performance commences as a collective chorus, but Odysseus focuses more on Demodocus’ song accompanying the dance, particularly when the poet sings the story of Aphrodite and Ares.

In essence, when the Phaeacians present a multimedia spectacle, Odysseus’ attention gravitates towards the auditory aspect rather than the visual. In this context, the king commands two dancers to perform a duet and Odysseus eventually responds with thauma (Ἀλκίνοος δ᾿ Ἅλιον καὶ Λαοδάμαντα κέλευσεν μουνὰξ ὀρχήσασθαι).⁶⁹ Odysseus, unable to dance but excelling in various sports, then employs his highly logocentric means of recounting his personal sufferings, involving various fairytales, including the lotus-eating island: Books 9 to 12 thus constitute apologoi in response to the embodied performance presented by the Phaeacians.⁷⁰ While presenting the dance, Alcinous anticipates that Odysseus will narrate the tale of Phaeacia upon his return to Ithaca. This expectation meta-poetically underscores Odysseus’ role as a storyteller and how his storytelling would propagate the fame of the Phaeacians. Dance, therefore, becomes a central component in shaping outside visitors’ perception of Phaeacia as a utopian island.

Similarly, the island in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ is best interpreted as a meta-media construction of a K-pop concert, which satisfies the visual and acoustic needs and desires of global K-pop fans. This dynamic is akin to consuming sugar. This virtual and metaphoric island highlights the virtual construction of Korea’s utopian image alongside the global dissemination of Korean popular culture, particularly K-pop, on mainstream social media platforms. In this light, whereas we have no existing evidence to ground the Sophytos epigram within its concrete sociocultural system other than to relate it to the Cretan episode in the epic, we are able to build a meaningful link between this K-pop song, with its Homeric veneer, and the contemporary neo-capitalistic system and previous modern colonialism to which it speaks.

The dual themes in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ — the haptic experience of consuming K-pop through sweets and the meta-musical representation of K-pop performers’ global travels — are not new in K-pop. A similar effect was exhibited in the 1996 song ‘Candy’ by H.O.T., one of the earliest K-pop groups.⁷¹ In its music video, set in an American-style amusement park, the members donned cartoon outfits and the overall ambiance reflected the political economic underpinning of K-pop as a burgeoning youth culture in 1990s Korea. While the Korean middle class formed during the 1960s and 1980s, their children had ample pocket money to pursue pop fandom.⁷²

Over more than two decades, K-pop evolved from a subgenre of Korean popular music catering to young adults to a music industry produced in Korea for global audiences.⁷³ While sharing the affective structure of using sweets to capture the haptic feel of music, the sugar imagery in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ can be connected to the colonial past of sugar production in capitalist modernity, which is symbolized by the shipwreck and island depicted in the music video. Under European colonialism, Caribbean islands were transformed into landscapes of sugar production, which often involved slavery, initially by Spain and later by England from the sixteenth to eighteenth centuries.⁷⁴ In this dynamic, sugar emerged as a symbol of ideological contestation in Anglo-Caribbean literature, encompassing colonialists/imperialists, abolitionists, and post-colonialists.⁷⁵ Broadly, the motif of the island and shipwreck in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ embodies a classical colonial motif, as represented by Daniel Defoe’s novel Robinson Crusoe.⁷⁶

Simultaneously, when the K-pop industry embraces the representation of K-pop idols as travelling performers in various songs,⁷⁷ it turns to European colonial modernity. An exemplary instance is the 2022 song ‘Don Quixote’ sung by Seventeen, another HYBE idol group similar to TXT.⁷⁸ It is a common consensus amongst literary critics that Cervantes’ novel Don Quixote speaks to early modern Spanish global expansion in the Age of Discovery.⁷⁹ Though the song’s composers may not have an extensive understanding of this novel, its borrowing by K-pop effectively engages with the semiotic world and political economic implications behind this literary work, in the sense that Korea is ‘conquering’ the world by exporting its popular culture.⁸⁰

Similarly, the incorporation of the shipwreck/island motif, along with flower-eating, into a song stressing the sweetness of K-pop idols’ bodies, speaks to the colonial past of sugar production, whether or not the producers and composers are fully aware of it.⁸¹ This dynamic involves two aspects: (1) the political economy underpinning the forging of K-pop idols’ bodies within the K-pop industry; (2) the artistic connection between K-pop choreography and Black dance traditions.

Literary critic Simon Gikandi highlights the obscured link between the harsh labour of slaves in the New World and the cultivation of a refined taste in the Old World, particularly in Britain. The consumption of sugar produced in the Caribbean islands plays a significant role in this dynamic.⁸² This contradiction between production and consumption aligns with Karl Marx’s notion of ‘alienation labor’.⁸³ Gikandi’s focus has a more racially oriented dimension, whereas Marx emphasizes the proletariat in European metropoles.⁸⁴ In our time, K-pop, as a potent cultural industry, exemplifies this issue: the allure behind global fans’ fascination with K-pop idols’ flamboyant performances is rooted in the idols’ rigorous training and countless rehearsals.⁸⁵ When ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ uses sugar imagery to convey the taste of K-pop performances, juxtaposing it with the colonial motif of shipwreck and island, the song conveys a sweet sensation that taps into this internal contradiction between production and consumption rooted in capitalist modernity.

Through its engagement with ‘high culture’, the K-pop industry notably makes a profound statement about this political economic aspect through the 2016 BTS song ‘Blood Sweat Tears’. Towards the conclusion of its official music video, one of the members, Jin, is depicted walking towards a wall on which is written: Man muss noch Chaos in sich haben um einen tanzenden Stern gebären zu können from Nietzsche’s Also Sprach Zarathustra.⁸⁶ This quote, complementing the essence of the song that symbolizes the sacrifices made by K-pop trainees — shedding blood, sweat, and tears — adds an aesthetic layer to the core of K-pop training in the mastery of various popular dance styles.⁸⁷ When K-pop idols take the global stage, their dance movements, essential to the audiences’ aesthetic experiences, stem from their rigorous daily training.⁸⁸

Similarly, the song ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, employing the motif of flower-eating from Homer, delves into the consumption of eroticized K-pop idols’ bodies.⁸⁹ This song acts as a sister song to ‘Blood, Sweat, Tears’ in many respects, as both products touch on the theme of temptation. The choreography of these songs shares signature movements, notably the circling of hands around the back of the head. While the song’s lyrics highlight the sweetness of the K-pop product, the music video visually illustrates the creation of this sweetness through the eroticism of its dancing bodies.

The opening scene symbolizes the members’ immersion in nature, as plants grow over them. This theme unfolds further at 00:46 when Yeonjun notices a few pink flowers and moves to pick them, surrounded by green vines wrapping around his waist. The video illustrates his addiction by distorting the scene after he obtains the flower. Similarly, Soobin encounters a comparable effect while approaching a tree with a white flower growing on one of its branches, accompanied by a nearby mantis at 00:53. He reaches up on tiptoes to pluck the flower, with green vines entwining around him from the upper right arm to the lower left thigh.

The music then transitions to the chorus at 1:00, as the five members dance under a large tree. The choreography, reminiscent of the fluid movements in ‘Blood, Sweat, Tears’, accompanies the soft melody. Their movements involve the slow downward motion of their right hands from their shoulders, followed by holding their jaws with their left hands while half squatting. The camera zooms in on Yeonjun, the first flower-eater, capturing his deep breath while mimicking his enjoyment of consuming flowers.⁹⁰ Subsequently, they sing ‘gimme, gimme more’ in English twice, using a distinct hand gesture: thumbs up with their index fingers parallel, tips facing each other and wrapping around the wrist. This combined gesture and phrase visually and acoustically depict their addiction to flower-eating, emphasizing their constant desire for more.⁹¹

While previously only carrying green vines, the activities of plucking and eating flowers lead to the growth of plant sprouts on the boys’ inner arms at 1:06. The music video also spotlights Huening Kai’s addiction at 1:09. A body-plant transformation thus occurs.⁹² After portraying green vines circling around Huening Kai between 1:11 and 1:13, the scene at 1:13 vividly highlights intense sweat on the right side of his neck as his right hand touches it. The lyric in verse 2, sung by Huening Kai and Taehyun, conveys:

The lyric vividly depicts the body-plant transformation where sweet-tasting flowers intertwine with their bodies. This thematic exploration takes place from 1:30 to 1:45 in the music video. Beginning with a serene scene around a pristine pool, the song echoes ‘you are so addicted’. It then shifts back to the members dancing under the tree. As Huening Kai stands in the centre, the other four sit and extend their hands towards him. This choreography emphasizes the lines ‘my blood veins full of sweets/the forbidden lines slowly’, while displaying their collective transformation into a tree.

During the transition to the lyric ‘this daze like anemia/but I prefer it that way’, the four members adjust their movement, forming a straight line while seated on the ground, led by Taehyun. Subsequently, Taehyun stands up and faces the remaining seated members. He uses his right hand to touch his left inner arm, which corresponds to the lyric ‘every cell under my skin becomes more sensitive’. At 1:45, a scene depicts his sinking into a world of pink flowers.

This context leads to other members having to pull Taehyun away at 2:05, which is consistent with the lotus-eating passage in the Odyssey (τοὺς μὲν ἐγὼν ἐπὶ νῆας ἄγον κλαίοντας ἀνάγκῃ, νηυσὶ δ᾿ ἐνὶ γλαφυρῇσιν ὑπὸ ζυγὰ δῆσα ἐρύσσας).⁹³ Following this, the music video progresses to its final significant segment, aligned with the choreographic version.⁹⁴ Here, night falls, and the five members dance beneath a tree with red leaves. Unlike their earlier slow choreography, their movements become more rapid and more synchronized, especially since 2:34. Moreover, while they previously wore worn clothes, they now don black uniforms consisting of black undershirts/waistcoats and black leather trousers.

Notably, the undershirt exposes their entire arms, displaying visible sweat. The sweat becomes a testament to their labour during daily training, intricately woven into their synchronized choreography.⁹⁵ It symbolizes the physical toil of K-pop idols’ daily training, ultimately leading to their captivating dancing bodies on social media screens and in physical concerts.⁹⁶ However, the direct representation of their sweat hints that this intermediary production process can also take on an aesthetic aspect by further highlighting the eroticized portrayal of their bodies. This dynamic aligns with the attention economy logic in the age of social media, where everything is representable and subject to aestheticization.

A pivotal question to ponder in this music video is the image of the island, a key element in its Homeric reception.⁹⁷ In connection with ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, the utopian island, where TXT members showcase their dancing bodies, symbolizes Korea. In the age of the global ascent of Korean popular culture, including K-pop, global K-pop fans who consume K-pop via social media platforms formulate a utopian image of Korea.⁹⁸ This digital semblance prompts a global pilgrimage to Korea, which resembles the eighteenth-century Grand Tour to Italy and Greece.⁹⁹ This social media-mediatized global pilgrimage essentially constructs South Korea as a techno-orientalist entity amongst global, especially Western, audiences.

When examining the GIS representation of Chinese artificial islands in the South Chinese Sea amidst territorial disputes, Erin Huang draws on island theories from Deleuze and Derrida, critiquing how this digitalized island image serves as a crucial site for scrutinizing China’s infrastructural power, when China has been actively exporting its infrastructure-building model of development to the Global South.¹⁰⁰ Similarly, as Korea ambitiously exports its global popular culture, facilitated by the advent of the social media, its self-representation as an island populated solely by dancing K-pop idols metaphorically encapsulates how K-pop idols epitomize Korea’s post-colonial subjectivity.¹⁰¹ This post-colonial assertion provokes critical reflections on how this subjectivity within a neo-liberal capitalistic framework ultimately caters to neo-orientalist fantasy in the West.¹⁰² This internal contradiction resonates with the dual aspects of Homeric receptions, particularly in the Odyssey: Odysseus embodies both a proto-colonizer and a subaltern post-colonial hero.¹⁰³

Considering the theme of sugar in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, the song resonates with modern and contemporary Caribbean literature, specifically instances in which sugar is referenced in Derek Walcott’s Omeros, a significant Homeric reception in Anglophone Caribbean literature.¹⁰⁴ Nevertheless, it is essential to recognize that this portrayal remains a social media construct. This contradiction is already apparent in the complex relationship between K-pop and African American hip-hop. While acknowledging hip-hop’s influence on K-pop in both music and dance, film scholar Kyung Hyun Kim still emphasizes that they are two distinct cultures, especially since K-pop, even Korean hip-hop, lacks the context of the ghetto.¹⁰⁵

In linking ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ to Caribbean literature, a similar ambiguous relationship surfaces. On the one hand, the song signifies the colonialism surrounding sugar production and consumption in Europe, while meta-musically illustrating the political economic process of producing K-pop in Korea and consuming it in the West. On the other hand, despite these underlying contexts, the song predominantly cultivates a neo-liberal fantasy, while the Homeric reception adds a sublime aspect.

Nevertheless, Kim asks: ‘Can K-pop rap? Of course it can. But can it rap songs in videos that synesthetically reference a historically dense space called Korea and its underlying real traumas? The jury is still out on that question’.¹⁰⁶ Here, he contemplates Korea’s subaltern experience during the twentieth century, from Japanese colonialism to the Korean War, as potentially fertile ground for future K-pop to explore. Similarly, a future Homeric reception centred on sugar in K-pop could directly engage with the initial instances of Koreans experiencing America: Korean migrant labourers in sugar plantation estates in Hawaii during the early twentieth century.¹⁰⁷ This would enable K-pop not only to articulate a historically dense space beyond a neo-liberal utopia, but also position itself as a jewel of the Yellow Pacific, equivalent to Black performance as a gem of the Black Atlantic.¹⁰⁸

Conclusion: towards decolonizing Hellenistic Asia

After individually examining Homeric receptions in both the Sophytos inscription and ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ within their idiosyncratic contexts, considering them together provides a broader perspective. Classical receptions in K-pop signify how the K-pop industry leverages Greco-Roman motifs to illustrate its own themes and concerns. While some connections are overt, others remain more elusive. ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ embodies a masked reception, which requires a certain familiarity with classical backgrounds to identify its Homeric allusions.¹⁰⁹ The endeavour to uncover traces of Hellenism in Central Asia, whether in written or material forms, resembles the potential future approach of media archaeologists with antiquarian sentiments. Imagining a millennium from now, they might ‘excavate’ solely K-pop music videos featuring Greco-Roman motifs, potentially overlooking the vast array of other K-pop products.

Similarly, the focus on Hellenistic Central Asia and its aftermath due to a limited quantity of excavated materials with Hellenic motifs raises epistemic concerns. However, critical reflections are already emerging. An examination of classical receptions in contemporary East Asian media, including K-pop, will potentially prompt further thoughtful contemplations on Hellenism in (post)-Hellenistic Asia, particularly in regions like Gandhara.

For instance, critical discussions around the representation of Greek instruments in Gandharan art already have indicated that they do not necessarily provide evidence of Greek music culture in Gandhara but rather reflect an awareness of their existence.¹¹⁰ Similarly, in BTS’s 2019 concert performance of ‘Dionysus’, the presence of Greek instrument players like harp and lyre functions as a visual homage rather than authentic musical contributors.¹¹¹ Images of Greek instruments in Gandharan art, as well as the famous Dionysiac scene, serve a similar purpose. They only construct a classical ambiance for artistic expression. For Hellenistic scholars, the study of classical receptions in K-pop can provide insights into how Greco-Roman visual cultures in Central Asia and India were assimilated into a visual world that was originally distinct.

Concerning the Sophytos inscription, its learned adaptation of archaic Homeric idioms imparts a specific aesthetic sentiment, likely intriguing both ancient and contemporary readers. The effort to delve into the motivation behind this cultural and aesthetic choice holds particular significance. While the use of Greek as an administrative language in Mauryan Kandahar during the third century BCE and Greco-Bactrian governance in the second century BCE formed the background, it is essential to ponder an Indian’s profound engagement with it.¹¹² Despite inadequate evidence, a ‘seeing double’ dynamic likely operates, particularly in the case of the Homeric reception in ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, suggesting that beneath the Homeric veneer lies the societal fabric of ancient Kandahar, a region about which our knowledge remains insufficient.¹¹³

While this article is necessarily unable to fully address how classical receptions in K-pop prompt a rethinking of Hellenistic Asia, I aim for this case study to contribute towards a more decolonized approach to such research. It delves into Homeric receptions in a surviving inscription from (post-)Hellenistic Asia and a music video constructing an image of a virtual Hellenistic Asia. It hopes to propel the conversation forward. In particular, the modern colonial background implicitly underpinning the ‘Sugar Rush Ride’ also formed the backdrop against which research on Hellenistic Asia was conducted: some baggage from that age is still very much with us.

Acknowledgements

First and foremost, I thank Alain Bresson, who first informed me of the existence of the Sophytos inscription, and Yu Jiakun, a performance artist and K-pop cover dancer, who first informed me of the existence of ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, considering that it may be of interest to me for research purposes. In undertaking research on the Sophytos inscription, I much appreciate conversations and suggestions from Alain Bresson, Barbara Graziosi, Mark Griffith, Andrew Johnston, Leslie Kurke, Emily Mackil, Duncan MacRae, Sarah Nooter, Mark Payne, Richard Payne, James Porter, and Peter Chenye Shi; in undertaking research on ‘Sugar Rush Ride’, I much appreciate suggestions from Hye Eun Choi, Johan Chu, Kyung Hyun Kim, Suk-Young Kim, and John Lie. Under Weiwuming, an independent Chinese online platform for East Asian studies, I presented the initial draft of this piece in May 2023. I thank the organization by CHEN Yan, WANG Qing, and WEI Chen. I also thank the comments from two discussants: Lu Kou and Tian Li. A special thank-you goes to Yiwen Wu, who read the draft and provided incisive feedback. I appreciate the interest of the editors of the Classical Receptions Journal in this unconventional piece and its two sympathetic but critical readers. Last but not least, I cannot fail to thank Patrice Rankine; although he is not directly involved in this research, his work on Odysseus and his mentorship in reception studies underlie this piece. Of course, I am responsible for it.

References

NOTES ON CONTRIBUTOR

Yanxiao He is currently the Shuimu postdoctoral research fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Humanities and Social Sciences, Tsinghua University, Beijing. His research interests revolve around the Hellenistic and Roman East, Greco-Roman performance and dance studies, the ancient Silk Road, and classical receptions in East Asian popular culture.

Footnotes