DECREMENT
In the lassitude after love Odysseus asks Circe, "What is the way to the land of the dead?"
Circe answers, "You are muffled in folds of heavy fabric. You close your eyes against the rough cloth and though you struggle to free yourself you can barely move. With much thrashing and writhing, you manage to throw off a layer, but find that not only is there another one beyond it, but that the weight bearing you down has scarcely decreased. With dauntless spirit you continue to struggle.
"By infinitesimal degrees, the load becomes lighter and your confinement less. At last, you push away a piece of coarse, heavy cloth and, relieved, feel that it was the last one. As it falls away, you realize you have been fighting through years. You open your eyes."
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Understandly, it sort of caught me.
It was labeled The Lost Books of the Odyssey. A quick search online reveals that it's a collection of fragments like this, written by Zachary Mason - all the chapters are online, but it's also in print.
The first chapter reads like this:
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Odysseus set foot on Ithaca trembling with wrath, his spear poised to fly through the heart of the first man unwise enough to cross him.
He passed unopposed up to his old hall where instead of enemies he found his kinsmen turning to face him with wide eyes, exclaiming in wonder--he first thought it was a war-cry and nearly slew them. They drew him in among them, touching and praising him, all astonishment and delight except for Penelope (whose face had been the ground for the figure of his dreams), hardly aged and oddly quiet, lingering alone at the back of the crowd.
He pushed his way through to her and reached out to touch her cheek but she evaded him and the crowd looked away, suddenly quiet, and Odysseus was aware that he had blundered. The next day they showed him her grave.
For the rest of his time on Ithaca Odysseus avoided looking at her as she lingered around his house, staring out the window and idly running her fingertips over familiar things. He mastered his desire to seize her legs and kiss her thighs and hands for he knew she would turn to ash and shadow as soon as he touched her and moreover nothing is more disgraceful than to acknowledge the presence of the dead.
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In another chapter, Alexander the Great and his lover Hephaistion visit the grave of Achilles. Another one is a treatise on chess. Another one is from the perspective of Polyphemus the Cyclops.
Another coy aspect is that in the supporting text, he pretends it's a contested scholarly discovery instead of a work of loopy poetic fiction.
Anyway. It seems lovely, and here it is.
