Page 1 of The Hymn to Dionysus

“Sing of rage, goddess”

— THE ILIAD , LINE 1

Our bards always ask the Muse to find the beginning, but the big joke—I say joke in the loosest possible sense—is that they never then start at the bloody beginning. Find the beginning, Muse, and then they say, well, here we are, seven years into the middle of a big adventure I haven’t told you about, there was this witch, right, and this man—and then they sparkle at you like it’s clever.

It’s not clever. It’s irritating.

I am going to start at the beginning, because I’m a knight, and I was taught to report things properly, in a straight line, without faffing around and looking smug that I’ve remembered the bits I artfully left out to Reveal Unto You later on for narrative effect. I’m not going to sing it to you in poetry, either. Poetry is for things that are made up. I’m just going to tell it.

But I do promise this. One way or another, I will do what the bards always ask the Muse for, after they’ve done their stupid opening about beginnings.

I’ll tell you about rage, and a complicated man.