Redborne School
Classics Department
How Percy made me love Classics
By Chloe (yr13)
Look, I didn’t want to be a half-blood.
If you’re reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe what-ever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life. Being a half-blood is dangerous. It’s scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.
If you’re a normal kid, reading this because you think it’s fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.
But if you recognize yourself in these pages-if you feel something stirring inside-stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it’s only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they’ll come for you.
Don’t say I didn’t warn you.
My name is Percy Jackson.
I’m twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.
Am I a troubled kid?
Yeah. You could say that.
Percy Who?
For those who haven’t picked up on the franchise yet, Percy is a troubled 12 year old kid from New York, having to move from school to school until he finds himself at Yancey Academy with Mr Brunner, a centaur undercover as an enthusiastic ‘Latin teacher’ who identifies him as a demi god.
After an incident with a Fury (see chapter one, ‘I accidentally vaporise my math teacher’), he gets sent to Camp Half Blood where he finds out the gods of ancient Greece haven’t changed much in a couple thousand years and continue to have demi-god children with mortals.
It turns out Percy is the son of Poseidon. At camp he meets Annabeth (daughter of Athena) and finds out his best friend Grover was a satyr all along, sent into the mortal world to find half-bloods and take them to camp where they will be safe (sort of). From this point on he enters into a world of prophecies and quests and goes on many adventures, all centred around the Greek myths.
Origins
Percy Jackson first began as bedtime story to author Rick Riordan’s son. As a history teacher, he’d always had a great interest in the classics and Greek mythology so he would tell these myths to his son before bed. Once he’d run out, Haley asked him for more and Percy Jackson was born:
When I ran out of myths, he was disappointed and asked me if I could make up something new with the same characters.
… [O]ff the top of my head, I made up Percy Jackson and told Haley all about his quest to recover Zeus’ lightning bolt in modern day America. It took about three nights to tell the whole story, and when I was done, Haley told me I should write it out as a book.
Riordan’s son Haley had been diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia, so he gave Percy the same traits. Rick created the idea that he had these problems because he was meant to be a hero; the ADHD would keep him alive and alert in battle, and the dyslexia was because he was meant to read ancient Greek.
One of Rick’s main focuses when writing these books was to encourage young people with learning difficulties to read, by making Percy the same as them, he became more relatable and showed kids everywhere that nothing can hold them back.
Modernisation
The series is set in modern day America, with the pretext that the gods move with the centre of western civilisation; it used to be in Greece, but as civilisation has changed and expanded, it has moved to America. This can lead to some interesting interpretations of the myths and the gods themselves (e.g. Dionysus getting a drinking ban after sleeping with Zeus’s favourite nymph).
Riordan leaves the original myths alone, but then he adapts them and fits them into modern day context as an extension of what has already happened. By making the myths relatable to modern day teenagers, it encourages them to interact with the classics. Examples of modernisation include anything from monster fast food chains trying to take over the world, to the Amazon warrior women actually owning the company.
Percy Jackson and the Odyssey
The second book of the first series ‘The Sea of Monsters’ is largely based on the Odyssey with elements of Jason and the Argonauts. It is fairly easy to identify elements of the Odyssey throughout the novel after having studied it:
Laestrygonians – In the beginning of the novel Percy is at school when a game of dodge-ball becomes rather more deadly as the opposing team turns into a hoard of laestrygonian giants.
Hermes on the Beach – Percy goes to the beach to clear his head where he meets Hermes. The god encourages him to go on the quest he is facing and gives him some gifts to help him (including a thermos full of wind).
Scylla and Charybdis – When sailing the Sea of Monsters (Bermuda Triangle) the teams has to navigate their way through Scylla and Charybdis.
Cc’s Spa and Resort – This turns out to be Circe’s island where she turns Percy into a guinea pig (real pigs were too hard to look after). Annabeth saves him by feeding him some of Hermes’s ‘multivitamins’.
Sirens – Annabeth decides she wants to listen to the song of the sirens so gets Percy to tie her up to the mast of the ship and plug his own ears with wax (just like Odysseus).
Polyphemus – Percy’s best friend Grover is trapped by Polyphemus in his cave, having to pretend to be a female Cyclopes to survive (he is still blind so doesn’t notice). Percy and the others are able to get him out by sneaking in under the sheep. Only after studying the Odyssey do I realise how clever Riordan is. Grover is trapped for the vast duration of the novel and is able to communicate to Percy through dreams. Within these we find out he is stalling Polyphemus by saying he has to finish weaving a wedding veil, but he’s actually pulling a Penelope and unravelling it whenever he can to gain more time.
I grew up reading the Percy Jackson books, and I believe they are what got me interested in the world of classics. For those who haven’t, I recommend you read the books, whether you’re still a child or not, they are wonderfully witty and a great way to be introduced to the ancient world.
