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>> I have heard the opinion voiced that works like the Iliad are too daunting or too boring even for university students. I disagree. My experience teaching the

>> I have heard the opinion voiced that works like the Iliad are too daunting or too boring even for university students. I disagree. My experience teaching the Iliad proved to me that even high school students can find the epic engrossing. Most teenagers need help to get there, however. In this post I am going to outline how I taught the Iliad to a gaggle of Chinese teenagers. I grew up in Greece and we were taught the Iliad and the Odyssey at school. I didn't find them daunting. I liked reading them both, despite being extremely annoyed at the translation into Demotic Greek - a made-up, wooden language that nobody has ever spoken, nor will. I also couldn't stand the way the epics were taught, by literary "analysis" that bored every child out of their head. But I liked the Iliad because it was basically more of the epic battles in the songs and movies I liked at the time: I listented to a lot of epic Metal and Connan the Barbarian was my favourite movie (with a soundtrack by Basil Poledouris that could easily have been written for the Iliad). And I liked the Odyssey because it was like the fantasy books I read and the games I played: a big adventure, with many monsters encountered along the way where the hero lost companions, rather than Hit Points, I guess. All this came natural to me. I needed no "help to get there". I probably very much didn't get to any place a literature professor would want me to get. I decided that Achilles is a bloodthirsty assshole and fuck him and his μήνις, whereas Odysseus was a smart guy, an engineer, but one with a heart who guided him home, one of my childhood heroes [1]. But I think the ancient bards [2] would have been happy. They would have found the literary analysis boring and preferred the spontaneous enjoyment of a young child to a thousand eloquent analyses about the cultural value of their epics. What cultural value does an epic have, with monsters and warriors, if it can't get a teenager to be interested in it? ____________ [1] Together with Socrates and, er, Alexander. The Great - great butcher. What was I thinking? [2] Yeah, I mean the people we collectively call "Homer".

mbivert 3y ago
> I decided that Achilles is a bloodthirsty assshole and fuck him and his μήνις In the French translation I have, the translator mentions that "wrath" is used once or so in the book, only to describe Zeus's behavior. I believe the key is to interpret the text in a theistic setting: it's not "rage" in the human sense: Agamemnon is going against Apollo by disrespecting his priest, Achilles helps Agamemnon to solve the issue, and instead of being thankful, Agamemnon punishes Achilles. Achilles would have slayed him, but he didn't because Athena told him not to. That's a key difference between Agamemnon and Achilles: the latter is much more respectful of the Gods than the other. In theistic societies, you don't pick heretical heroes. Agamemnon is motivated by this blind human rage when he punishes Achilles. Achilles isn't. I believe we could make similar comments regarding the act of killing back then: in a setting where people firmly believe in immortality of the soul, the moral rules are probably way different that in today's essentially atheistic setting.
- YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
  >> In the French translation I have, the translator mentions that "wrath" is used once or so in the book, only to describe Zeus's behavior. It's the very first word of the very first verse: μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος Literal translation: μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος [The rage] [sing] [goddess] [of Peleus' son] [Achilles] More grammatically: "Sing, o goddess, the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus". It really is all about Achilles having a hissy fit, throwing a tantrum, stamping his little feet, chucking his toys out of the pram and holding his breath until he's blue in the face. The analysis of the translator in your book is over-engineered, I would say.
  - mbivert 3y ago
    (I'm seeing this quite late, my bad). Let me rephrase this: the observation is the translator's; the analysis is mine. Why would anyone chose to celebrate so highly such a childish behavior? That's preposterous. People weren't stupid. Teaching people to show respect to virtuous people, I barely see how over-engineered of an interpretation this is: it's basic common sense.
    - YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
      Thanks for the clarification. You're quite right about the childish behaviour, yet I don't think it was celebrated, as such. I think the Illiad makes more sense in the context of the ancients' notion of hubris. I think they enjoyed the Illiad as a cautionary tale, of what happens when success goes to peoples' heads and they think they're invincible. Many Greek myths and legends have similar themes: Icarus, Phaethon, Arachne, anyone who put on airs and defied the gods, or acted above their station.
      - mbivert 3y ago
        Exactly! I believe those myths, like the Bible's and others, were used in part to teach people a few basic things, so as to ensure some amount of social stability, hence allowing societies to persist. "Controlling the masses via fear and tall tales" is unfortunately too common of a caricature: we're probably making a sizable mistake by discarding them, and replacing them with whatever's trending on TikTok, or whoever's agendas. For example, the definition of "courage" exemplified by Herakles's behavior has nothing to do with the "courage" of a man showing off his breast implants on TV: using the same word to qualify both behaviors is ill-suited (regardless of any opinions, positive or negative, on the latter case; I'm merely pointing that distinct words would be more appropriate to qualify fundamentally distinct behaviors) (it's a real example, but I won't be able to source it).
unmole 3y ago
> I have heard the opinion voiced that works like the Iliad are too daunting or too boring even for university students. I grew up in India and we studied abridged versions of the Illiad and Odessy in high school. I have a hard time believing that people actually think these epics are boring.
lupire 3y ago
How is Demotic Greek made up? I thought it's a name for common modern Greek.
- Exoristos 3y ago
  I'm going to guess GP specifically meant katharevousa demotic Greek, or similar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharevousa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharevousa
- eynsham 3y ago
  The standardised register has some Katharevousa features that perhaps aren’t very common in ordinary speech.
- YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
  The "demotic Greek" in the translation I was taught (by Kazantzakis and Kakridis) is a language made up by the translators and not the modern Greek spoken by everdyay people, not even the translators' contemporaries. As far as I understand it (you will struggle to find a clear discussion of this on the English-speaking internet, and possibly not in the Greek-speaking one, also) it is a language created for political reasons, from bits and pieces of the speech of farmers in the countryside, but without being a specific local dialect, just a patchwork of local dialects; it is the language that proletarians would speak, at least in the confused imagination of the translators. Incidentally, the same translators destroyed my attempt to read Dante's Inferno, in high school, when I asked for a translation and was given one of their own (or I think it was just Kakridis) in the same style. Just to be clear, I grew up reading Katharevousa because my family was right-leaning and my father considered Katharevousa to be a "correct" Greek, closer to the ancient Greek. Which of the ancient Greek dialects, I never asked, but that was also a fake, made-up, politically-motivated langauge that nobody spoke in everyday life, and never will. There are plenty of very silly people in Greece that carry around unrealistic ideas about what "proper Greek" means, for example I've seen folks use the polytonic system in internet posts, which uses accents inherited from Koine Greek meant to teach barbarians proper Gerek pronounciation... that we no longer use. It's all a bit like the French Academy's attempt to control how French is spoken: a futile, misguided and ill-thought out attempt, entirely politically motivated, that will never work. Ηuman language is an expression of the freedom of the human spirit and no idiot can control it, try as they might. Btw, this is the translation of the Iliad I was taught at school: https://www.alfavita.gr/sites/default/files/attachments/omiroy-iliada.pdf https://www.alfavita.gr/sites/default/files/attachments/omir... And here's a short excerpt (my transcription, and [sic]'s)): Του Δία και της Λητώς τους έσπρωξεν [sic] ο γιος που με το ρήγα [sic] χολιάζοντας [sic] κακιά εξεσήκωσεν [sic] αρρώστια και πέθαιναν [sic] στρατός πολύς' τι [sic] δε σεβάστηκεν [sic] ο γιος [sic[ του Ατρεά το Χρύση, του θεού το λειτουργό· στ' Αργίτικα γοργά καράβια είχε έρθει με λύτρα αρίφνητα [sic], την κόρη του να ξαγοράσει πίσω [sic], του μακροσαγιτάρη [sic] Απόλλωνα κρατώντας τα στεφάνια πα [sic] στο χρυσό ραβδί, και πρόσπεφτε μπρος στους Αγίτες όλους, ξεχωριστά στους δυο πολέμαρχους υγιους [sic] του Ατρέα γυρνώντας" Sorry about the sics, but it's that kind of language that pissed me off as a high-schooler: nobody. Nobody speaks that way in modern Greek. No. Body. There was an older version by Iakovos Polylas, in katharevousa, or katharevousa-like demotic, not sure. I think the two books have been used interchangeably at differen times. Why? Why can't we have an ordinary, easy-to-read translation for school kids? Is it any wonder they prefer to watch One Piece and read Spider Μan than this incomprehensible nonsense?
norir 3y ago
I am coincidentally reading the Iliad right now. Which of the warriors exactly weren't bloodthirsty assholes? Odysseus goes on a raid with Diomedes in book 10 and stands by while Diomedes kills a bunch of sleeping soldiers. They also murder a Trojan they easily could have taken hostage. And what about the part of the Odyssey when he comes home and murders the suitors until the goddess steps in? The Iliad is particularly challenging when we project our current values back onto this ancient story. If we can suspend that, it contains timeless human questions, particularly on the role of fate and the forces that drive us. I feel that we lose the thread if we focus too much on whether the characters are likable. Also, why are you so certain that the bards would have found the analysis boring? Truly great works can operate on multiple levels.
- deepsun 3y ago
  The target audience was like that -- warriors. They like warrior things. Like detailed depictions of strikes and injuries.
  - simpletone 3y ago
    The general public likes warrior things too. To think the iliad was 'written' ( or sung ) for warriors is naive and simplistic.
    - deepsun 3y ago
      Would you change your opinion if I say that it's not my words, I just cited a professional archeologist? From this myth-busting movie review (sorry not in English I should probably make a translation) at 17:45 https://youtu.be/f77h_-wFYGo https://youtu.be/f77h_-wFYGo
- pineaux 3y ago
  Interesting take: Thats because at the time people had not developed consciousness yet. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in_the_Breakdown_of_the_Bicameral_Mind https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_...
B1FF_PSUVM 3y ago
> I liked the Odyssey You can get quite a few good bedtime stories out of it, if you tone down the gore so the kids don't get nightmares - Circe, Polyphemus, Aeolus, Scylla and Charybdis, the sirens, the Trojan horse ...
- spdgg 3y ago
  > good bedtime stories May I suggest this? https://garethhinds.com/wp/the-odyssey/ https://garethhinds.com/wp/the-odyssey/ Excellent graphic novel adaptation. The gore is mostly a set of a dozen pages towards the end, when Odysseus kills the suitors, that can easily be skipped.
  - ahazred8ta 3y ago
    There's another graphic novel too. https://bigheadpress.com/otr?page=1 https://bigheadpress.com/otr?page=1
- tnecniv 3y ago
  There’s a picture book of Greek myths my dad would read to me from when I was a kid. It toned down the gore and rape stuff (it was still there just implied so a kid won’t get it), and made for great listening as a kid before bed. 20 years later I’m in grad school and I meet some classicists. It seems basically every one of them had that book as a kid. Maybe I missed my calling
Rapzid 3y ago
> I grew up in Greece and we were taught the Iliad and the Odyssey at school I grew up in Texas and we covered the Illiad and Odyssey in High School.
- usrusr 3y ago
  I grew up in Germany and I don't remember any mention of mythologic literature outside things like "this, but the way, is when the Iliad is set". The optional religion classes of course were full of mythologic literature, but no Iliad there either (geographically it wasn't that far off). There was a series of youth entertainment books that retold the stories, that were very widely read. Think Lord of the Rings, but kids would then talk of Achilles instead of Aragorn. Fallen out of favor I think, because the good/evil dichotomy, where it appeared, was almost as seeped in racist ideas as in LotR, just without being able to hide behind "yeah, this is middle earth, where wildly different hominid species just exist and look how good some of them can get along anyways"
- YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
  Great to know. I watched a bunch of Western movies that were at least set in Teas when I was growing up.
xenospn 3y ago
You might enjoy “The Odyssey” by Symphony X.
pyuser583 3y ago
One reason I love the Iliad is that the closer you look, the more of a paradox it becomes. For example, in parts of Iliad bronze is given as a valuable gift. In other parts, it’s thrown away on the heads of spears and arrows. So was it composed before or after the fall of the Bronze Age? Likewise, some wedding have dowries, others have bride-prices. You can’t have both! But Homer has no problem going back and forth. It’s almost like Homers trying to confuse future historians. There’s actually a thesis that the Iliad was intended to be heard by clubs of war veterans on public holidays. The veterans would get the inside jokes, but the civilians would miss them.
- defrost 3y ago
  I'm not seeing the paradox. Gold today is considered a valuable gift. It is also consumed at 70 tonnes per quarter in the global consumer electronics sector, much of which is later discarded. https://www.gold.org/goldhub/research/gold-demand-trends/gold-demand-trends-q1-2023/Technology https://www.gold.org/goldhub/research/gold-demand-trends/gol... Both valued and wasted can be true for bronze as it is for gold.
  - ipsum2 3y ago
    Gold is definitely not discarded, it's usually recycled out of electronics.
    - defrost 3y ago
      Out of the electronics that are recycled, sure. Currently thats less than 20% of the electronic waste generated. Annual e-waste generation: The world generated 53.6 Mt of e-waste in 2019. That's an average of 7.3 kg per capita. The amount of e-waste generated is expected to grow at about 3.5% per year and will reach 74.7 Mt by 2030. E-waste recycling rate: In 2019 only 17.4% of the e-waste was collected and recycled. from: https://blog.emew.com/global-e-waste-statistics https://blog.emew.com/global-e-waste-statistics (unverified by cross check, literally a first hit on search)
      - 3y ago

mbivert 3y ago

> I decided that Achilles is a bloodthirsty assshole and fuck him and his μήνις In the French translation I have, the translator mentions that "wrath" is used once or so in the book, only to describe Zeus's behavior. I believe the key is to interpret the text in a theistic setting: it's not "rage" in the human sense: Agamemnon is going against Apollo by disrespecting his priest, Achilles helps Agamemnon to solve the issue, and instead of being thankful, Agamemnon punishes Achilles. Achilles would have slayed him, but he didn't because Athena told him not to. That's a key difference between Agamemnon and Achilles: the latter is much more respectful of the Gods than the other. In theistic societies, you don't pick heretical heroes. Agamemnon is motivated by this blind human rage when he punishes Achilles. Achilles isn't. I believe we could make similar comments regarding the act of killing back then: in a setting where people firmly believe in immortality of the soul, the moral rules are probably way different that in today's essentially atheistic setting.

YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
>> In the French translation I have, the translator mentions that "wrath" is used once or so in the book, only to describe Zeus's behavior. It's the very first word of the very first verse: μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος Literal translation: μῆνιν ἄειδε θεὰ Πηληϊάδεω Ἀχιλῆος [The rage] [sing] [goddess] [of Peleus' son] [Achilles] More grammatically: "Sing, o goddess, the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus". It really is all about Achilles having a hissy fit, throwing a tantrum, stamping his little feet, chucking his toys out of the pram and holding his breath until he's blue in the face. The analysis of the translator in your book is over-engineered, I would say.
- mbivert 3y ago
  (I'm seeing this quite late, my bad). Let me rephrase this: the observation is the translator's; the analysis is mine. Why would anyone chose to celebrate so highly such a childish behavior? That's preposterous. People weren't stupid. Teaching people to show respect to virtuous people, I barely see how over-engineered of an interpretation this is: it's basic common sense.
  - YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
    Thanks for the clarification. You're quite right about the childish behaviour, yet I don't think it was celebrated, as such. I think the Illiad makes more sense in the context of the ancients' notion of hubris. I think they enjoyed the Illiad as a cautionary tale, of what happens when success goes to peoples' heads and they think they're invincible. Many Greek myths and legends have similar themes: Icarus, Phaethon, Arachne, anyone who put on airs and defied the gods, or acted above their station.
    - mbivert 3y ago
      Exactly! I believe those myths, like the Bible's and others, were used in part to teach people a few basic things, so as to ensure some amount of social stability, hence allowing societies to persist. "Controlling the masses via fear and tall tales" is unfortunately too common of a caricature: we're probably making a sizable mistake by discarding them, and replacing them with whatever's trending on TikTok, or whoever's agendas. For example, the definition of "courage" exemplified by Herakles's behavior has nothing to do with the "courage" of a man showing off his breast implants on TV: using the same word to qualify both behaviors is ill-suited (regardless of any opinions, positive or negative, on the latter case; I'm merely pointing that distinct words would be more appropriate to qualify fundamentally distinct behaviors) (it's a real example, but I won't be able to source it).

unmole 3y ago

> I have heard the opinion voiced that works like the Iliad are too daunting or too boring even for university students. I grew up in India and we studied abridged versions of the Illiad and Odessy in high school. I have a hard time believing that people actually think these epics are boring.

lupire 3y ago

How is Demotic Greek made up? I thought it's a name for common modern Greek.

Exoristos 3y ago
I'm going to guess GP specifically meant katharevousa demotic Greek, or similar. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharevousa https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katharevousa
eynsham 3y ago
The standardised register has some Katharevousa features that perhaps aren’t very common in ordinary speech.
YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
The "demotic Greek" in the translation I was taught (by Kazantzakis and Kakridis) is a language made up by the translators and not the modern Greek spoken by everdyay people, not even the translators' contemporaries. As far as I understand it (you will struggle to find a clear discussion of this on the English-speaking internet, and possibly not in the Greek-speaking one, also) it is a language created for political reasons, from bits and pieces of the speech of farmers in the countryside, but without being a specific local dialect, just a patchwork of local dialects; it is the language that proletarians would speak, at least in the confused imagination of the translators. Incidentally, the same translators destroyed my attempt to read Dante's Inferno, in high school, when I asked for a translation and was given one of their own (or I think it was just Kakridis) in the same style. Just to be clear, I grew up reading Katharevousa because my family was right-leaning and my father considered Katharevousa to be a "correct" Greek, closer to the ancient Greek. Which of the ancient Greek dialects, I never asked, but that was also a fake, made-up, politically-motivated langauge that nobody spoke in everyday life, and never will. There are plenty of very silly people in Greece that carry around unrealistic ideas about what "proper Greek" means, for example I've seen folks use the polytonic system in internet posts, which uses accents inherited from Koine Greek meant to teach barbarians proper Gerek pronounciation... that we no longer use. It's all a bit like the French Academy's attempt to control how French is spoken: a futile, misguided and ill-thought out attempt, entirely politically motivated, that will never work. Ηuman language is an expression of the freedom of the human spirit and no idiot can control it, try as they might. Btw, this is the translation of the Iliad I was taught at school: https://www.alfavita.gr/sites/default/files/attachments/omiroy-iliada.pdf https://www.alfavita.gr/sites/default/files/attachments/omir... And here's a short excerpt (my transcription, and [sic]'s)): Του Δία και της Λητώς τους έσπρωξεν [sic] ο γιος που με το ρήγα [sic] χολιάζοντας [sic] κακιά εξεσήκωσεν [sic] αρρώστια και πέθαιναν [sic] στρατός πολύς' τι [sic] δε σεβάστηκεν [sic] ο γιος [sic[ του Ατρεά το Χρύση, του θεού το λειτουργό· στ' Αργίτικα γοργά καράβια είχε έρθει με λύτρα αρίφνητα [sic], την κόρη του να ξαγοράσει πίσω [sic], του μακροσαγιτάρη [sic] Απόλλωνα κρατώντας τα στεφάνια πα [sic] στο χρυσό ραβδί, και πρόσπεφτε μπρος στους Αγίτες όλους, ξεχωριστά στους δυο πολέμαρχους υγιους [sic] του Ατρέα γυρνώντας" Sorry about the sics, but it's that kind of language that pissed me off as a high-schooler: nobody. Nobody speaks that way in modern Greek. No. Body. There was an older version by Iakovos Polylas, in katharevousa, or katharevousa-like demotic, not sure. I think the two books have been used interchangeably at differen times. Why? Why can't we have an ordinary, easy-to-read translation for school kids? Is it any wonder they prefer to watch One Piece and read Spider Μan than this incomprehensible nonsense?

norir 3y ago

I am coincidentally reading the Iliad right now. Which of the warriors exactly weren't bloodthirsty assholes? Odysseus goes on a raid with Diomedes in book 10 and stands by while Diomedes kills a bunch of sleeping soldiers. They also murder a Trojan they easily could have taken hostage. And what about the part of the Odyssey when he comes home and murders the suitors until the goddess steps in? The Iliad is particularly challenging when we project our current values back onto this ancient story. If we can suspend that, it contains timeless human questions, particularly on the role of fate and the forces that drive us. I feel that we lose the thread if we focus too much on whether the characters are likable. Also, why are you so certain that the bards would have found the analysis boring? Truly great works can operate on multiple levels.

deepsun 3y ago
The target audience was like that -- warriors. They like warrior things. Like detailed depictions of strikes and injuries.
- simpletone 3y ago
  The general public likes warrior things too. To think the iliad was 'written' ( or sung ) for warriors is naive and simplistic.
  - deepsun 3y ago
    Would you change your opinion if I say that it's not my words, I just cited a professional archeologist? From this myth-busting movie review (sorry not in English I should probably make a translation) at 17:45 https://youtu.be/f77h_-wFYGo https://youtu.be/f77h_-wFYGo
pineaux 3y ago
Interesting take: Thats because at the time people had not developed consciousness yet. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_in_the_Breakdown_of_the_Bicameral_Mind https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Origin_of_Consciousness_...

B1FF_PSUVM 3y ago

> I liked the Odyssey You can get quite a few good bedtime stories out of it, if you tone down the gore so the kids don't get nightmares - Circe, Polyphemus, Aeolus, Scylla and Charybdis, the sirens, the Trojan horse ...

spdgg 3y ago
> good bedtime stories May I suggest this? https://garethhinds.com/wp/the-odyssey/ https://garethhinds.com/wp/the-odyssey/ Excellent graphic novel adaptation. The gore is mostly a set of a dozen pages towards the end, when Odysseus kills the suitors, that can easily be skipped.
- ahazred8ta 3y ago
  There's another graphic novel too. https://bigheadpress.com/otr?page=1 https://bigheadpress.com/otr?page=1
tnecniv 3y ago
There’s a picture book of Greek myths my dad would read to me from when I was a kid. It toned down the gore and rape stuff (it was still there just implied so a kid won’t get it), and made for great listening as a kid before bed. 20 years later I’m in grad school and I meet some classicists. It seems basically every one of them had that book as a kid. Maybe I missed my calling

Rapzid 3y ago

> I grew up in Greece and we were taught the Iliad and the Odyssey at school I grew up in Texas and we covered the Illiad and Odyssey in High School.

usrusr 3y ago
I grew up in Germany and I don't remember any mention of mythologic literature outside things like "this, but the way, is when the Iliad is set". The optional religion classes of course were full of mythologic literature, but no Iliad there either (geographically it wasn't that far off). There was a series of youth entertainment books that retold the stories, that were very widely read. Think Lord of the Rings, but kids would then talk of Achilles instead of Aragorn. Fallen out of favor I think, because the good/evil dichotomy, where it appeared, was almost as seeped in racist ideas as in LotR, just without being able to hide behind "yeah, this is middle earth, where wildly different hominid species just exist and look how good some of them can get along anyways"
YeGoblynQueenne 3y ago
Great to know. I watched a bunch of Western movies that were at least set in Teas when I was growing up.

xenospn 3y ago

You might enjoy “The Odyssey” by Symphony X.

pyuser583 3y ago

One reason I love the Iliad is that the closer you look, the more of a paradox it becomes. For example, in parts of Iliad bronze is given as a valuable gift. In other parts, it’s thrown away on the heads of spears and arrows. So was it composed before or after the fall of the Bronze Age? Likewise, some wedding have dowries, others have bride-prices. You can’t have both! But Homer has no problem going back and forth. It’s almost like Homers trying to confuse future historians. There’s actually a thesis that the Iliad was intended to be heard by clubs of war veterans on public holidays. The veterans would get the inside jokes, but the civilians would miss them.

defrost 3y ago
I'm not seeing the paradox. Gold today is considered a valuable gift. It is also consumed at 70 tonnes per quarter in the global consumer electronics sector, much of which is later discarded. https://www.gold.org/goldhub/research/gold-demand-trends/gold-demand-trends-q1-2023/Technology https://www.gold.org/goldhub/research/gold-demand-trends/gol... Both valued and wasted can be true for bronze as it is for gold.
- ipsum2 3y ago
  Gold is definitely not discarded, it's usually recycled out of electronics.
  - defrost 3y ago
    Out of the electronics that are recycled, sure. Currently thats less than 20% of the electronic waste generated. Annual e-waste generation: The world generated 53.6 Mt of e-waste in 2019. That's an average of 7.3 kg per capita. The amount of e-waste generated is expected to grow at about 3.5% per year and will reach 74.7 Mt by 2030. E-waste recycling rate: In 2019 only 17.4% of the e-waste was collected and recycled. from: https://blog.emew.com/global-e-waste-statistics https://blog.emew.com/global-e-waste-statistics (unverified by cross check, literally a first hit on search)
    - 3y ago