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In the story of the great lyric poet Simonides, Mary Renault brings alive a time in Greece when tyrants kept an unsteady rule and poetry, music, and royal patronage combined to produce a flowering of the arts.

Born into a stern farming family on the island of Keos, Simonides escapes his harsh childhood through a lucky apprenticeship with a renowned Ionian singer. As they travel through 5th century B.C. Greece, Simonides learns not only how to play the kithara and compose poetry, but also how to navigate the shifting alliances surrounding his rich patrons. He is witness to the Persian invasion of Ionia, to the decadent reign of the Samian pirate king Polykrates, and to the fall of the Pisistratids in the Athenian court. Along the way, he encounters artists, statesmen, athletes, thinkers, and lovers, including the likes of Pythagoras and Aischylos. Using the singer's unique perspective, Renault combines her vibrant imagination and her formidable knowledge of history to establish a sweeping, resilient vision of a golden century.

Review

"[Renault's] historical novels . . . are among the finest ever written."–The Washington Post Book World

“A song of praise, a work of love, a serene, deliberate book, full of wisdom, rich in character, incident and description.” –Wall Street Journal

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of the great lyric poet Simonides, Mary Renault brings alive a time in Greece when tyrants kept an unsteady rule and poetry, music, and royal patronage combined to produce a flowering of the arts.

Born into a stern farming family on the island of Keos, Simonides escapes his harsh childhood through a lucky apprenticeship with a renowned Ionian singer. As they travel through 5th century B.C. Greece, Simonides learns not only how to play the kithara and compose poetry, but also how to navigate the shifting alliances surrounding his rich patrons. He is witness to the Persian invasion of Ionia, to the decadent reign of the Samian pirate king Polykrates, and to the fall of the Pisistratids in the Athenian court. Along the way, he encounters artists, statesmen, athletes, thinkers, and lovers, including the likes of Pythagoras and Aischylos. Using the singer's unique perspective, Renault combines her vibrant imagination and her formidable knowledge of history to establish a sweeping, resili

About the Author

Mary Renault was born in London and educated at Oxford. She then trained for three years as a nurse, and wrote her first published novel, Promise of Love. Her next three novels were written while serving in WWII. After the war, she settled in South Africa and traveled considerably in Africa and Greece. It was at this time that she began writing her brilliant historical reconstructions of ancient Greece, including The King Must Die, The Last of the Wine, and The Persian Boy. She died in Cape Town in 1983.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

KEOS

I

Keos is stern. You'd not suppose so from the proverb, that it knows not the horse nor ox, but is rich in the gladdening vine-fruit, and brings forth poets. That last had not been added, when I was born. On the other hand, it is a lie that on Keos a man has to take hemlock when he reaches sixty. That was only in the old siege when the warriors had to be kept alive. Nowadays, it is just considered good manners.

Iulis, my native city, is high up the mountain, above Koressia harbor. I used to sit on a rock with my father's sheep around me, looking at the foreign sails and wondering where they came from; they thread the Kyklades from all four corners of the world. I could seldom go down to see. My father was not a man to leave his land to a steward while he sat at ease, nor let his sons go sightseeing. My elder brother, Theasides, got leave from work much oftener than I; not because he was the heir, which would have made it heavier, but because he was good with the disk and javelin and a fine pankratiast, and had to train for the games to do the family credit. He was handsome too. My parents never told me in so many words that they preferred me out of sight, but they had no need. I seemed to have known it from my birth.

Keeping out of sight, one is a good deal alone. But if one is short of company, one can always make it. I kept, you might say, the very best company in Keos.

If a fine ship with a painted sail passed proudly by the port, keeping its mystery, for me it was the Argo with its talking prow and its crew of heroes, going north to the bewitched Kolchian shore. If a hawk hovered, I saw winged Perseus poised for his flashing swoop; grasping, like the hawk its prey, the Gorgon's deadly head to freeze the dragon. The boulder I sat on had been flung by Herakles, playing ball as a boy. When I drove my flock to pasture, I was with Achilles on some great cattle-raid, bringing the spoils of a plundered city back to camp.

As I dreamed I sang, as far back as I can remember. I needed only to be alone, among the creatures of my thought, and the songs would come. Childish, at first; tunes picked up from the work songs of my father's thralls, or the women weaving. They satisfied me, till I was old enough to be taken to the Apollo festival, and heard a rhapsodist chanting his bit of Homer, and some local poet taking his choir through a choral ode. I suppose I was nine or ten.

For the first time, I knew that my secret joy was a thing grown men could make a life of, even a living. I did not yet hope that for myself. I only dreamed of it, as I'd dreamed of fighting at Troy; but on the mountain I dreamed aloud. When some old ewes pushed up to see what all the noise was about, I felt like Orpheus, and wished that Keos had lions to be enchanted. Then I would go home at night, and be silent in a corner. No wonder my father thought me a sullen boy. But what could I have said to him?

Time passed; I was twelve, thirteen; I heard the singing at the festivals; I understood that these men, happy beyond imagining, had all once been boys like me, and somehow achieved their bliss. My dreams turned to wishes; but they could find no voice, except in secret on the mountain. Soon I would be a man, just one of my father's farm-hands. A poet? I could as soon have told him I wanted to be a Scythian king. I would be lucky if he did no worse than laugh. I began to know bitterness, and despair.

Then came the wedding from which my life was born.

The bridegroom was Laertes, our neighbor Milon's eldest son. He was a sea-captain, his rich father having bought him a ship when he came of age. He had grown rich in his turn, by boldness, shrewdness and luck, trading about lonia and as far as Egypt, and had stayed unmarried till thirty, mostly for lack of time. There was always a stir when he put in with his foreign goods, his outlandish men and his tales. Theas, who was taken to call with our father, used to save the tales for me.

I had never thought they would take me to the wedding. Any treats I had as a child came always from Theasides. This time they could hardly leave me behind, because my five-year-old sister was going. She was pretty, though, with hair as soft as cobweb and red as fire. Once she had asked me gravely how I came to be so ugly, not believing such a thing could happen without a reason her elders would understand. I told her I had been cursed by a raven from whom I had taken a lamb, which left her satisfied. Hearing her crying as her hair was combed, I wondered they should be troubled with either of us at a feast, forgetting that weddings beget weddings and are times for looking ahead.

At all events, my best tunic came out of the chest; a castoff of Theasides's though there were five years between us; quite good, but I was outgrowing it in my turn. I looked dismayed at my lean thighs with their dark pelt of hair. But I would have to show enough to frighten the women, before I would get a new one. Keos is stern.

Before the house of the bride was a gently sloping meadow, where the bridesmaids stood with their garlands, waiting to sing. The thrones of the bride and groom were decked with flowers. My parents greeted their hosts, and sought out their friends among the guests, taking Theasides with them. He was plainly dressed (there are laws in Keos against extravagance), but the cloth was fine, and if he had been in rags his beauty would have graced them. I, knowing what my parents would have wished of me, lost myself in the crowd. There was more in this than filial duty. I had marked down the slab of rock where the bard would stand to sing, and the clump of brush near by where I could listen undisturbed. I meant not to miss a word.

Bride and groom took their thrones. Though weathered, he had kept his looks, and his purple fillet from Tyre became him. They made a good pair, for all she was half his age. The girls stood in their circle, hand-linked ready to dance, bright on the grass as another wedding garland. And now came the bard, in his festal robe, its border embroidered in Miletos, his seven-stringed kithara in his hand. He walked to the singing place, and drew his plectrum across the strongs.

Happy groom, the favored of Aphrodite,
Now at last you have her, your matchless maiden,
Girdled with violets.

The garland began to turn, like windblown petals.

He was a smallish man past his middle years; his beard, and the hair under his festal garland, were ash-grey. At that time he can't yet have been sixty; but to my youth he seemed as old as Zeus, and I was amazed he could sing so well. I knew nothing of training, except that it was given to good-looking boys who were chosen for Apollo's choir, and went to Delos, the holy island, for his birthday feast. All I had was a voice to which the sheep would answer; and perfect pitch, which I was half aware of, enough to recognize it in the bard. I knew too that his inlaid kithara was a masterpiece.

There it hangs on my wall. The embroidered neck-sling wore ragged, and I had a new one worked in Athens. That's wearing too, but never mind.

He had been costly to hire, by Keos reckoning, where most things are paid in kind. You can't offer a sheep or heifer to us wandering men. I once accepted a mule, which I had need of at the time; but that's long ago. From kings, maintenance and gold; from lords, either or both according to their rank; from others, weighed-out silver. Or one makes a gift, for the honor of gods or heroes. Nothing between.

He had been ten days on Keos, a guest in the bride's household, teaching the girls the wedding song and the dance. Sometimes from up the hill I had seen them dancing, but too far to hear. It would have been as much as my hide was worth, to leave my flock.

From my lair in the brush, a yard or two from the dais, I saw only the backs of the bride-maidens, as they faced the seats of honor. But, as I had planned, I could hear each note and each word.

The dancers had on their best thinnest dresses, of fine linen beaten soft upon the river-stones and squeezed, still damp, into clinging folds. As they passed the bride's throne, one or another would toss a flower from the wreath she wore; the lap of the saffron-veiled girl was full of roses. It was too late for the violets of the song. Their clear voices rose like birds' at dawn. The bridegroom's friends, bold young rips for the most part, stood by his throne as quiet as well-beaten schoolboys, saving their bawdries for the bridal ride. At most weddings, they'd have been clapping time and calling out to the girls.

The song was the dance; the bard was its perfect instrument. He sang it lightly but with reverence; none of those little variations thrown in to flatter the hosts, though they are sometimes good enough to keep. This piece was sacred, this he handled like a phoenix egg. When already a singer, he had heard the Tenth Muse sing her own song herself. Such things are the heirlooms of the bards. This time it was a family heirloom too; the bride's mother in her trailing lonian gown was smiling and wiping her eyes. She came from Lesbos, and it had been a gift for her own wedding.

I gathered my childish thoughts as best I could, to make all this my possession. But I was aware, too, that near by on the rock sat the harper's boy.

He was a comely lad, well fed and clothed and washed. His blue eyes were narrowed under his drawn fair brows, as he tried to listen. I knew, from my visits to the festivals, that this was no slave but a pupil, working to learn his art. This was part of his training and reward: a wedding song of Sappho's, a treasure to store in memory. I think I noticed he was shivering, though the breeze hardly stirred the flowers; but my mind was on other matters. Once he looked my way. Poor lad, he was far from home; I daresay he would gladly have changed places, even with me. I eyed him with envy, as a beggar might a prince.

I drank down the song as a thirsty plant does water, freshening and growing, feeling in folded flower-buds the core of fruit. Some of the words I'd seized, and would keep tomorrow sitting among the sheep; some would escape me, and I must patch as best I could. The tune I would remember, but I had no lyre, only my shepherd's pipe; one cannot both pipe and sing. Already the song was done, the dance was over, the girls blew the bride kisses and ran back for their parents' praise. For a little while the rain would nourish me; then would be drought again. Tomorrow the bard would leave; and my parents were looking about to see what had become of me.

I crossed the grass, humming as I went, to fix the song. Theasides was with them; six feet high and hardly done growing yet; wide shoulders and strong thighs; his golden hair cut short across his forehead and hanging down his back, neatly crimped from overnight plaiting in honor of the feast, and crowned with fresh flowers. He was smiling still from the pleasure of the dance. I could not think why our father should have missed me.

Beside my parents stood neighbor Bouselos and his wife, whose small vineyard was near our land. With them was their six-year daughter, picking her nose with a fat finger. As I came up her mother slapped down her hand. She tugged Theasides's mantle, and he turned to give her a smile.

My parents did not scold me for my absence. My father even remarked to Bouselos how I had grown. Bouselos eyed my bare lanky legs, nodded and winked.

People forget their own childhood, or they'd remember a child's long ears. The moment she saw that wink, the child jumped at her father's arm. "Daddy!" she piped. "I don't want to marry Sim! I want to marry Theas!"

There was the pause that you might expect, then the fathers laughed, my mother looked down her nose, Bouselos' wife said, "Hush, naughty girl!" But being a spoiled only child, she stamped and said it again. It distressed my brother, who, though himself a favorite, was sweetened by all the gods had given him.

"You can't marry me," he said, reasoning with her kindly. "You know I'm promised to Hegesilla. You don't have to marry Sim yet, not till you're big; and then you'll like him. He's very clever."

All the parents gazed at him, admiring his good heart, in which indeed they were not deceived. My betrothed looked from him to me; it was, you might say, an epigram. Going fiery red--with temper, not maiden shame--she shouted, "I won't marry him ever! When I'm old I still won't marry him! He's ugly, he's all black, he's got a dirty face."

I had scrubbed it well for the wedding, but had not lightened my swarthy skin nor taken off my birthmark. Like all lonians who have gone east and mixed their blood, we Keans set store by Hellene looks. It is said that before the war in Troy, King Minos' Cretans had a city where Koressia stands, and sometimes we throw back to them. One thing's for sure, on Keos it is not admired. I had black hair, before it whitened; also, though my beard covers it now, a dark mole on my cheek, as big as a double drachma. If I had been a girl, no doubt they would have exposed me on the mountain. But my father was never one to waste a pair of hands.

He looked put about by the words of his chosen daughter-in-law; but it was Theas who darkened with his rare anger. I think he'd even have given the girl a clip; but her mother, from civility to mine, was first with a box on the ear. She was led off bawling. Little Philomache screamed out after her, "You're uglier than our Sim! You're dirtier too! You smell!"

Review:

4.6 out of 5

92.31% of customers are satisfied

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic, Relaxing Book

A. · April 19, 2023

I love this book and I love Mary Renault! She never gets old.This book is lovely and I had a great time reading it. It's literally about a praise singer, but it's also about so much more. I love that the book looks really closely at the daily life of someone living in ancient Greece. Her descriptions of landscapes and routines are insanely beautiful. And she also makes really good commentary throughout on what it means to make art, to remember, and to make a career out of something you love.An added bonus is that you can learn a lot about ancient Greece by reading this book! There are a lot of historical events covered in each of her books. Also, sometimes she quotes ancient greek texts (in English). She does a great job of subtly incorporating these ancient ideas and phrases into her work.

4.0 out of 5 stars A lyric poet bridges the divide to the written Homer

S. · August 4, 2018

Mary Renault weaves a compelling story around the life of Simonides, 556-468 B.C. a famous Greek lyric poet. Praise Singing refers to the mostly commissioned work to celebrate the famous deeds of heroes, kings and the like in a time when the wealthy heavily supported the arts and funded great prizes for poets and playwrights. She builds her story around what historic facts of the time are known, and this in itself makes a palatable history lesson. Simonides was remembered for his great oral knowledge of the entirety of the Homeric poems, strictly an oral tradition for thousands of years at the time he was born. True to his professional training, he had concerns about what would happen to the art of poetry when it was introduced to written word after thousands of years of an oral tradition. Eventually, he was commissioned to make that leap for posterity. He is also remembered for his method of storing huge amounts of information in his mind. Anecdotes that outlived him carry forward his explanation of his method as a mind palace which has been used as a Sherlock Holmes device in a recent production.Although I enjoyed this story, I do not rate it above some all time Mary Renault favorites: The King Must Die, The Bull from the Sea and others. She brought life and passion and great study to many of the stories of the ancient world. She had a unique gift for fully seizing the life essence of a historic or mythological character and memorably telling that story.

5.0 out of 5 stars Last novel from Mary Renault for my collection

h. · July 8, 2023

I've been a fan of Mary Renault for years. Unfortunately, I have not had much time to read for a number of years. This was the last in her series of novels that I did not have. I realized it was finally in stock and at a reasonable price. It showed up faster than expected and in perfect condition. It is just as good as I imagined it would be and it complements her other novels wonderfully.

5.0 out of 5 stars My favorite Mary Renault novel.

M.T.K. · May 10, 2017

I have read all of Mary Renault's Greek history novels and this is my favorite. It is short and covers a brief period in the history of Greece. The character, the poet Simonides, had a long life and the story is told from his boyhood to his old age. He witnesses the loss of Ionia to the Persians and moves to Athens to meet Peisistratus the tyrant who compiled the works of Homer in written text to save it for posterity. He ruled for several periods and was ousted only to return to power. His sons ruled after his death and one, Hipparchus, is a friend of Simonides and a patron of the arts. He is murdered by the two lovers, Harmodius and Aristogeiton. They were credited with being democrats which was early propaganda. Statues were erected of them in Athens and taken by the Persians during the invasion. Alexander recovered the statues when he invaded Persia. This short novel is an enjoyable study of early Athens.

5.0 out of 5 stars Great story

P. · January 28, 2023

Great storyline. Mary is a superb writer. I've thoroughly enjoyed reading all of her books.

3.0 out of 5 stars Fair condition. The cover is torn in several places ...

g. · January 19, 2017

Fair condition. The cover is torn in several places and the corners are bent as well as some of the pages. But the binding is intact.

4.0 out of 5 stars Lyrical and Memorable

L. · March 25, 2021

“The Praise Singer” by Mary Renault is a first-person narration of Simonides of Keos, a lyric poet who lived from approximately 556 to 469 BCE. The story spans the poets life, the many historical events he witnessed at the Samos court of Polycrates, and the Athenian court of Hippias and Hipparchos.Renault’s writing truly brings life and emotion to the long dead poet, especially the descriptions of Simonides’ artistic journey and reflections on his life. The writing is more lyrical than many of her other works, and embodies the narration of a character who loves his craft and language. I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys historical fictions, Classics, or GreekHistory.

5.0 out of 5 stars ancient greece

R.N.S. · November 30, 2009

Excellent book by Mary Renault on the society of ancient Greece. The society valued the histories of Greek heroes and gods told by poets via rote memorization similar to Homeric epics in a society just beginning to adopt the (newfangled) written word.The poet was attached to the courts of the time and witnessed the power struggles and abuses of power of the times-principally in Athens,the cultural center of Greece, particularly after the rise of Persia. The rulers in a sense collected the major praise singers for their courts to enhance their glory and sing the praises of the rulers(naturally) for which the poets were well paid and lived as house guests. In many ways the history is quite modern.Excellent book. highly recommended.

Classic historical fiction - try!

G.D.M. · February 22, 2021

Very much enjoyed the story of the poet Simonides & his youth, sojourn on Samos, life in Pisistratid Athens... It took a while to get used to the writing style, Renault's books being from a past era, but once engaged found it very enjoyable.

A gloriously exciting chronicle.

I.M. · June 8, 2017

How can I do justice to this wonderful book? It is the last but one of Renault's eight novels tracing the rise and fall of Golden Age of Greek culture, and as such is a kind of climax, being the second-last written. It is the first, however, in historical-chronological order, if one excepts the two novels about Theseus. Between the Theseus novels, and three on Alexander, we have the three novels on Athens, of which this is the first. Each one explores a particular aspect of Ancient Greek culture. 'The Praise Singer' tells of Simonides, the poet, and of the momentous events of his time. He begins life very simply as a shepherd boy on the island of Kios, and then, apprenticed to a travelling bard, moves to Ephesus. With Cyrus' conquests of the Greek settlements on the coast of Asia, they flee to Samos, and then when its tyrant is murdered, finally to Athens. Along the way we discover wondrous things: the austerity of Kean life, the rite of scapegoating in Ephesos, the opulence of Polycrates' court on Samos, the wisdom and grace of Pisistratos' "tyranny" in Athens. The major events in the build-up ('adolescence' one might almost say) of what is set to become the Glory of Greek history, the Athens of Pericles, are fascinatingly chronicled. Solon, the great Law-giver, foundation-stone of Athenian democracy, is brought to life for us through the memories of Pisistratos, who having been his disciple-friend, became the protector of his laws... not without cost, for Solon detested dictatorship, and it was only by establishing himself as First Archon by force, that Pisistratos was able to have Solon's code accepted by the reluctant nobility. Pisistratos also collected and committed to writing the songs of Homer which had been carried for centuries in the memories of the bards who sang them at the festivals. The climax of the story is the assassination of Hipparchos, one of the sons who inherited Pisistratos' power. Harmodios, a young man whose sister had been publicly shamed by Hipparchos because he had spurned his advances, avenges the honour of his family. This event, like all the others in the story, only more so, is breathtakingly fascinating. Harmodios, and his friend, Aristogeiton, sacrifice their lives in the assassination. They go down in history as The Tyrannicides, heroes of Athenian democracy. I recommend this book as strongly as I can! You will love it and learn much from it - Incidentally, the Kindle edition is very well done indeed.

Good for Classics A level - if they read it!

K.C. · August 15, 2013

I bought this for my daughter who is thinking of doing Classics A level. It brings to life the role of the praise singer in ancient Greek culture and society and I hoped it would give her some insight into the world of Homer. I remembered reading it 30 years ago and liking it then and as she didn't seem interested I read it again and still enjoyed it.

The Praise Singer - Mary Renault

S.C. · August 14, 2019

Not one of her better known stories, but a lovely intermingling of fiction with known history of the period. A great read.

Spell-binding

K. · December 1, 2022

Mary Renault is in a class of her own when it comes to imagining pre-Classical Greece. This tale encompasses poetry in the oral tradition of Homer and the roots of classical Greek tragedy as well as the pre-democratic age of tyrants.

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The Praise Singer

Name: The Praise Singer
Brand: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
SKU: U0375714200
Price: 8.81 BHD
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Rating: 4.5 (13 reviews)

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