Episode 163: Spartan Spirit | 300 (2006), Greek History & Mythology

Spartans! What is your profession? As we continue exploring historical fiction, this week’s episode is a deep dive into Zack Snyder’s 2006 adaptation of Frank Miller’s graphic novel 300. Based on the historical Battle of Thermopylae, in which 300 Spartan soldiers laid down their lives against a massive force of the Persian army, 300 is in some ways a surprisingly accurate—and often problematic—presentation of the distant past. We’ll discuss what really (probably, maybe) happened at the Hot Gates according to the original historian himself, Herodotus, the powerful discourse it created around Western and Eastern Civilization, and how the modern adaptations of this event take those divides to a new level. We’ll never know everything there is to know about the Spartans, but thanks to the histories we have, and the myths they created, we certainly know who they believed they were.

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