In a pinch, Colgate students stay up all night reading the classics. But until last week, they’d never staged a 24-hour nonstop reading of Homer’s Iliad.

Shannon Young, a first-year from Tempe, Ariz., organized the event, the reading portion of which took 17 hours and 36 minutes. They spent the rest of the time “hanging out” between readings, munching delicacies from the Greek-themed buffet, and laughing with faculty members of the classics department, who told Greek and Latin jokes.

“The Iliad was meant to be read orally,” said Young. “We read portions, but never the whole thing start to finish, in a way that we can absorb the story. Then again, it’s pretty random to find people who want to read Homer for 24 hours straight.”

At Colgate, Young found 40 kindred spirits who were eager to read, and another 100 or so students and faculty members who dropped in at their leisure.

Some were drawn to the novelty and stayed for a short while; others brought dog-eared paperbacks and stayed for hours. The audience in the Ho Lecture Room was rapt if not forgiving, as some could be heard murmuring pronunciations they believed to be correct.

“Colgate is amazing this way,” said Young. “One day, I talked about the Iliathon with a few friends at breakfast. Two weeks later, the classics department was behind the event. I couldn’t have done it without them.”

Young recruited readers through an announcement on the Colgate portal (an internal website), an ad in the Maroon-News student newspaper, posters, and word of mouth. The Austin Murray Classics Fund covered promotional expenses, the Greek buffet, and many gallons of coffee.

The event began at 4 p.m. Friday, with classics faculty members donning long black beards for their dynamic reading of Book I.

“They hammed it up in both ancient Greek and English,” said Kelly McGowan '07, who read Book II, also in both languages, with three other advanced Greek students. McGowan, who stayed for Books I-IV, VIII-XIII, and XVII-XXIV, was one of the most loyal listeners.

Matt Carter, postdoctoral fellow in the classics, witnessed almost every word. He was most excited about the variety of translations that were used, including the prose versions by Rich Lattimore and Robert Fagles, and the poetic translation by Alexander Pope.

“The fact that we switched back and forth from Greek to English, from poetry to prose, even from one prose translation to another, was a pleasant bit of variety, in counterpoint to the constant of The Iliad,” said Carter.

The energy ebbed and flowed, as one might expect at an event of such epic proportions, and there were a few surprises.

First-years Gregory Golden, Brian Haghighi, and Michael Chang wore togas to read Book XVII at 8 a.m. Saturday. They used the Pope translation’s rhyming couplets.

“For a while, Mike accompanied the readers with his guitar. Brian rapped parts of the book. Then Mike read while Brian and Greg juggled. Diehard classics fans weren’t impressed,” said Young, “but it was funny. A little bit ridiculous, but that made it interesting.”

Finally, it was Young’s turn to read Book XXIV. Sleep-deprived and emotionally invested in the story, she ended the event with a powerful reading.

Several members of the audience were brought to tears, and Carter said he was mesmerized. “I thought, this is the effect Homer would have had on an ancient Greek audience.”

Participants will likely remember the event for a long time. They received T-shirts that say “One face, 1,000 ships, 24 hours,” and Young vowed to reunite the group in the spring for a marathon reading of The Odyssey. She also dreams of similar events for Paradise Lost, Dante's Inferno and other classics.