Who Can Launch a Thousand Ships? In honor of the Iliad-based movie about to come out, Troy, Slate has a slide show about the visualizations of Helen throughout history. Very engrossing, and a great lens to look at an era through: do they show Helen or imply her? Was she abducted by Paris, or did they fall in love? I personally would cast Angelina Jolie, my longstanding celebrity crush. She oozes sex and can launch any number of...ships. Also she's just wild enough to straddle that line between abduction and love. You can see her being impulsive enough to run off, but having Menelaus so wrapped around her finger that he's convinced she was stolen.


Who would you cast, and why? Let's get some comments! Also--did you read the Iliad (or the Odyssey) in school? I have a feeling that's not as common as it once was...
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