Graffiti, The Iliad, and why art helps us laugh in the face of death

Jenny Valentine on why art has the power to save and change us, from reading The Iliad via a wall in Falmouth to Yves Klein’s Fire Colour One

There’s a quote at the very beginning of my new book Fire Colour One. My husband Alex took a photo of some graffiti on the Falmouth seafront and a clever friend told us it was from The Iliad so that’s what it says underneath, all highbrow and literary. Check me. I read the classics. Except I don’t. Turns out it’s actually from The Iliad, via a movie in Hollywood, via a wall in Falmouth, which is much more my style and in so many ways, makes me love it even more.

Alex didn’t take the photo until after I’d finished writing Fire Colour One but it struck me as the perfect companion to the book.

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