Category: Analysis

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Michael La Corte, Research Associate, Curation and Communication, University of Tübingen

Imagine waking up to find strangers in your home – eating your food, killing your animals, then laughing as they blind you. Later, they tell the world you were the monster.

We are describing one of the better known episodes of Homer’s Odyssey, written around the late 8th or early 7th century BC. The intruders are protagonist Odysseus’s men, and the “monster” they attack is Polyphemus, a solitary giant shepherd later remembered only as a cyclops.

For centuries, we’ve followed the hero’s journey without asking what it costs. But what if the cyclops wasn’t the monster, but just one of many lives shattered along the way?

Director Christopher Nolan’s new adaptation of The Odyssey hits cinemas in July 2026. But will it celebrate Odysseus as the clever hero – or finally confront the wreckage he leaves in his wake?

Homer’s Odyssey, composed at the turn of the 8th to the 7th century BC, follows Odysseus, king of Ithaca, as he struggles to return home from the Trojan war, outwitting monsters, gods and fate. It’s a tale of resilience and cunning – and the template for countless stories since: the clever man triumphs over the monstrous other and sails home in glory.

We know the pattern by heart. But we rarely ask: who gets trampled along the way, and whose story is never told?

This article is part of Rethinking the Classics. The stories in this series offer insightful new ways to think about and interpret classic books and artworks. This is the canon – with a twist.

In the scene of Odysseus v Polyphemus, the cyclops is cast as a brute, a savage who traps the hero and his men in a cave. Odysseus responds with legendary cunning: wine, lies, a sharpened stake – and escape.

From the outside, it’s textbook heroism, yet Homer himself hints at the cost of that victory. He has Odysseus reveal his name only after the escape: “Tell them it was Odysseus, sacker of cities, who blinded you.” It’s a moment of pride, not necessity – the spark that seals his fate. In that instant, the clever survivor becomes the arrogant aggressor, and the story’s moral axis begins to tilt.

Yet if we shift perspective, the story changes. Polyphemus is a solitary shepherd, living in peace. Strangers break into his home, steal his food, kill his livestock, and leave him blinded and broken. His cave isn’t a prison but a home under siege. His violence, while brutal, emerges from desperation. You could easily argue that Polyphemus isn’t the villain. He’s the victim.

This reversal reveals a troubling pattern: our cultural instinct to root for the protagonist, no matter what they do – as long as the cause feels noble. From ancient epics to Hollywood blockbusters, we excuse deception, destruction, even murder, if it serves the “greater good”.

We cheer when the hero escapes – but rarely look back at what’s left behind. A burned city. A grieving family. A blinded shepherd. If it fits the story, we accept the collateral damage as necessary. That’s the seductive logic of heroism: clean endings, messy consequences.

In Homer’s writing, Polyphemus gets a single moment of anguish – a prayer to Poseidon, his father – and then vanishes from the story. His voice, his pain, his version of events do not fit the heroic arc.

And this pattern continues. Empires and conquerors have long branded enemies as “barbarians”, “savages” or “monsters” to justify violence. From Roman propaganda to colonial domination in the Americas and Africa – and, more recently, to claims of “denazification” in Ukraine – this tactic dehumanises the “other side” and erases their stories. Strip the enemy of humanity, and their suffering becomes legitimised.

If history is so often written by the victors, we must ask: what remains of heroism when we finally listen to the so-called monsters? As global conflicts polarise public discourse around heroes and villains, the stories we choose, and those we silence, matter more than ever.

What if we shift the spotlight? Polyphemus becomes more than a monster – he’s a mirror, showing how unchecked heroism can slip into cruelty. Cleverness isn’t virtue. And survival at others’ expense isn’t always justified.

Odysseus, the “man of many turns” is brilliant but ambiguous. His actions bring destruction alongside triumph. For every hero who returns, many suffer or are lost. True heroism lies not just in daring escapes, but in owning the cost left behind.

The cyclops’ tale warns us how easily we dehumanise those in the hero’s way. How we flatten complexity to fit a script. How we justify harm if the story feels right. Rethinking Polyphemus complicates Odysseus and challenges us as storytellers and audiences.

The real challenge for Nolan’s The Odyssey won’t be spectacle or scale, but perspective. Will it dare to look beyond the hero? Will it give voice to those left in his shadow? Clint Eastwood did just that with Flags of Our Fathers (2006) and Letters from Iwo Jima (2006), telling the story of the battle of Iwo Jima from opposing sides. By letting the “enemy” speak, he shattered the illusion of a single, righteous story.

If Nolan embraces that sort of complexity, The Odyssey won’t just retell a myth but will challenge us to rethink who we name as heroes and to listen more closely to those we once dismissed as monsters.

Looking for something good? Cut through the noise with a carefully curated selection of the latest releases, live events and exhibitions, straight to your inbox every fortnight, on Fridays. Sign up here.

This article features references to books that have been included for editorial reasons, and may contain links to bookshop.org. If you click on one of the links and go on to buy something from bookshop.org The Conversation UK may earn a commission.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Odysseus the destroyer? Christopher Nolan’s new Odyssey adaptation revives an ancient moral question – https://theconversation.com/odysseus-the-destroyer-christopher-nolans-new-odyssey-adaptation-revives-an-ancient-moral-question-270312

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Richard Hargy, Visiting Research Fellow in International Studies, Queen’s University Belfast

Republican congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, once a close ally of Donald Trump, spelled out in one short sentence why elements of the US president’s core voter base were dismayed at the weekend operation that captured Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro: “This is what many in Maga thought they voted to end.”

The sentiment expressed by Greene, who recently broke with Trump over what she alleged was his unwillingness to order the justice department to fully release its files relating to the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, was shared by some other elected Republican officials.

This included Kentucky’s Thomas Massie, who also publicly stated his disapproval with Trump’s decision to order the attack. But so far these voices are in the minority. In the days and hours since the operation, a series of prominent Congressional Republicans have united behind the president.

Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, for example, praised Trump’s decision to green light the US mission. He wrote on social media: “We will be more prosperous and safer for it. I am hoping and praying that the Venezuelan people will soon have a fresh start on democracy and freedom.”

American public opinion on the Venezuela attack will be measured in the coming days. But it is useful to reflect on polling leading up to the event. The Trump administration has authorised a number of military strikes on alleged drug boats near Venezuelan territory in recent months, while Trump himself has repeatedly threatened land strikes in the country.

A poll from December 2025 conducted by Quinnipiac University in the US found that 63% of registered American voters opposed military action against Venezuela – a significant figure against this type of intervention. More than half of the 25% of voters that supported military action were Republicans.

Some Republican political operatives are warning that a prolonged American presence in Venezuela will be detrimental to Trump and his party ahead of midterm elections in November. Dave Carney, a Republican strategist, stated on January 3 that “Nobody wants a quagmire. Nobody wants … body bags coming back to Dover of American soldiers who are being sniped at from … a rebellious minority in Venezuela.”

Philip Elliot, senior correspondent at Time magazine, has asserted that Trump’s aversion to foreign interventions was a huge appeal for many who supported him in the 2024 election. Elliot wrote on January 3 that, for these people, Trump’s “incursion into Venezuela, the capture of its first family, and its about-face of campaign promises stung something bitter”.

Trump’s overseas strategy

The military operation in Venezuela modifies Trump’s make America great again (Maga) foreign policy doctrine. In his second inaugural address in January 2025, Trump pledged that: “We will measure our success not only by the battles we win, but also by the wars that we end, and perhaps most importantly, by the wars we never get into.”

But the recent events in Venezuela seem to indicate a shift in Trump’s overseas strategy. The attack sees the president follow similar forays by his Republican predecessors in the western hemisphere. These include Ronald Reagan’s decision to invade Grenada in 1983 and George H.W. Bush’s authorisation of a military operation to oust Panama’s president, Manuel Noriega, in 1989.

This reorientation was to some extent codified by the Trump administration’s new national security strategy, which was published in late 2025. Vanda Felbab-Brown of the Brookings Institution argues that this document pivots “the US toward the western hemisphere … essentially asserting a neo-imperialist presence in the region”. The document may explain the rationale behind the operation in Venezuela.

The military action in Venezuela represents a victory for the more hawkish members of the Trump administration. This is perhaps most true for secretary of state Marco Rubio, who has long advocated removing Maduro from power. A possible change in government in Venezuela could lead to other geopolitical events in the western hemisphere that Rubio has spent years pushing for.

In 2019, for instance, he intimated that a diminished Cuban regime would be a welcome “byproduct” of Maduro’s removal. Since the raid in Venezuela, Rubio has asserted that Cuba’s government may be on borrowed time. “If I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I’d be concerned at least a little bit,” he said.

Being focused solely on the foreign policy sphere is also currently a political advantage for Rubio, especially if he is contemplating a run for the presidency in 2028. The crisis in Venezuela ensures he avoids becoming ensnared in other current domestic political controversies, including the high cost of living and continuing controversy over the release of the Epstein files.

The road ahead

In the coming weeks and months, the Trump administration will strive to navigate a path that reduces the risk of the US becoming entangled in a military conflict in South America. It will face continuing criticism from within its own party ranks and the Democratic opposition in Congress. The administration will also face media scrutiny on the legality of the action as well as the future scope of the US mission in Venezuela.

Laurel Rapp from Chatham House, a research institute based in the UK, has stated the Trump team will worry particularly about the potential for some of the leaders within the “Maga movement” who have broken with Trump to “exploit this rift as the midterms heat up”.

There could be some political currency for Maga standard bearers opposed to military operation in Venezuela to trade on. But, in my opinion, it is unlikely to have serious national domestic political ramifications in the immediate term. This is due to the fact the military action was executed successfully and without any American deaths.

So, standby for the more established issues to return to the fore soon – the economy, healthcare costs and the Epstein files.

Richard Hargy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. What Trump’s Venezuela intervention means for US domestic politics – https://theconversation.com/what-trumps-venezuela-intervention-means-for-us-domestic-politics-272688

Source: The Conversation – UK – By Emily Servante, Postdoctoral Researcher, Cereal Symbiosis, Department of Plant Sciences, University of Cambridge

It’s an exciting time to be a microbiologist working in rice research. A global push towards the cultivation of water-saving rice is enabling farmers to harness the power of microbes that thrive in less water.

Some farmers already use rice production systems that reduce or eliminate the length of time rice is submerged in a flooded paddy field. At the sowing stage, planting of pre-germinated seeds (direct seeding) rather than traditional transplanting of small plants into flooded paddies reduces the need for waterlogged fields. Waterlogged rice paddies emit huge amounts of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

Similarly, an irrigation practice known as alternate wetting and drying uses pipes drilled into fields to encourage water management and intermittent flooding, reducing water usage and methane emissions.

Among microbes thriving in less water are arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi. These are beneficial soil fungi that live inside plant roots and help to extend plants’ reach into the soil to collect nutrients, acting as “natural biofertilisers”.

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi are aerobic, meaning they require oxygen for survival. This makes them more likely to be well suited to the drier, more aerated soils (with air spaces to allow efficient exchange of nutrients, water and air) that are increasingly promoted in sustainable rice systems.

To test this theory, I stepped out of the Crop Science lab at the University of Cambridge and into the field at the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines.

Using some ink stain and a microscope, I examined roots from IRRI 154, a direct-seeded water-saving rice variety developed by the institute.

The results were striking: in IRRI 154 grown in traditional flooded paddy conditions, there were no signs of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonising the rice roots. But in irrigated, non-flooded “dry” conditions, the fungi were present in up to 20% of the root. This was a clear indication that water-reducing farming practices like dry direct-seeding can promote arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi colonisation in rice.

Similarly, a recent study reported that arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi help rice grown under alternate wetting and drying in Senegal to have increased resilience to changes in water and nutrient levels.

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi don’t just help plants access nutrients. They can also provide resistance to pathogens and increased survival in harsh climate conditions such as drought. Encouraging them to colonise rice plants could therefore enhance the overall resilience of rice, an increasingly important trait in the face of climate change and water shortages.

By supporting and even boosting beneficial microbes like these, our team at the Crop Science Centre also hope to reduce the use of synthetic nitrogen fertilisers. Fertilisers are a major source of nitrous oxide (N₂O), a potent greenhouse gas. One alternative is for farmers to apply biofertilisers, products containing live beneficial microorganisms such as arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi to promote growth.

Determining and testing optimal formulations and application strategies is a big challenge for researchers like me. The effectiveness of biofertilisers depends on several critical quality-control factors. This includes avoiding contamination, preventing spoilage during storage, successful establishment in the soil and efficient colonisation of plant roots.

The soil is a complex environment. Solutions need to be tailored to local landscapes and specific situations. That’s where an ongoing partnership with Tilda, a UK rice brand, comes in. Tilda successfully implemented water-saving alternate wetting and drying with thousands of basmati farmers in India. Since this encourages the arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, it has enabled my colleagues and I to put our science into practice.

I visited farmers in Haryana and Uttar Pradesh to ask about their thoughts on using local arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi-based biofertilisers to reduce the use of synthetic fertiliser. To my surprise, many had heard of “mycorrhizae” and were optimistic about its potential.

Our first mission was to check the presence of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in Pusa 1, a popular basmati variety grown in the area. Together with the rice farmers in Haryana, we turned the local rice market (mandi) into a lab, setting up ink staining and microscopes for people to see. I found the characteristic tree-like structure of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in a root, and ran outside to tell the crowd of over 20 farmers and agronomists to take a look.

From lab to field

Having confirmed that the fungi were present in Pusa 1 basmati, and with advice from Tilda’s local agronomists, we decided to test two locally available “mycorrhizae” biofertilisers in 31 pilot farms.

We visited the farmers involved in this pilot in September 2025. In Uttar Pradesh, we visited the family farm of Bhoti Devi, a female farmer, and gathered under a tree for shade while discussing field observations with her and some other farmers in the area.

The farmers told me that the rice with added mycorrhizae biofertiliser appeared to have increased root growth and a higher number of tillers (farm machinery with rotating blades that churn up and aerate the soil), indicating a potential boost in yields. I shared images from my own tests in Cambridge which showed similar results. It was so exciting to share and compare our observations.

In Haryana, ten farmers similarly described improved root growth. This visible improvement gives us and farmers confidence that these biofertilisers could be improving crop performance while water-saving techniques are being used. Now, we’re gathering data from this season to confirm these initial observations.

Our next steps for the biofertiliser testing are two-fold: to investigate whether we can apply them to reduce the use of synthetic fertiliser, and to examine the composition and sustainability of the available commercial biofertiliser products. This will ensures they reduce the use of synthetic fertiliser and associated greenhouse gas emissions. With more than 4,000 farmers in Tilda’s network, tests can be scaled up to assess the effects of reduced synthetic fertiliser on rice yields.

Translating our lab-based research into a real-world, scalable application is a dream scenario. From breeding programmes at IRRI in the Philippines to farmer fields in India, water-saving rice systems like direct seeding and alternate wetting and drying are promoting the presence of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi in rice roots.

Together with rice farmers in India, we can explore how to use more natural biofertilisers to reduce synthetic fertilisers and build more sustainable farming systems.

Don’t have time to read about climate change as much as you’d like?

Get a weekly roundup in your inbox instead. Every Wednesday, The Conversation’s environment editor writes Imagine, a short email that goes a little deeper into just one climate issue. Join the 47,000+ readers who’ve subscribed so far.

Emily Servante is collaborating on a project with Tilda, funded by the Ebro Foundation.

– ref. How I’m helping rice farmers in India harness the power of fungi in the soil – https://theconversation.com/how-im-helping-rice-farmers-in-india-harness-the-power-of-fungi-in-the-soil-269209