Katherine Roberts

The Muse has been rather a lazy blogger this August, as you've probably noticed. Only ONE post this month so far, and that one was about the Olympic Games, which doesn't even have an event for unicorns. (At least not yet, though when I have a proper name, I plan to enter the show jumping in disguise and show all those posh horses a thing or two...) But though I haven't been writing many actual blog-words, I've been playing around in the enchanted blog-woods and made a few small changes. Design. I'm experimenting with a beautiful bright blog background the talented Alzrith sent me - this one is a drawing called "Creatures" inspired by my books. Of course now you're probably all looking at the background instead of reading my words, but that's fine with me! Words and pictures are simply two different paths into the enchanted mists. You can check out more of Alzrith's lovely colourful work at  http://alzrith.de...

Wild olive: Olympic crown Now that all the excitement of the Olympic Games is over, the Muse has been musing on the difference between the ancient and modern events. In ancient Greece, the Games were part of a religious festival held to celebrate their gods. The greatest honour a young runner could gain was that of carrying the sacred torch in the closing ceremony to light the fire at the altar of Zeus Olympia, whose statue was one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Winning athletes were crowned with wild olive and given a red ribbon to wear around their arm, and soon the sporting events (originally not the most important part of the festival) became as famous in the ancient world as the statue of the god, prompting Aristophanes to write: Why, Zeus is poor, and I will clearly prove it to you. In the Olympic games, which he founded, and to which he convokes the whole of Greece every four years, why does he only crown the victorious athletes with wild olive? If he ...