Σάββατο 7 Ιουλίου 2012

Send them back: The Parthenon Marbles should be returned to Athens

The Parthenon in Athens after the removal of the "Elgin Marbles" (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

This debate took place at Cadogan Hall on 11th June 2012.

Νικήτρια με διαφορά αναδείχθηκε η ομάδα που υποστήριξε την επιστροφή των Γλυπτών του Παρθενώνα στην Ελλάδα σε αγώνα επιχειρηματολογίας που διοργανώθηκε στο Λονδίνο.

Στο debate του οργανισμού Intelligence Squared με θέμα την επιστροφή των Γλυπτών από το Βρετανικό Μουσείο παρατάχθηκαν από τη μία πλευρά ο γνωστός Βρετανός ηθοποιός, συγγραφέας, σκηνοθέτης και τηλεοπτικός παρουσιαστής Στίβεν Φράι και ο συμπατριώτης του βουλευτής των Φιλελεύθερων Δημοκρατών και επικεφαλής της οργάνωσης Marbles Reunited, Άντριου Τζορτζ, υποστηρίζοντες την επιστροφή και από την άλλη ο Βρετανός ιστορικός και επίσης βουλευτής (με τους Εργατικούς) Τρίστραμ Χαντ με τον Ισπανό καθηγητή ιστορίας στο αμερικανικό πανεπιστήμιο Νοτρ Νταμ, Φελίπε Φερνάντεθ-Αρμέστο.

LONDON, ENGLAND - JUNE 01: The Townley Discobolus is displayed in The British Museum's 'Winning at the ancient Games' victory trail on June 1, 2012 in London, England. To celebrate the London Olympics, the British Museum is staging a trail for visitors to highlight various objects connected by the theme of winning, many synonymous with the games of ancient Greece and Rome. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)

Event info:
What's all this nonsense about sending the Parthenon Marbles back to Greece? If Lord Elgin hadn't
rescued them from the Parthenon in Athens and presented them to the British Museum almost 200 years ago, these exquisite sculptures -- the finest embodiment of the classical ideal of beauty and harmony -- would have been lost to the ravages of pollution and time. So we have every right to keep them: indeed, returning them would set a dangerous precedent, setting off a clamour for every Egyptian mummy and Grecian urn to be wrenched from the world's museums and sent back to its country of origin. It is great institutions like the British Museum that have established such artefacts as items of world significance: more people see the Marbles in the BM than visit Athens every year. Why send them back to relative obscurity?

But aren't such arguments a little too imperialistic? All this talk of visitor numbers and dangerous precedents -- doesn't it just sound like an excuse for Britain to hold on to dubiously acquired treasures that were removed without the consent of the Greek people to whom they culturally and historically belong? That's what Lord Byron thought, and now Stephen Fry is taking up the cause. We should return the Marbles as a gesture of solidarity with Greece in its financial distress, says Fry, and as a mark of respect for the cradle of democracy and the birthplace of rational thought.