GoatsongPhoebe Giannisi (trans. Brian Sneeden) The ancient Greek word for tragedy () is a compound of goat () and song (). In Phoebe Giannisis Goatsong, the seam that connects human and animal, myths and history, is the body. In Giannisis language, life obeys myth. A man places a screaming cicada in his mouth, reminding us of a scene from Platos Phaedrus, where Socrates claims cicadas to have been humans who became entranced by the invention of singing, and