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Iliad
Achilles is sulking in his tent like a grounded teenager, having been deprived of his sex-slave by Agamemnon. As king, Agamemnon was perfectly within his rights to do this. But his fateful decision...
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Iliad
Achilles is enraged because Agamemnon quite arbitrarily takes possession of Briseis, his "maid of honor" (i.e. his concubine), a girl whom Achilles had kidnapped from a Trojan priest. Achilles in...
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Iliad
At the end of Book VI in the Iliad, Hector's wife, Andromache, and their young son bid farewell to him on the eve of battle. It is a touching scene of domesticity, showing the kind of tender home...
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Iliad
In the Iliad, the heroic code is seen through the bond of friendship, the customs of hospitality, and the concept of loyalty and courage of battle. The belief in hospitality customs carried great...
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Iliad
I assume that you are asking about the conflict between Agamemnon and Achilles that takes place in Book I of this epic. In that case, the conflict comes about because Agamemnon wants to take...
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Iliad
While it is often said that Achilles's fatal flaw was his anger, his hubris could also be considered a contributing factor to his eventual downfall. His hubris could have stemmed from the...
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Iliad
It has been established by scholars that the Iliad contains textual layers that pertain to various epochs beginning from Pre-Mycenaean era and ending at least with the ninth century BCE. Thus,...
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Iliad
There are quite a number of ways to approach this question. We see the importance of gods in the lives of the Greeks. We also see their strong belief in fate. Even the gods cannot control fate....
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Iliad
The narration of the Iliad takes place in the third-person omniscient, which means the narrator is not within the story but is looking at it as an objective outsider. Some have speculated that the...
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Iliad
I think that Homer's work embodies several conventions or elements of the epic poem. On one hand, the oral recitation element is of vital importance to the epic poem, and something that Homer's...
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Iliad
This strikes me as a very good question because from a modern perspective the heroes and villains in Homer's Iliad are sometimes difficult to identify. Also, the ancient definition of hero is...
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Iliad
The first consequence of Achilles' anger is that withdraws from the fighting and remains lounging in his tent. Shakespeare has comic scenes involving Achilles amusing himself in his tent along with...
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Iliad
One theme of the Iliad is an exploration of love. For example, Hector shows love for his wife, Andromache, and their very young son, Astyanax, as he (Hector) goes off to fight. Andromache shows her...
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Iliad
The Iliad is told in the third person, from an omniscient point of view. (It's important to note the narrator is the Muse, different from Homer, the poet.) The narrator's point of view is above the...
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Iliad
Greek religion, as portrayed in the Homeric epics, is characterized as "anthropomorphic." That means that the gods have "human forms." They are similar to humans in more than just outward form....
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Iliad
This is an interesting question, as Homer present conflicting ideas about war in the Iliad. On the one hand, it is a way men achieve glory. It is also a way individuals can achieve a form of...
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Iliad
An epic poem has several characteristics. First, epics tend to be long, and tell stories involving important events in the past. The Iliad fulfills this requirement as it is long (with some modern...
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Iliad
The Iliad is Homer's fictionalized representation of the events of the Trojan War. Although the war between Troy and Greece had many causes, the single incident that has most often been...
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Iliad
Homer's other great epic, the Odyssey, probably has more in common with Dante's Inferno than the Iliad. Indeed, the Odyssey, like the Inferno, involves the hero descending into the underworld and...
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Iliad
Achilles, as portrayed in Homer's Iliad, and Antigone, as portrayed in Sophocles' Antigone, face some similar challenges. One issue both face is having to deal with a king who has authority over...
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Iliad
In the Iliad, Zeus is conspiring with Achilles and helping the Trojans, essentially trying to aid in the destruction of the Greeks. Early in the poem, Achilles prays to his mother, asking her to...
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Iliad
Homer does right in calling Andromache a "precious wife." She is precious to Hektor. One of the most powerful elements in Homer's Iliad is that Hektor is an amazingly talented and gifted soldier,...
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Iliad
In the first book of Homer's Iliad, it is difficult for a modern audience to recognize heroism, mainly because few of the characters do anything that seems heroic from a modern perspective....
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Iliad
You can find the answer to this in book 9, when the Achaeans have been routed by the Trojans and beaten back to their ships (which the Trojans plan to set fire to, trapping the Achaeans on the...
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Iliad
I would make the choice that Hector makes: responsibility to other people. This is one of the many personal qualities that makes Hector such a sympathetic character and which distinguishes him from...
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Iliad
As Iliad 6 opens, the Greeks and Trojans have been fighting vigorously. As the Greeks begin to rally against the Trojans, the Trojan prophet Helenus advises Hector to head back toward the city,...
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Iliad
The first thing would be the husband's feelings toward her. The second thing would be the value he places in her as his wife. The third thing would be the value he places in her abilities as his...
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Iliad
I think that the significance of the prayer scene is large. It is this particular scene where Hector's life as a warrior for his city and his love as a father clash, creating an ultimate sense of...
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Iliad
As Priam explains to Achilles, who has finally agreed to give him the corpse of his son Hector, he is very tired. He has not slept for days, because he has been weeping and mourning for his son....
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Iliad
In The Iliad the rage of Achilles takes place over a considerable length of time. This means that, although Achilles is absent from the early action on the battlefield while he sulks in his tent,...
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Iliad
I suppose you would say that the role of Patroclus is to be a sacrificial lamb in order to get Achilles to come back to the battle. Achilles has been sulking in his tend because he was forced to...
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Iliad
It is important to consider the time period when discussing pride in the Iliad. In Ancient Greece, “heroes” were worshipped and idolized, almost as gods. Throughout this epic poem, Agamemnon,...
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Iliad
I think it would have to be "Heroes never make mistakes" because there are numerous examples in The Iliad when they do indeed make mistakes. Heroes, though exceptional in many ways, are nonetheless...
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Iliad
In Book 16 of the Iliad, Achilles prays that two things will return safely from battle: his dear friend Patroclus and the Greek ships. Zeus decides he will only grant one of these requests. As the...
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Iliad
The number three is a recurrent theme in Greek mythology. For the Greeks, this number was understood to mean several things. First, "three" could stand for the three most powerful gods,...
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Iliad
She is precious to Hector because he loves her. She is the mother of his son who is still just a baby. She is not like the other women who are hiding in their houses or praying at the temple to...
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Iliad
You are, I imagine, referring particularly to Book 22, which narrates the titanic final battle between Hector and Achilles and then Hector's death. As to who is the more "heroic", there are...
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Iliad
Achillles was keeping Hector's body and dragging it around the tomb of his friend to show he had avenged his friend in battle. Achilles was in horrible grief over the death of Patroclus. ...but...
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Iliad
In Book 22 of the Iliad, Achilles has returned to the battle after the death of Patroclus. He is the greatest warrior of the Greeks and enraged by the death of his lover. He first challenges Aeneas...
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Iliad
In Book 1 of Homer's Iliad, the quarrel between Agamemnon and Achilles revolves around the concept of honor. Both Agamemnon and Achilles believe that, as active participants in the war, they are...
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Iliad
At the most critical point of "The Iliad", when Hector knows that he and the Trojans are going to lose, he offers a prayer to Zeus in honor of his child, Astyanax. He knows that with a Troy loss,...
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Iliad
Athena’s role in Homer’s Iliad actually starts before the text itself. She is one of the three goddesses who wish to be awarded the apple Eris throws to provoke disent among the wedding guests....
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Iliad
The theme of honor amongst human beings is a significant throughout the work. It is the basis for much of the characters' actions. It becomes the reason why war is waged, why Agamemnon is the way...
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Iliad
Homer certainly has dual feelings about war. On the one hand, Homer's opinion about war conforms with the traditional opinion of war held by the Ancient Greeks, an opinion that really was not...
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Iliad
I think that Homer is seeking to bring out how human beings, unlike the Gods, can change in a worthwhile and meaningful manner. Achilles' evolution is a reminder that the horrors of war can be...
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Iliad
Achilles is responsible for Hector's death because he kills him. Achilles had been staying in his tent, angry because Agamemmnon had taken Briseis from him. While he was there, his best friend,...
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Iliad
Like so much in Homer, there is no easy answer here. The dynamic of fate vs. free will is something that defines consciousness in the Trojan War. Everyone understands its presence, but few, if...
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Iliad
I think that it's tough to not consider Homer's work an example of the epic genre. It meets so many of the established criteria for what makes an epic. The epic hero is evident in the work. One...
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Iliad
Both Homer's Iliad and Christa Wolf's novel Cassandra show that there is a direct relationship between fate and choice. Fate does not act based only on itself; fate is guided by the choices we...
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Iliad
Menelaus, son of Atreus, is the brother of Agamemnon. He is also the husband of Helen and, therefore, when Paris/Alexander abducts her, Menelaus wants to recover his wife, so he enlists the aid of...
