IDS 118           INTRO TO GREEK LITERATURE

HOMER: Some introductory remarks

The earliest poems in Western Literature are the Iliad and the Odyssey.  These are epics, that is to say long narrative poems; each of the poems contain 24 books, the books varying in length from 450 to 900 lines.  They tell stories about the age of the heroes, and both center on the Trojan War.

The father of the epic, and of all Western literature, is Homer.  He made use of the emergent system of writing the Greek language, which was modeled on the Phoenician alphabetic system.  I spoke about some of the problems found in earlier writing systems in the initial lecture on this material.  Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey came to be known and recited by every Greek of the Classical period.  One was not considered to be educated unless one could recite portions of Homer.  Respected as fountains of wisdom, they provided succeeding Greek writers with countless plots, themes, and characters.  To the Greek of the Classical period, these works were generally recognized to be the source of tradition, of proper education, and proper behavior befitting a Greek of good moral character.  Some modern scholars have noted that the use of Homer’s poems by the Classical age Greek is somewhat similar to the use of revealed scripture by European man in the Middle Ages or in Modern times. 

No one knows exactly who Homer was, though his authorship of the two epics is firmly established by tradition.  It is believed that he lived in one of the Greek cities on the coast of Asia Minor, perhaps about 800 BCE.  He gave classical formulation to tales that had been in circulation for several centuries before him.  The general setting of his poems is the Trojan war, a struggle between early Greeks and the defenders of Troy (Ilium), which purportedly took place in the twelfth century BCE.

The Iliad tells the story of the wrath of Achilles, the greatest of the Greek heroes who fought at Troy.  Achilles and Agamemnon, leader of the Greek host, quarrel at an assembly of the army before Troy.  Agamemnon takes away Achilles’ prize, a captive girl whom he loves.  Thus insulted, Achilles refuses to fight any longer and stays by his ships, with disastrous consequences for both himself and the rest of the Greeks.

Without his help the Greeks suffer heavy losses and are driven back to their ships.  Achilles still refuses to fight but is at last persuaded to allow his closest friend, Patroclus, to lead his men into battle.  Only when Patroclus has been killed by Hector, the greatest of the Trojan heroes, does Achilles turn his anger from Agamemnon and fight against the Trojans.  To avenge the death of his friend, he leads his men into battle, causing terrible carnage.  He sweeps the Trojans back into the city and kills Hector in single combat before the walls of Troy.  He, then, ties the corpse of Hector behind his chariot and drags it around the walls before the eyes of Hector’s father, Priam, and his mother and wife. 

Achilles’ anger does not cease until the aged Priam, alone and at night, makes his way through the Greek camp to Achilles’ tent and begs him to return the body of Hector for burial.  Achilles, overcome by pity for the old man, consents and allows a truce for his burial.

The Odyssey tells the story of the return of Odysseus from Troy to his home in Ithica.  The plot is more complex than that of the Iliad.  It starts in Ithica, where Penelope, Odysseus’ wife, has been waiting for twenty years for her husband’s return.  She is beset by suitors who are competing for her hand and the kingdom.  Her son, Telemachus, sets out to look for his father, who he believes is still alive.

Odysseus, meanwhile, is held captive by a nymph, Calypso, on a far-off island.  She is at last persuaded by the gods to let him go and helps him build a raft.  He sails off, only to be wrecked on the island of Phaeacia.  Here the king receives him kindly, and at a banquet given in his honor Odysseus recounts the adventures he has undergone since he left Troy.  The Phaeacians load him with gifts and take him home to Ithica, where they leave him sleeping on the shore.  The second half of the Odyssey tells how he returned to his palace disguised as a beggar and with the help of Telemachus and a faithful servant slew the suitors and was reunited with Penelope.

The Greeks attributed both of these great poems to Homer.  Scholars have shown that the poems are in fact the culmination of a long tradition of oral poetry, that is of poetry composed without the aid of writing.  The tradition probably originated in the Bronze Age, and in every succeeding generation poets retold and embroidered the stories about the heroes.  Finally, Homer composed these two great poems, which are on a far larger scale than oral epic usually is, in an age when writing had just been reintroduced to Greece.

The internal evidence of the Iliad suggests that it was composed between 750 and 700 BCE in Ionia. Modern scholars are not agreed on whether the Odyssey was composed by the same poet; there are considerable differences in style and tone between the two poems.  Both poems show characteristics of oral epic that make them very different from literary poetry.  They were composed to be recited or sung aloud to the accompaniment of the lyre.  The stories themselves, the recurrent themes, and a large proportion of the actual lines are traditional, but the structure of the poems, the clear and consistent characterization of the leading figures, and the atmosphere of each poem, tragic in the Iliad, romantic in the Odyssey, are the creation of a single poetic genus.

Looking at our text, let us examine the central set piece of the first book of the Iliad.  Lines 90 - 215 focus on the main theme of this book.  Here, the Greeks are being punished by Apollo for not returning the girl Chryseis to her father Chryses in exchange for the ransom.  Why won’t Agamemnon return Chryseis to her father? Because I was unwilling to accept the ransom for Chryses’ daughter but preferred instead to keep her in my tent!  And why shouldn’t I?  I like her better than my wife Clytemnestra.  She’s no worse than her when it comes to looks, body, mind or ability.  Still, I’ll give her back, if that’s what’s best.  I don’t want to see the army destroyed like this.  But I want another prize ready for me right away.  I’m not going to be the only Greek without a prize, it wouldn’t be right.  And you all see where mine is going. (Iliad: Lines 119 - 128 trans. Lombardo)

Why does Achilles complain about Agamemnon’s request for another prize?  “You shameless, profiteering excuse for a commander!  How are you going to get any Greek warrior to follow you into battle again?  You know, I don’t have any quarrel with the Trojans, they didn’t do anything to me to make me come over here and fight, didn’t run off my cattle or horses or ruin my farmland back home in Phthia, not with all the shadowy mountains and moaning seas between.  It’s for you, dogface, for your precious pleasure - and Menelaus’ honor - that we came here, a fact you don’t have the decency even to mention!  And now you’re threatening to take away the prize that I sweated for, and the Greeks gave me.  I never get a prize equal to yours when the army captures one of the Trojan strongholds.  No, I do all the dirty work with my own hands, and when the battle’s over and we divide the loot you get the lion’s share and I go back to the ships with some pitiful little thing, so worn out from fighting I don’t have the strength left even to complain. (Iliad: lines 159 - 178 trans. Lombardo)

What is it that Achilles’ accusing Agamemnon of doing?  Acting greedily or unjustly.  Aristotle claimed, in the Nicomachean Ethics, that acts of injustice string from the motive of pleonexia.  “The unjust person awards himself an excess of what is considered beneficial, without qualification, and a deficiency of what is harmful, and, speaking as a whole, he acts similarly in distributions between others.” (NE1134a10 - 14 trans. Irwin)

The question remains: does Agamemnon act in the way that Aristotle describes the unjust person acting?  Is there any evidence in Achilles’ complaint that Agamemnon awards himself a deficiency of what is harmful?  “You’ve never had the guts to buckle on armor in battle or come out with the best fighting Greeks on any campaign!  Afraid to look Death in the eye, Agamemnon?  It’s far more profitable to hang back in the army’s rear . . . confiscating prizes from any Greek who talks back and bleeding your people dry.  (Iliad: Lines 236 - 244 trans. Lombardo).

Is there any indication in the poem what should be done in this situation?  Let’s look at the advice of Nestor.  Agamemnon, for all your nobility, don’t take his girl.  Leave her be: the army originally gave her to him as a prize.  Nor should you, son of Peleus, want to lock horns with a king.  A scepter-holding king has honor beyond the rest of the men, power and glory given by Zeus himself.  You are stronger, and it is a goddess who bore you.  But he is more powerful, since he rules over more.  (Iliad: lines 290 - 297 trans. Lombardo.)

One thing to notice here.  In connection with Archaic Greece, Agamemnon is acting, to some extent, in the manner expected of a king.  It is very interesting that Aristotle uses this scene from the Iliad to explain the nature of ruling.  Although this scene is not explicitly mentioned in connection with the passage on justice in the Nicomachean Ethics, it is clear that Aristotle has this scene in mind.  For he says: that is why we allow only reason, not a human being, to be ruler.  For a human being awards himself too many goods and becomes a tyrant; a ruler, however, is a guardian of the just, and hence of the equal and so must not award himself too many good things.  If a ruler is just, he seems to profit nothing by it.  For since he does not award himself more of what is considered without qualification good, if it is not proportionate to him, he seems to labor for another’s benefit.  That is why justice is said to be another person’s good.  Hence some payment for ruling should be given; this is honor and privilege.  The people who are not satisfied with these rewards are the ones who become tyrants. (NE1134a35 - 1134b9 trans. Irwin).

Notice that Nestor’s advice echoes what Aristotle recommends here.  Agamemnon is more concerned with the prizes he can gain from the campaign rather than doing what is right by his troops.  Achilles is guilty of not giving the proper respect to Agamemnon.  But this is motivated by the complaint that Agamemnon is acting greedily and not acting like a leader of men.

Was it possible, before Achilles took the oath, for things to turn out differently?  Even after Achilles took the oath, did Agamemnon have a chance to make things right by Achilles?  What is the moment when Agamemnon and in turn the rest of the Greek’s fate, sealed?  I think that it is the moment when Agamemnon actually takes Briseis from Achilles.  There is time before this action to prove to Achilles that is wrong in his assessment of Agamemnon.  Only when Agamemnon orders Briseis taken from Achilles that it is too late to turn aside from Achilles acting in accordance with his oath.