It was at this period, about four hundred years after the war, that a poet flourished of the name of Melesigenes, or Moeonides, but most probably the former. He saw that these ballads might be made of great utility to his purpose of writing a poem on the social position of Hellas, and, as a collection, he published these lays, connecting them by a tale of his own. This poem now exists, under the title of the 'Odyssea.' The author, however, did not affix his own name to the poem, which, in fact, was, great part of it, remodelled from the archaic dialect of Crete, in which tongue the ballads were found by him. He therefore called it the poem of Homeros, or the Collector; but this is rather a proof of his modesty and talent, than of his mere drudging arrangement of other people's ideas; for, as Grote has finely observed, arguing for the unity of authorship, 'a great poet might have re-cast pre-existing separate songs into one comprehensive whole; but no mere arrangers or compilers would be competent to do so.' One can make a strong argument that The Iliad seems to celebrate war. Characters emerge as worthy or despicable based on their degree of competence and bravery in battle. Paris, for example, doesn’t like to fight, and correspondingly receives the scorn of both his family and his lover. Achilles, on the other hand, wins eternal glory by explicitly rejecting the option of a long, comfortable, uneventful life at home. The text itself seems to support this means of judging character and extends it even to the gods. The epic holds up warlike deities such as Athena for the reader’s admiration while it makes fun of gods who run from aggression, using the timidity of Aphrodite and Artemis to create a scene of comic relief. To fight is to prove one’s honor and integrity, while to avoid warfare is to demonstrate laziness, ignoble fear, or misaligned priorities. The Iliad begins in medias res, which is a Latin phrase meaning “in the middle of things.” Homer made this way of starting an epic famous, and in the case of The Iliad, the poet plunges into his story nine years into the Trojan War, at the moment when a personal dispute erupts between the Achaean king, Agamemnon, and the greatest Achaean warrior, Achilles. I cannot, however, help thinking, that the story which attributes the preservation of these poems to Lycurgus, is little else than a version of the same story as that of Peisistratus, while its historical probability must be measured by that of many others relating to the Spartan Confucius. Fate plays a crucial role in The Iliad. Not only does the poet use fate as a narrative means to foreshadow future events, but he also uses it as a thematic means to underline the significance of heroism. One of the defining features of heroism in The Iliad relates to the way heroes accept their destiny without flinching. Hector explains this point to his wife, Andromache, when she expresses her concern that he will die in battle. “And fate?” he responds rhetorically, “No one alive has ever escaped it.” Yet despite Hector’s insistence on the inescapability of fate, the poem also shows that destiny isn’t always written in stone. For example, Achilles has two fates, which means that he must choose his destiny. Whereas his mother, Thetis, begs him to choose a long life devoid of heroic glory, Achilles ultimately selects a hero’s death. Furthermore, gods have the power to challenge fate. Before Patroclus slays Sarpedon, a fierce Trojan warrior who happens to be one of Zeus’s favored sons, the father of the gods contemplates saving him to prevent his fated death. Ultimately, though, Hera warns Zeus against following through with his desire since challenging Sarpedon’s fate would set a dangerous precedent.

Analysis in The Iliad | SparkNotes Achilles Character Analysis in The Iliad | SparkNotes

To her Pelides:--"With regardful ear, 'Tis just, O goddess! I thy dictates hear. Hard as it is, my vengeance I suppress: Those who revere the gods the gods will bless." He said, observant of the blue-eyed maid; Then in the sheath return'd the shining blade. The goddess swift to high Olympus flies, And joins the sacred senate of the skies. Read about an opposing use of war as a theme in Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front. Military Glory over Family Life Scepticism has attained its culminating point with respect to Homer, and the state of our Homeric knowledge may be described as a free permission to believe any theory, provided we throw overboard all written tradition, concerning the author or authors of the Iliad and Odyssey. What few authorities exist on the subject, are summarily dismissed, although the arguments appear to run in a circle. "This cannot be true, because it is not true; and, that is not true, because it cannot be true." Such seems to be the style, in which testimony upon testimony, statement upon statement, is consigned to denial and oblivion. Scepticism is as much the result of knowledge, as knowledge is of scepticism. To be content with what we at present know, is, for the most part, to shut our ears against conviction; since, from the very gradual character of our education, we must continually forget, and emancipate ourselves from, knowledge previously acquired; we must set aside old notions and embrace fresh ones; and, as we learn, we must be daily unlearning something which it has cost us no small labour and anxiety to acquire. Setting: The city of Troy and its outskirts, located on the northwest coast of Anatolia (modern day Turkey)If, however, not even such faint and indistinct traces of Athenian compilation are discoverable in the language of the poems, the total absence of Athenian national feeling is perhaps no less worthy of observation. In later, and it may fairly be suspected in earlier times, the Athenians were more than ordinarily jealous of the fame of their ancestors. But, amid all the traditions of the glories of early Greece embodied in the Iliad, the Athenians play a most subordinate and insignificant part. Even the few passages which relate to their ancestors, Mr. Knight suspects to be interpolations. It is possible, indeed, that in its leading outline, the Iliad may be true to historic fact, that in the great maritime expedition of western Greece against the rival and half-kindred empire of the Laomedontiadae, the chieftain of Thessaly, from his valour and the number of his forces, may have been the most important ally of the Peloponnesian sovereign; the preeminent value of the ancient poetry on the Trojan war may thus have forced the national feeling of the Athenians to yield to their taste. The songs which spoke of their own great ancestor were, no doubt, of far inferior sublimity and popularity, or, at first sight, a Theseid would have been much more likely to have emanated from an Athenian synod of compilers of ancient song, than an Achilleid or an Olysseid. Could France have given birth to a Tasso, Tancred would have been the hero of the Jerusalem. If, however, the Homeric ballads, as they are sometimes called, which related the wrath of Achilles, with all its direful consequences, were so far superior to the rest of the poetic cycle, as to admit no rivalry,--it is still surprising, that throughout the whole poem the _callida junctura_ should never betray the workmanship of an Athenian hand, and that the national spirit of a race, who have at a later period not inaptly been compared to our self admiring neighbours, the French, should submit with lofty self denial to the almost total exclusion of their own ancestors--or, at least, to the questionable dignity of only having produced a leader tolerably skilled in the military tactics of his age."(27) It was Homer who formed the character of the Greek nation. No poet has ever, as a poet, exercised a similar influence over his countrymen. Prophets, lawgivers, and sages have formed the character of other nations; it was reserved to a poet to form that of the Greeks. This is a feature in their character which was not wholly erased even in the period of their degeneracy. When lawgivers and sages appeared in Greece, the work of the poet had already been accomplished; and they paid homage to his superior genius. He held up before his nation the mirror, in which they were to behold the world of gods and heroes no less than of feeble mortals, and to behold them reflected with purity and truth. His poems are founded on the first feeling of human nature; on the love of children, wife, and country; on that passion which outweighs all others, the love of glory. His songs were poured forth from a breast which sympathized with all the feelings of man; and therefore they enter, and will continue to enter, every breast which cherishes the same sympathies. If it is granted to his immortal spirit, from another heaven than any of which he dreamed on earth, to look down on his race, to see the nations from the fields of Asia to the forests of Hercynia, performing pilgrimages to the fountain which his magic wand caused to flow; if it is permitted to him to view the vast assemblage of grand, of elevated, of glorious productions, which had been called into being by means of his songs; wherever his immortal spirit may reside, this alone would suffice to complete his happiness."(35)

The Iliad: Important Quotes Explained | SparkNotes The Iliad: Important Quotes Explained | SparkNotes

Similarly, The Iliad recognizes, and repeatedly reminds its readers, that the creations of mortals have a mortality of their own. The glory of men does not live on in their constructions, institutions, or cities. The prophecy of Calchas, as well as Hector’s tender words with Andromache and the debates of the gods, constantly remind the reader that Troy’s lofty ramparts will fall. But the Greek fortifications will not last much longer. Though the Greeks erect their bulwarks only partway into the epic, Apollo and Poseidon plan their destruction as early as Book 12. The poem thus emphasizes the ephemeral nature of human beings and their world, suggesting that mortals should try to live their lives as honorably as possible, so that they will be remembered well. For if mortals’ physical bodies and material creations cannot survive them, perhaps their words and deeds can. Certainly the existence of Homer’s poem would attest to this notion. In addition to the many translations that have appeared through the centuries, numerous poets and novelists have offered creative retellings of The Iliad. Among the most important poetic reimaginings is Christopher Logue’s long-term project in which he sought to compose a poetic “account” that would retell the events of Homer’s poem in a modernist style. Logue used numerous translations of The Iliad as references while composing a version that emphasized a loose, Imagist style that did away with many of the formal conventions typically associated with Homeric verse. Logue’s poem initially met criticism from classicists when the first installments of the work appeared in 1981, but the project eventually achieved recognition, with Logue receiving the prestigious Whitbread Poetry Award in 2005 for the installment titled Cold Calls. Though not completed before his death in 2011, Logue’s project includes accounts of Books 1–9 and 16–19, all of which were originally published separately and later collected in one volume titled War Music. When Published: Manuscripts existed throughout antiquity. The oldest surviving copy is from the 10th century AD.

The greater part of the assembly seemed favourable to the poet's demand, but one man observed that "if they were to feed _Homers,_ they would be encumbered with a multitude of useless people." "From this circumstance," says the writer, "Melesigenes acquired the name of Homer, for the Cumans call blind men _Homers._"(7) With a love of economy, which shows how similar the world has always been in its treatment of literary men, the pension was denied, and the poet vented his disappointment in a wish that Cumoea might never produce a poet capable of giving it renown and glory.