In Book One of The Illiad, the story began with an inevitable cataclysm. Zeus, the king of the Gods, laid upon the Achaeans a massive destruction, which led to their defeat and loss of plentifully innocent lives. Why would the Almighty Zeus strike upon them? For once the title “The Rage of Achilles” says it all. Achilles was boiling with antipathy and fury towards Agamemnon for snatching his worthy prize, Briseis, away from him. However, Agamemnon had done so because God Apollo himself was angry at Agamemnon for taking Chryseis, the daughter of priest Chryses and a prize Agamemnon so very much believe he deserved, and demanded that he return her back to the father.

Achilles and Agamemnon are concerned about these women because of their dignity and pride more so than love. The reason is that Achilles is a stubborn and insurgent warrior, which he often disagrees with Agamemnon and vilifies his honor. Whereupon disliking his tenacity, Agamemnon retaliates back. To them, this is a battle of pride and honor between two men. In Agamemnon’s point of view, if he doesn’t get what he wants, then neither will Achilles.

However, in my perspectives, this is simply a childish play. It’s a never ending game of retaliation. Achilles’ fierce refusal to part with Briseis is like a child’s tantrum when the older brother snatches his toys away because the parents suspended the brother’s car. To Achilles, Agamemnon has won because, at the very least, he now possesses Briseis whereas Achilles has nothing. Therefore, Achilles pleads Thetis to avenge him, and consequently, Zeus swarms Agamemnon’s men with utter defeat and shame.

If we’re being completely honest here, I had a pretty tough time getting through Book 1. With all of the different characters and the language used in the book, I found myself stumped after nearly every paragraph. Either confused about which person is which, or which person said what. At that point, I decided to read the summary of Book 1, and then go back to the original text and try again. I was amazed at how much smoother the reading was for me. I highly recommend doing that before reading Book 2 if the language in this book seems completely out of your comprehension (like it is for me.)

What surprised me most about Book 1 was the fact that there is a major war taking place simply because Agamemnon is being stubborn and won’t return the “prize” he believes is rightfully his. He would rather let a war ensue, watch hundreds of men die from the plague, than to be defeated. Preserving Agamemnon’s pride seems to be the ultimate goal here, not winning any war. It’s seems truly disappointing that this is the leader of the Achean army. He’s self-serving and reckless, and he clearly isn’t fit to be a leader. I guess I’m also confused as to why he returns Chryseis back to her home and keeps Briseis, were they both his prizes or was only Briseis his prize?

In my opinion, Iliad is one of the greatest epics of all time, because it is  written and described in a way that keeps the reader in suspense to try comprehending the development and ending of a story in such tragic way. One of the most interesting and mysterious things concerning this poem is the time when it was written, considering that it is assumed that the Trojan war took place around 1250 B.C. The role of each character is extremely important to understand, because by knowing the characters’ approach to the story, we can have a better understanding of the Homers’ description to the tragic ending. The main characters, also the leaders of the war from both sides have a crucial roles on the poem, because their acts and decisions decided the fate of two great nations. Agamemnons’ desire for power, Achilles’ behavior due to his pride, Hectors’ duty to protect his land and family, and Helens’ beauty are some of the most memorable situations and descriptions that the reader will get to enjoy while reading this amazing story. There so much to talk about this poem, however, I would like to talk a little about the epic battle between Hector and Achilles. The battle which decided the fate of this long war. The wrath and anger of Achilles became stronger than ever when he was told that his young cousin was killed by Hector thinking that it had been him. Achilles greatness becomes a visual fact seen by all people of Troy. He alone goes to fight Hector and avenges his cousins death. Achilles defeats and kills Hector! He had gained the pride again, unfortunately for the Trojans that was a devastating loss of a great leader, which in fact will lead the fall of a great nation. This is a story of love, of extreme violence, of great battles, of deception, of pride, and of rising heroes that gave their lives in one of the most memorable wars that has ever been fought…

Homer’s pieces are normally tough to read because their written in a form I’m not used to. In high school I read The Odyssey but I must admit that I didn’t enjoy it one bit. I quickly gave up on it because the language just seemed to confusing. So when I saw we were going to read The Iliad I knew I had to get some more background about the book before I could start reading it.

By reading a brief summary about this book before I started reading it allowed me to understand what was going on right away. I flew through the pages much quicker than I had expected. To my surprise it is a fairly easy book to read and comprehend. The only thing that throws me off a bit is all the characters. Throughout Book 1 Homer must have mentioned at least 10 characters. It seems as if he doesn’t give much background as to who each of them are. Luckily, I remembered a couple of the gods from my high school English class.

It was surprising to me that this is a poem because normally when I read poems they are confusing and boring. From what I have read The Iliad doesn’t seem confusing and it has an interesting story line. Since I haven’t read a poem in years I’m not familiar with the correct way of reading it. I know with poems you pause differently as you would an ordinary novel. I wonder if reading it more like a poem versus a novel would change the tone at all.

Honestly, this is my first time reading The Iliad. I’ve heard much about it, the bedtime stories that are told through the eyes of the Greeks. I’ve tried to read The Odyssey, but quickly realized that it was way out of my comprehension. Though I understand the importance of this ancient text; I’ve been avoiding it because of its complex layout.

As I read through the first book, I’ve noticed the simplicity and flow of the writing style. Yet it is still very hard to comprehend what the authors are saying. But I guess this what i’m in school for, to learn how to understand dramatic poetry at its finest.

The thing that I find hardest, is trying to keep up with all the names of the characters. Yes, there are some very distinctive characters that we’ve all heard about somewhere, maybe in a book, movie or history lesson. But then there are names that seem all too similar and if I not fully concentrating on it then I’ll probably mistake some name for another character with a similar name.

But thats neither here nor there (Sorry, I love saying that). Because, as we all know the importance of understanding these writings. I like to look at it as a landmark in writing, to see how it was back then compared to modern day writings. So other then this, I don’t expect to dive into this book and its characters, like I’ve experienced in some other books.

This image, which appears on a 5th-century BCE terracotta cup in the collection of the Louvre museum, is said to show Briseis with Achilles’ tutor, Phoenix. (Feel free to poke around in the Art Museum Image Gallery, a database available through our library’s website, more images; they have a wide, wide array of paintings on the subject of the judgment of Paris, for example, which we talked about a little bit today). Briseis will play an important part in Book One; she’s crucial to the action of the poem. As you read through Book One, go slowly. Don’t be dismayed if you feel a little bit confused: as we said in class, we open in media res, and partly, the confusion is deliberate. It’s also partly down to the fact that we’re less immediately familiar with the characters and stories being introduced here than the poem’s original audiences would have been. Think of Jim’s comment about Star Wars.

Your assignment for this week (due, as always, by Sunday at 11:59 PM) is to provide a 225-250-word post in response to Book One. Your post can be reflective, telling us what struck you as interesting, surprising, weird, troubling, or exciting about the poem. Or, if you like, you are welcome to answer one of the following questions: 1) Why are Achilles and Agamemnon so concerned about these women? What causes Achilles’ fierce refusal to part with Briseis? Put differently: is this about love, or something else? 2) Who’s in charge here? To what extent are Achilles, Agamemnon, and the other Greeks in Book One responsible for shaping events, and to what extent are those events being shaped by other forces (the gods, fate)? These are big questions–especially #2–and we’ll be coming back to them again and again as we read this poem. Whichever question you choose, or if you decided to write a more reflective post, you’ll need to finish Book One before beginning to write your post. So be sure to leave yourself plenty of time.

Instructions: Rather than adding your thoughts as a comment on this post (like we did last week), I ask that you put them on our blog in the form of a wholly new post. First, log in to the blog using your Baruch username and password. At the top of the page, hold your cursor over the word “New,” which will open up a drop-down menu. Click “Post.” Now, you can either type your post directly into the window or copy and paste text into the box from a Word doc. When you’re happy with your post and ready to share it, click the blue “Publish” box on the right. I look forward to reading your thoughts!