The Iliad

موضوع: The Iliad الأربعاء أبريل 27, 2011 4:08 pm

The Iliad
Plot Overview

NINE
YEARS AFTER THE START OF THE TROJAN WAR, the Greek (“Achaean”) army
sacks Chryse, a town allied with Troy. During the battle, the Achaeans
capture a pair of beautiful maidens, Chryseis and Briseis. Agamemnon,
the leader of the Achaean forces, takes Chryseis as his prize, and
Achilles, the Achaeans’ greatest warrior, claims Briseis. Chryseis’s
father, Chryses, who serves as a priest of the god Apollo, offers an
enormous ransom in return for his daughter, but Agamemnon refuses to
give Chryseis back. Chryses then prays to Apollo, who sends a plague
upon the Achaean camp.
After many Achaeans die, Agamemnon consults
the prophet Calchas to determine the cause of the plague. When he learns
that Chryseis is the cause, he reluctantly gives her up but then
demands Briseis from Achilles as compensation. Furious at this insult,
Achilles returns to his tent in the army camp and refuses to fight in
the war any longer. He vengefully yearns to see the Achaeans destroyed
and asks his mother, the sea-nymph Thetis, to enlist the services of
Zeus, king of the gods, toward this end. The Trojan and Achaean sides
have declared a cease-fire with each other, but now the Trojans breach
the treaty and Zeus comes to their aid.
With Zeus supporting the
Trojans and Achilles refusing to fight, the Achaeans suffer great
losses. Several days of fierce conflict ensue, including duels between
Paris and Menelaus and between Hector and Ajax. The Achaeans make no
progress; even the heroism of the great Achaean warrior Diomedes proves
fruitless. The Trojans push the Achaeans back, forcing them to take
refuge behind the ramparts that protect their ships. The Achaeans begin
to nurture some hope for the future when a nighttime reconnaissance
mission by Diomedes and Odysseus yields information about the Trojans’
plans, but the next day brings disaster. Several Achaean commanders
become wounded, and the Trojans break through the Achaean ramparts. They
advance all the way up to the boundary of the Achaean camp and set fire
to one of the ships. Defeat seems imminent, because without the ships,
the army will be stranded at Troy and almost certainly destroyed.
Concerned
for his comrades but still too proud to help them himself, Achilles
agrees to a plan proposed by Nestor that will allow his beloved friend
Patroclus to take his place in battle, wearing his armor. Patroclus is a
fine warrior, and his presence on the battlefield helps the Achaeans
push the Trojans away from the ships and back to the city walls. But the
counterattack soon falters. Apollo knocks Patroclus’s armor to the
ground, and Hector slays him. Fighting then breaks out as both sides try
to lay claim to the body and armor. Hector ends up with the armor, but
the Achaeans, thanks to a courageous effort by Menelaus and others,
manage to bring the body back to their camp. When Achilles discovers
that Hector has killed Patroclus, he fills with such grief and rage that
he agrees to reconcile with Agamemnon and rejoin the battle. Thetis
goes to Mount Olympus and persuades the god Hephaestus to forge Achilles
a new suit of armor, which she presents to him the next morning.
Achilles then rides out to battle at the head of the Achaean army.
Meanwhile,
Hector, not expecting Achilles to rejoin the battle, has ordered his
men to camp outside the walls of Troy. But when the Trojan army glimpses
Achilles, it flees in terror back behind the city walls. Achilles cuts
down every Trojan he sees. Strengthened by his rage, he even fights the
god of the river Xanthus, who is angered that Achilles has caused so
many corpses to fall into his streams. Finally, Achilles confronts
Hector outside the walls of Troy. Ashamed at the poor advice that he
gave his comrades, Hector refuses to flee inside the city with them.
Achilles chases him around the city’s periphery three times, but the
goddess Athena finally tricks Hector into turning around and fighting
Achilles. In a dramatic duel, Achilles kills Hector. He then lashes the
body to the back of his chariot and drags it across the battlefield to
the Achaean camp. Upon Achilles’ arrival, the triumphant Achaeans
celebrate Patroclus’s funeral with a long series of athletic games in
his honor. Each day for the next nine days, Achilles drags Hector’s body
in circles around Patroclus’s funeral bier.
At last, the gods agree
that Hector deserves a proper burial. Zeus sends the god Hermes to
escort King Priam, Hector’s father and the ruler of Troy, into the
Achaean camp. Priam tearfully pleads with Achilles to take pity on a
father bereft of his son and return Hector’s body. He invokes the memory
of Achilles’ own father, Peleus. Deeply moved, Achilles finally relents
and returns Hector’s corpse to the Trojans. Both sides agree to a
temporary truce, and Hector receives a hero’s funeral.