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The old stories are the oldest
May. 28th, 2016 09:12 amIn the Iliad, composed around 720-700 BCE, possibly by somebody called Homer, a bunch of legendary Greek heroes are engaged in the siege of the city-state of Troy. As the poem begins, the siege has been on for several years; other poems from the same oral tradition, now mostly lost, tell the story of how and why the war began, and we know it from fragments and summaries by later writers.
(No, this isn't the Homer piece I teased you with a couple of posts ago. This seemed more, shall we say, topical. I'll do that one another time, okay?)
As the Iliad opens, we meet Chryses, a priest of Apollo from a neighbouring city-state allied to Troy, whose daughter Chryseis has been taken by Agamemnon, the de facto leader of the Greek forces, as a war prize. Chryses goes to Agamemnon and begs for his daughter's return, offering rich gifts as compensation. Agamemnon angrily refuses and sends Chryses away with a flea in his ear, whereupon Chryses prays to Apollo, reminding the god of all the sacrifices and stuff he, Chryses, has done in Apollo's name, to strike the Greeks with pestilence. Apollo does so.
There follows a big argument between Agamemnon and Achilles, who leads the majority of the Greeks in thinking Agamemnon should give the girl back and stop their armies beingg slaughtered.
Agamemnon: "No! MINE! My preciousss!" (I paraphrase a little.)
Achilles calls Agamemnon a few names, whereupon Agamemnon says "Well, if I've got to give my trophy woman up I'll take yours instead, so ner to you." And does so. Achilles then in his turn flies into a passion, takes his ball and goes back to his ships saying "You'll be sorry," and calls on his mother, who is a sea-nymph, to talk to Zeus, the top god, to make him help the Trojans win from now on.
At which point we can imagine the reaction of the (Greek) audience listening to this.
"WTF, Homer? How dare you mess with our hero! Achilles is the very embodiment of what Greece can and should be, and you've made him be on the Trojans' side! This is a betrayal of everything the original poets intended when they started these stories! You've turned a celebration of Greek heroism and courage into a hollow mockery that spits on our very national identity! I'm shocked, shocked I say!" You get the idea.
Nothing changes.
(No, this isn't the Homer piece I teased you with a couple of posts ago. This seemed more, shall we say, topical. I'll do that one another time, okay?)
As the Iliad opens, we meet Chryses, a priest of Apollo from a neighbouring city-state allied to Troy, whose daughter Chryseis has been taken by Agamemnon, the de facto leader of the Greek forces, as a war prize. Chryses goes to Agamemnon and begs for his daughter's return, offering rich gifts as compensation. Agamemnon angrily refuses and sends Chryses away with a flea in his ear, whereupon Chryses prays to Apollo, reminding the god of all the sacrifices and stuff he, Chryses, has done in Apollo's name, to strike the Greeks with pestilence. Apollo does so.
There follows a big argument between Agamemnon and Achilles, who leads the majority of the Greeks in thinking Agamemnon should give the girl back and stop their armies beingg slaughtered.
Agamemnon: "No! MINE! My preciousss!" (I paraphrase a little.)
Achilles calls Agamemnon a few names, whereupon Agamemnon says "Well, if I've got to give my trophy woman up I'll take yours instead, so ner to you." And does so. Achilles then in his turn flies into a passion, takes his ball and goes back to his ships saying "You'll be sorry," and calls on his mother, who is a sea-nymph, to talk to Zeus, the top god, to make him help the Trojans win from now on.
At which point we can imagine the reaction of the (Greek) audience listening to this.
"WTF, Homer? How dare you mess with our hero! Achilles is the very embodiment of what Greece can and should be, and you've made him be on the Trojans' side! This is a betrayal of everything the original poets intended when they started these stories! You've turned a celebration of Greek heroism and courage into a hollow mockery that spits on our very national identity! I'm shocked, shocked I say!" You get the idea.
Nothing changes.