iliad
"The Iliad", an epic tale told by the famous Greek author Homer, is focused primarily on the Trojan War between the Greeks, or Argives, and the Trojans. This war was filled with bloody battles and a massive loss of life. Homer tells stories about a duration of time during this fighting, and not the entire war. He uses his story-telling abilities to focus the audience on the garish and sometimes mundane drudgery of war. Due to his removal from the actual time of these battles, his stories may be embellished or not completely accurate descriptions of what did or did not happen. Overall, however, the Iliad is believed to be mostly true. Homer was born, most likely, in the 8th Century B.C. He is widely believed to be the best and most popular of the Ionian poets. His birthplace is not known beyond a doubt. Some have even said that he may have been blind. This idea has its share of critics though, since Homer details specific landscape scenes all throughout his works, and most of his writing is focused on the vision of the scene in which he describes. Homer relies heavily on descriptions to get his points across to the audience. In Homer's time, stories were told orally. Therefore, as a good writer, he attempted to write el
The question remains; however, does this difference in the expected nature of men and women make women seem submissive to the stronger, less emotional males? On one hand, lack of emotion in Homer's Greece was probably seen as being strong, or above pain and sorrow. Thus, males would be seen as stronger, more dominant. However, by today's standards it is known that emotions are inescapable and must be dealt with. If the ancient Greeks did know this, then females may have a socially accepted dominance over men, but they probably did not. "And so Briseis returned but when she saw Patroclus lying torn by bronze, she flung herself on his body she sobbed like a goddess in her grief " (p. 497, 333-335). Fire was also used by Homer to describe the intensity of The Iliad's battles. These were not used as much as the references to animals in the book, but fire did prove to be a major description of the fighting, as in this excerpt: Along with the fighting and nature, Homer's similes also show us the societal norms in ancient Greek culture when it comes to differences between the sexes. Men were described in grand God-like terms, while women were given praise for being nurturing and caring. As a man was supposed to be rather stoic, so a woman was supposed to show emotion. Examples of this are: Homer could simply say that the army moved forward and swarmed the opposing lines, but by the use of his simile, the audience gets a perfect example of what Homer is trying to convey to us. However, even though these similes sometimes may seem unimportant or even redundant, every situation they are used in is different. A lion may be just another lion, but no two conflicts that they describe are exactly alike. Homer uses this thought to convey the energy, and even at times beauty, of his fighting scenes. This describes the fierce destruction by Achilles' warriors of the opposing forces in blunt, raw terms. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ "But now, wild as a black cyclone twisting out of a cloudbank, building up from the day's heat, blasts and towers- so brazen Ares looked to Tydeus' son Diomedes." (p.192, 997-1000) and,
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Approximate Word count = 1504
Approximate Pages = 6 (250 words per page double spaced)
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