Readings Notes: The Iliad, Part A

Homer's Iliad. 

Prose version- The Iliad by Alfred J, Church.

For this week's reading, I picked Homer's Iliad. From the readings I did for Part A, I am focusing on three chapters that stood out to me. They are chapters 2- The Quarrel, 3- The Quarrel (cont.) and 4- What Thetis Did for Her Son. 

I'm honestly not sure why they stood out the most to me out of all of the other chapters. However, I did like the plot more of these three chapters compared to the others so I think that is probably why.

In The Quarrel, Achilles and King Agamemnon are arguing about who gets what share of the spoils after conquering the city of Chryse. King Agamemnon originally wanted to take a girl name Chryseis who is the daughter of the priest of Apollo. When Apollo heard the priest prayers for help, he got angry that his priest had to go through such things and came down to Earth to start killing  people. Achilles at one point gets tired of seeing people die for nine days straight so he calls an assembly. There he finds out that it is King Agamemnon's selfishness that is causing this destruction. He tries to fight Agamemnon when the king says that he will return the girl and take the girl meant for Achilles instead. The goddess Athene comes down at the right time and stops him by saying that Queen Hera and her love them both, and tries to convince him that one day he will be payed back three times as much for the wrong he will do.

In The Quarrel (cont.), King Agamemnon orders his heralds to go pick up the girl from Achilles. As they go to do so, they see Achilles sitting in front of his tent. He doesn't stop them because he says its not their fault they have to do this evil deed. After they took the girl away, he sat by the sea-shore and cried. His mother Thetis, the daughter of the sea, heard him and came up to ask him what's wrong. He tells her what happened and then tells her to go to Zeus and ask him to make the Greeks leave so that Agamemnon can learn how foolish he has been. He reminds her of how much she has helped Zeus in his time of trouble so Zeus would feel like he needed to help. Thetis says she will go to Zeus and ask for help.

Thetis and Zeus. Source: Wikimedia Commons.

In What Thesis Did for Her Son, Thetis has gone to Olympus to ask Zeus for help for her son. Zeus says nothing for a bit so Thetis holds him by his knees and beard and keeps asking him. Zeus tells Thetis it is a hard thing she is asking and that this will lead to a fight between him and his wife Hera. After he says he will help, he goes to his palace and there Hera is already suspecting that he had met with Thetis. They argue about it and Zeus threatens to raise his hands on her. Zeus kept thinking about how he was going to help so decided to sent a Dream to Agamemnon and try to fool him to think he can take the city of Troy with the help of Achilles.

Things I got out of these three chapters:

• Achilles is a great warrior but also seems like a brat at times. 
• Has a lot of pride (called himself the bravest man in your army)
• Genuinely wants the killing of his people to stop
• Has to give up his "share" of the spoils to starts crying and tells his mother to get him help
• I really liked the drama that builds up between Zeus and Hera. 
• I like that he knows if he goes against his wife then she will be mad. But I also like that he stood up for himself as well when she was accusing him in front of the other gods. 

I could either write a story about the drama between Zeus and Hera or I could write something about Achilles.