The Iliad



The Iliad

The following questions should be answered as completely as possible--very often requiring at least three complete sentences; also, a proper response will involve the insertion and analysis of quotations from the text as support. Provide for each vocabulary word: a numbered list of the word, its part of speech, a brief definition, the line from the poem that uses the word, and your own context sentence. Your answers to the questions should follow this vocabulary list for each book of the poem.

Book Vocab/Questions Due Date Location

1,2,3,4, and 5 10:00 P.M. 9/20 Dropbox

6,7,8,9,10,11 10:00 P.M. 9/27 Dropbox

16,18,19,22,23, and 24 10:00 P.M. 10/11 Dropbox

Quiz Dates

9/20 Books 1,2,3,4, and 5

9/27 Books 6,7,8,9,10, and 11

Test

10/11

Writing Assignment will be due on at 10:00 P.M. on 10/15

Extension Activity will be in class on 10/15

Book 1 Thursday 9/13---9/14 for Section 9

Vocabulary: plundered, sacrosanct, hecatomb, propitiate, derision,

defilement

1. As you read Book 1, notice how narrative slowly reveals characters, relationships, and the general situation. Why is this an effective narrative device? What are its limitations?

2. The Iliad opens with an invocation of the Muse (here referred to only as “Goddess”). What does it reveal about the narrator? How does it influence your reading of the rest of the work?

3. Why does Agamemnon respond so threateningly to the priest of Apollo? Why does Agamemnon give up his concubine, Chryseis? Why does he take Briseis? Why is this such an outrage to Achilles? What action against Agamemnon does Achilles contemplate before he decides to withdraw from the fighting? Note also how Homer attends to the social and political dynamics of events. Who is present when Agamemnon and Achilles have their quarrel? Would this quarrel have erupted if they were the only two present?

4. When Achilles addresses Thetis, he describes in detail his quarrel with Agamemnon. Is his account exactly the same as that narrated earlier in the book? Why would events, so recently narrated, be retold? What does Thetis’ reaction to his request reveal about Achilles?

5. Apollo, Athena, Zeus, Hera, and Hephaestus all play roles in Book 1. What types of human activities attract the attention of the gods?—provide at least one quotation, and analysis, that helps to explain the motivation of at least one of these gods.

6. Compare the conversations between Zeus and Thetis, in private, and between Zeus and Hera, before the other Olympian gods. Would Zeus have even entertained Thetis' request, had she made it in the presence of the other gods? Would Zeus have reacted as violently toward Hera if she hadn't pressed him before other gods?

Book 2 Monday, 9/16---Tuesday, 9/17 for Section 9

Vocabulary: tumult, courier, sparsely, citadel, prostrate

1. Book 2 presents the first of Agememnon’s “aborted plans”. What does Agamemnon decide to do? What prompts his decision? What does this say about Agamemnon’s effectiveness as a leader? Who steps in to save the situation?

2. Provide Thersites’ comments about Agamemnon and discuss how these are different from Achilles’? Why does Odysseus treat Thersites so harshly? What does this say about what is important to Odysseus

3. Why the long list of cities represented in the catalogue of ships? In antiquity this was often deemed one of the high points of the Iliad. Modern readers often have a different reaction. Why would one react positively to this passage? What does it add to the work? Outside of conveying the scope of the expedition, does the catalogue fulfill any other functions?

4. The book closes with a shorter Trojan catalogue. What does this reveal about the Trojans and their allies?

Book 3 Monday, 9/16---Tuesday 9/17 for Section 9

Vocabulary: brazen, flank, luminous, censure

1. Provide the quotation of at least two similes that open book 3 and explain what these reveal about the differences between Greeks and Trojans?

CSTS215: TALES OF TROY

2. How do the old men of Troy respond to Helen’s presence? How does Priam regard her? Is there blame of her for the losses, economic as well as human, to Troy?

3. Why do the gods intervene to rescue Paris from single combat with Menelaus? What is the outcome of this divine intervention for Paris? How does his character compare with other heroes in the poem?

4. Is the duel a complete waste of time, or is the situation at the end of the book at all different from the beginning? Why or why not? Do we know more about the relative guilt of Greeks and Trojans?

5. To what extent is Book 3 a repeat of the events that would most likely have occurred at the beginning of the war, ten years before? Why is scene situated here?

Book 4 Wednesday, 9/18—Thursday, 9/19 for section 9

Vocabulary: ramparts, marshaling, reproach, staunch, bastions

1. Consider the descriptions of fighting in these books. How graphic are the descriptions of fighting, wounding and death? Provide an example. Do you think this promotes warfare?

2. What kinds of things does Homer tell us about the minor characters who appear only to be killed? Provide at least one specific example.

3. What similes does Homer use to describe the behavior of combatants? Provide at least three samples and discuss why the poet uses these in this scene?

4. Much of this book is devoted to Agamemnon's marshalling of the troops and encouragement of the various leaders. Does he seem more competent here than in the previous books? Are his leadership methods effective? What historical or contemporary leader might you liken him to and why?

Please answer completely. Provide quotations to support your analysis.

Book 5 Due 9/26

Vocabulary: conspicuous, corselet, vaunting, insatiate, perdition

1. Provide the line(s) to explain why the immortals do not have blood

2. What is the divine response to Diomedes' violence against gods? Is he punished for impiety? Why or why not?

3. What is Zeus’ attitude toward these acts against his fellow Olympians? How does the relationship between heroes and gods differ from the relationship between the rest of humanity and the gods?

4. Now that you have read a significant section of the Iliad, what can do we know about the narrator? Does he reveal any partiality for one side or the other? Explain with at least two different ideas and/or examples.

Book 6 Due 9/26

Vocabulary: rapturous, injunctions, steadfast, aegis, lingered

1. Who prompts Hector to return to Troy? Why does he go? What exactly is his mandate from Helenus? (provide the lines of her mandate to him)

2. The Greek Diomedes and Glaucus decide not to fight each other. Why exactly is this?

3. What women does Hector encounter in Troy? What is his relationship between each? How might their attempts to delay him make him actually want to get back to the battle quicker?

4. What is the impact of war on Hector's mother, Hecuba? What does she desire to offer Hector and what is she instructed to do? Provide the quotation. What is ironic in this action?

5. How does the father regard his young son? How aloof or distant was this powerful warrior from his small child? How intimate? Here is another instance of Homeric laughter, as father and mother react to the infant's initial alarm at his father in battle gear with face mostly hidden by his helmet. What circumstances produce the laughter? How is this like the laughter on Olympus as gods watched Hephaestus scrambling in service to them? How is it different?

Book 7

Vocabulary: stricken, throng, haughty,

1. Another dual is proposed. Who will fight this time? How is the Greek champion chosen?

2. What is the initial Greek response to Hector’s challenge? Who breaks the silence? Why do the Greeks fear for Menelaus? How does Agamemnon persaude him not to fight?

3. Keeping the dual between Paris and Menelaus in mind: who seems to be winning the dual in Book 7? Why does it break off before it is completed? How do Ajax and Hector part.

4. A Trojan elder, Antenor, also has a plan? What does he suggest? Paris refuses but does make a counter-offer that is relayed to the Greeks. What is this offer? Could it be successful?

5. Poseidon takes a special interest in the construction of the Greek wall. He has two concerns about the wall; what are they? What does Zeus grant Poseidon concerning the wall? When will this come to pass?

Book 8

Vocabulary: hewed, traverse, goaded, audacious, fodder,

1. How does Zeus deal with Athena and Hera in their efforts to advance the Greek side? What is the basis of his power? What is revealed about the roles of Hector and Patroclus?

2. Beginning in the Book and climaxing just before his death in Book 22, Hector becomes increasingly arrogant. Given his performance in the dual in Book 7, is this attitude merited?

3. What does the brief scene between Hera and Poseidon add? How does it motivate the action of the work?

4. Just as Hector routs the Greeks, the scene shifts to Olympus. What does the conversation between Athena, Hera, and Zeus add to the narrative? What is happening when the narrative returns to the Trojan plain?

5. What do you make of Hector’s speech that closes the Book? Provide, and analyze the final sentence of his speech?

Book 9

Vocabulary: sentinels, supplication, cauldrons, sacrosanct, recompense

1. When Nestor confronts Agamemnon about his seizure of Briseis, what is Agamemnon’s view of that act?

3. What reparation does Agamemnon decide to offer Achilles? What relationship between himself and Achilles does Agamemnon envision?

4. Who are the members of the delegation sent to Achilles? Nestor selects these heroes not at random, but rather because of their close relationship with Achilles. What qualities does each have that would appeal to Achilles? How does each seek to persuade Achilles to return to combat? Who seems to move Achilles most from his determination to avoid fighting? Notice that the narrator says that Nestor gives advice to each member of the embassy but does not reveal that advice.

5. In his reply to Odysseus, Achilles says, "I hate that man like the very Gates of Death who says one thing but hides another in his heart" (lines 378-379). This charge, aimed at Agamemnon, must have a stunning effect on Odysseus, who is renowned among the Greeks for being a very clever and calculating speaker.

6. In his reply to Odysseus, what does Achilles say about his commitment to the values that brought him to Troy? About the heroic ideal? What are his reservations about pursuing heroic honor? What does he reveal about the two fates available to him? Which fate does he choose at this point?

7. Before this book, Agamemnon seems to have been chiefly responsible for sustaining the quarrel between himself and Achilles. Do the events of this book shift the burden of responsibility?

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