Journal: Greek Epic
20 January 2000
Here is what Edith Hamilton has to say about Hesiod:
“Hesiod was a poor farmer whose life was hard and bitter. There cannnot be a greater contrast than that between his poem, the Works and Days, which tries to show men how to live a good life in a harsh world, and the courtly splendor of the Iliad and the Odyssey. But Hesiod has much to say about the gods, and a second poem, usually ascribed to him, the Theogony, is entirely concerned with mythology. If Hesiod did write it, then a humble peasant, living on a lonely farm far from cities, was the first man in Greece to wonder how everything had happened, the world, the sky, the gods, mankind, and to think out an explanation. Homer never wondered about anything. The Theogony is an account of the creation of the universe and the generations of the gods, and it is very important for mythology.” (Hamilton, Mythology, 21-22) Also, Hesiod is “the first Greek who tried to explain how things began” (Hamilton, 64), who, inspired by the Muses, “was sacred far beyond any priest” (Hamilton, 37).
In thinking about Hesiod and his two works, I think that the role of the poet in each poem is a sacred one, becoming an active mouthpiece of the divine to men. I think Hamilton says that Hesiod is “sacred...beyond any priest” because a priest is only a passive servant to the divine while the poet is an active one: in expressing the divine, he is participating in it with his song, inspired by the divine. In other words, the Muses “breathed into me [the poet] / divine song” (Hesiod, Theogony, ll. 31-32), but the poet is also aware that the song he sings is “my song” (Theogony, l.1). The poet of the Theogony and the poet of the Works and Days is the same poet, with the same sacred, instructive role.
Hesiod structures the Theogony from the most general forces (Chaos, Earth, Love), to the cycle of son overthrowing father at the behest of the mother, to the rise of Zeus (whose arrival is at the center of the poem), to the ascendancy of the Olympians, to the rise of demigod heroes among mortal men. The principles at work in the process of generation are initially matriarchal and rather visceral: earth, sea, sky, blood, eating of children, blocking up of children in the womb, and even the castration of Ouranos by his son Kronos. The process of generation becomes patriarchal when Zeus stops the cycle of son overthrowing the father when he swallows Metis “a mate wiser than all gods and mortal men” (Theogony, l.887), who becomes a part of Zeus, “advis[ing] him in matters good and bad” (Theogony, l.900). This literal act represents the shift of power (as seen in the process of generation) from the matriarch (Gaia) to the patriarch (Zeus), the shift of the products of generation from the visceral and earthly (monsters, Titans, mountains) to principles which will effect not only gods but mortal men: Justice, the Fates, the Muses, to name a few (Theogony, l.900-917). The main symbol that the power has shifted is the birth of Athena: not from the womb of her mother Metis, but from the head of her father Zeus (Theogony, l.924-25). As seen in Aeschylus’ The Eumenides, the matriarchal Furies’ call for the blood-revenge from a matricide will give way to Athena’s call for judicious law from the realm of mortal men. Thus, the Theogony, implies the ascendancy and importance of the affairs of mortal men, which naturally leads to Hesiod’s other work, the Works and Days.
In the Works and Days, Hesiod relates the myth of the five races of men (W&D, l.110-200): the race of Gold, who live like gods; the race of Silver, who who is worse than the race of Gold and are “plagued by the pains / of foolishness”; the race of Bronze, who are war-like and violent; the race of Heroes, who are demigods but got wiped out by “Evil war and dreadful battle”; and the current race of Iron, whose “lot will be a blend of good and bad.” The significance of the races is that the races show why suffering exist among mortal men, beginning with a mythical Golden Age, the transition of two horrible ages, a penultimate age which clears away the effects of the intermediate ages, and the current age which is a mixture of “good and bad.” It is a hard life of work, and, often times, good men suffer while bad men prosper. But, the poet points out, “Justice is the winner in the race / against insolent crime.” (W&D, l.217-18). Since “Justice is a maiden and a daughter of Zeus,” (W&D, l.256), then mortal men must be aware that their actions have ramifications beyond the mortal realm. Thus, the poet instructs men to be good, even if doing bad seems more fruitful on earth, because divine justice is watching.
24 January 2000
It has been nearly a decade since I picked up the Iliad, and I have re-read my old Lit Trad I notes to refresh my dusty memory. After re-reading Books One and Two, I realize that anger is strong in these two books and, I suppose, is as much the subject of this epic as the war between the Greeks and the Trojans itself.
In my notes, as an aside, are these words: “menis=anger beyond reason; hubris=pride in defiance of good authority.” From the beginning, the epic poet asks for the muse for her to “Sing, goddess, the anger of Peleus’ son Achilleus” – and a large part of the focus of the epic is on Achilleus and his anger. But Books One and Two also show the anger of Agamemnon towards the priest Chryses and towards Achilleus; they also show the anger of the gods in Olympus, i.e., Hera’s and Zeus’ anger towards each other in regards to Thetis’ request to help her son by making the Greeks feel for their loss of Achilleus’ strength. The anger of the gods mingle with the anger of the humans, and it appears that there does not seem to be anything useful in the gods mingling with the affairs of men. For example, when Athene stays Achilleus’ hand when he draws his sword in the assembly before Agamemnon while he feels “divided two ways” (1.189), I think he becomes a puppet of the gods instead of his own man: Achilleus the man does not resolve this division between his allegiance to Agamemnon and his treasonous anger towards him, and, in fact, this division does not get resolved when Athene steps in. It is merely delayed and then mingled into a wish that the Greeks, especially Agamemnon, pay for his dishonour. Instead of one man – Agamemnon -- paying for Achilleus’ anger, all of the Greeks end up paying for Achilleus’ anger, which becomes Thetis’ anger and, thus, the anger of the Olympian gods. In Achilleus, menis and hubris are one and the same, which makes me wonder of the usual concept of hubris as “pride against the gods.” Can there be any real hubris, if the gods themselves seem to exhibit hubris?
26 January 2000
I have just finished reading Books Three through Six, I find myself still annoyed with the gods and with the men who receive help (sometimes unasked for help, as when Aphrodite rescues Paris in his duel with Menalaos). Is Zeus the only real father in this world of men and gods?
I have noted that the Trojans truly hate Paris, but they fight for the sake of him because he is Priam’s son. “Hate me, hate my family,” as it were. It would be better if Paris at least showed some real evidence of being a man, like his brother Hektor – at least I would feel sorry for this too-beautiful boy. But I don’t. He brings shame for his family, for his people, and even Helen feels shamed because she left her home for him.
Where is honour? Where is justice? It is hard to find honour when you have immortal gods helping out their favorites, when you have immortal gods ignoring the prayers of suffering innocents (i.e., the Trojan women), when you have immortal gods tricking a glory-seeking man like Pandaros into breaking his own people’s oath with the Achaians, when you have battle-seeking men attacking gods (i.e., Diomedes wounding Aphrodite), and gods attacking men (Ares attacking Diomedes). The main difference between men and gods is degree: Men in war get brutally killed – if not killed, then they are spared, for the most part, because a god has spared them from death. Gods in war get wounded but heal quickly and absolutely, such that they can site back in Olympus ans whine about getting wounded.
There is a lot of whining and childishness among the men and gods. As a result, Hektor’s actions, especially towards his wife Andromache and his son, are refreshing reminders of what it means to be a man and an adult.
21 February 2000
At the end of Book Nineteen, Achilles chides his immortal horses for allowing Patrokles to die. In order to reply to this serious charge, Hera allows one of the horses, Xanthos, to speak, saying, in essence, that Patrokles was destined to die, and so is Achilles. Afterwards, the Furies take away Xanthos’ ability to speak.
My question to the poet is “Why have a talking horse in The Iliad?” A reader may have a willing suspension of disbelief in regards to the gods being involved in this war between the Trojans and the Achaians over a woman. But nowhere, it seems, does the poet prepare the reader for a talking horse.
But on further reflection, I realize that the talking horse does belong in this story and, in actuality, the poet has prepared the reader all along for the arrival of this talking horse. Let us look at this horse more closely. The horse is a beast, but a beast from immortal stock, a heroic beast. The voice is from Hera, a goddess, and so the beast, possessed by a god, becomes a god-beast. Where have we seen god-beasts, i.e., extraordinary beasts from immortal stock (have an immortal in their lineage) but every once and a while helped and even possessed by gods, who come down and control their actions and even their thinking?
He have seen such god-beasts in the Heroes of The Iliad: Athene stays Achilles hand before Agamemnon in Book One (lines 188-218). Zeus sends evil Dream to Agamemnon in Book Two (line 6). Aphrodite saves
Paris in the duel with Menelaos in Book Three (lines 380-382). Apollo drives on the Trojans while Athene drives on the Achaians in Book Four (lines 507-516). Poseidon fills the Aiantes “with powerful valour” in Book Thirteen (line 60). Apollo takes away the pains and gives strength to Glaukos in Book Sixteen (526-528). Apollo strips Patrokles’ armour away so that he can be killed in Book Sixteen (line 790 and following). Athene takes the wits from the Trojans in Book Eighteen (line 310-311). Thetis drives courage into Achilles in Book Nineteen (line 38). Athene trickes Hektor in Book Twenty-two (lines 226 and following). These are just some of the examples of the interaction of the god-beasts with the gods.
When a god is able to control the actions of the god-beast in any given time, it is easy for that god-beast to shirk personal responsibility: For example, in Book Three Priam blames the gods for bringing the Trojan War, even though it was caused by the actions of men, i.e., his own son (line 164-165). But a most notable example is Agamemnon; in Book Nineteen, Agamemnon blames Zeus, Destiny, and Erinyes for losing his temper with Achilles, and he even calls Zeus a deliverer of “delusions” (line 270). Thus, the nature of personal free will, justice and responsibility becomes problematic when the nature of man is not human but god-beast, who is the Hero.
The talking horse, therefore, becomes a symbol for the nature of the Hero in the Heroic Age, the fourth age of Man between the Bronze Age and the Iron Age, which is the current age of the human beings. Hesiod in The Works and Days also calls these heroes “demigods,” mortals unlike mere mortals, the anthropoi. How does the ordinary human being, or anthropoi, rise from the Heroic Age? In The Works and Days, the heroes are all killed in wars, like in The Iliad, or re-settled in the Elysian Fields, such that the non-herioc mortals can rise, similar to the dinosaurs being wiped out so that mammals can rise.
But for Homer, there is another option, which is the transformation of the hero into another kind of hero. We see this incipiantly in Achilles, when he mourns for Patrokles and, in his own way, feels responsible for his friend’s death (lines 81-82). We will see this transformation of the too-public, open god-beast into the domestic, private hero in Odysseus in The Odyssey. In such a hero, personal responsibility, in which the hero does not blame the gods but blames himself for his wrongs, becomes an intricate part of what is means to be a human being. In such a hero, awareness of the consequences of one’s own actions becomes important, such that even a woman, Odysseus’ wife Penelope, is heroic. But, as Hesiod points out, with the rise of the human being in the Iron Age is the rise of “toil and pain” (W&D, line 177), which will lead to the type of hero found in tragedy.
25 February 2000
I have read the first eleven books of The Odyssey, from the Telemachy to Odysseus’ release from Calypso to Odysseus’ arrival and storytelling at the land of the Phaeacians. In thinking of the heroes of The Iliad and what it means to be a Greek and a human being, I can see The Odyssey as a kind of education of Telemachos and Odysseus, of how to be an urban, civilized Greek man. For Telemachos, his educational journey involves visiting households of his elders – Nestor and Menelaos – to see how a real Greek household should be managed. His own household, overrun with suitors with a mother who does not have the authority to send them away, is a shambles, compared to the well-run and hospitable households of these two old survivors of the Trojan War. For Odysseus, his educational journey involves visiting various lands and peoples, seeing how they treat guests, how civilized they are, and what information they can impart to him. Odysseus’ education also involves his own ownership of responsibility for his own actions, i.e., recklessness has definite consequences, and one cannot blame the gods for one’s own stupidity. I am thinking of Odysseus’ taunt of Polyphemus after he and his companions are safely in the sea after escaping. If it weren’t for Odysseus’ insatiable curiosity, he would not have lost four of his companions to the Cyclops’ meal. If it weren’t for Odysseus pride, he would not have Polyphemus’ prayer to Poseidon to make Odysseus’ return long, difficult, and lonely. Odysseus is the most circumspect of the Achaians in The Iliad, but the world of The Odyssey is not of the Trojan War. How does a warrior adjust to peace-time? And with Telemachos, how does a boy, who did not grow up with a strong, noble father figure, become a strong, noble man himself, controlling his own household? I think The Odyssey answers those questions.
Another idea: The gods in this epic are less like mortal men and more like guides and administrators. Says Zeus in Book One, “Well now, how indeed mortal men do blame the gods!/ They say it is from us evils come, yet they themselves/ By their own recklessness have pains beyond their lot.” (lines 32-34) In other words, man’s free will tends to make bad judgements. But the gods, like Athene, come down as guides, perhaps as a guide to man on how to make good judgements. Also, talking with others and telling their own life stories for didactic purposes seems to be the mode of narrative in The Odyssey. I cannot help but notice that much of the Telemachy is Nestor and Menelaos telling their stories to Telemachos, and the narrator of the Wanderings of Odysseus is Odysseus himself, narrating to the Phaeacians his own story.
Another question: Does this mean that the more human, or civilized, a people are, the more conversation they have? In The Iliad, there wasn’t so much conversation as ordering, taunting, and blustering. In fact, there was a talking horse. I think the discourse in The Odyssey is markedly different.
11 March 2000
I have just finished reading The Odyssey, and some thoughts come to mind. Odysseus “of many wiles” has different names (No-one, stranger, Aithon, for examples), different life stories, and, in the final nine books of the story, even a different appearance (old beggar man). But most importantly, he has different ways of speaking the “truth”: “He spoke many falsehoods and made them seem like the truth” (19.203).
I have mentioned in my earlier journal entry that The Odyssey seems to be an epic about learning, knowing, and testing. But what did Odysseus learn in his wanderings?
In Book Eleven, the souls of the dead recognize, or know, the living when they drink blood, i.e., Odysseus’ mother: “until my mother / Came up and drank the black-clouded blood. She knew me / At once” (11.152-154). Suffering and knowledge seem to go hand in hand, especially when the world seems to be not what it appears. The death of Agamemnon bears this link between suffering and knowledge: he believed that his wife was true until Aegisthus slayed him.
Odysseus is often called “long suffering,” and through his suffering, which was his lessons of the world as it is, including the suffering in his own household as a beggar man, he learned many things: 1) Do not automatically trust strangers, e.g., Lotus-Eaters, Polyphemus, Laistrygones, unless they merit your trust, e.g., Phaeacians, Circe. 2) Do not automatically trust your own household and countrymen, e.g., the suitors, the servants, unless they merit your trust, e.g., Eumaios, Telemachos, his nurse, Laertes. I suppose learning to be cynical and mistrustful is an awful lesson, but it is a lesson that Menelaos and Agamemnon learned the hard way. Odysseus will not make such a mistake because he has learned through his suffering.
This lesson explains why Odysseus is so slow to regain his household and make himself known to his family, why he must test the loyalty of his household and family. On the surface it looks cruel and inhuman, but it is not because Odysseus does not feel:
But he struck his breast and rebuked his heart in a speech:
“Stand it, my heart. You stood something still more shameful
On the day the Cylops with irresistible force devoured
My mighty companions. And you endured, until a plan
Led you out of the cave when you thought you were to die.”
20.17-21
What is on the appearence is not the truth.
Athene of The Iliad, a goddess of war, becomes, in The Odyssey, the goddess of peace: She comes down and stops the beginning of a civil war on Ithaka. Is this a contradiction? It does not seem so since it continues Zeus’ plan (24.473-486). War on Troy was meet because Troy had to fall for its various transgressions against the guest-host oath – not giving up Helen and even fighting on Paris’ behalf. War on Ithaka is not meet because it is a civil war, after the Trojan War has ended and Odysseus, the King of Ithaka, has come home. I think that Athene becomes a different sort of god when she functions to solemnize oaths which men make among themselves, and she also gives a final lesson to Odysseus: the war is over; let there be peace.
© 2000 Rufel F. Ramos