Death of Hektor 21.51422

1
Death of Hektor (21.514-22)

• At the sight of Achilles charging towards him,
  Hektor breaks and runs.
• Disguised Athena tricks Hektor into turning to
  fight. When she disappears, Hektor recognizes his
  doom.
• Achilles spears him through the throat.

2
The Death of Hektor
3
Trojan Reaction

• Achilles and the Greeks despoil Hektors body and
  affix it to a chariot.
• The Trojans watch and grieve.
• With Hektor dead, the ultimate doom of the city
  of Troy itself is fully present to the minds of
  an audience or reader.
• The death of Hektor is the climax of the Iliad,
  the culmination of the wrath theme.

4
The Ransom of Hektor (Book 24)

• After burying Patroklos Achilles is desolate.
  Revenge hasnt healed his grief. He continues to
  desecrate Hektors body until the gods have had
  enough.

5
Narrative Correspondences

• Book 1
• a) The rejection of the father who wishes to
  ransom his child
• b) Quarrel of Achilles Agamemnon
• c) Thetis speaks to Achilles, takes a message to
  Zeus.
• d) Thetis and Zeus.
• e) Dispute among the gods.

• Book 24
• e) Dispute among the gods.
• d) Thetis and Zeus.
• c) Thetis speaks to Achilles, bringing a message
  from Zeus
• b) Friendly converse between Achilles Priam
• a) Agreement that the father may ransom his child.

6
Narrative Divisions

• Priams expedition to ransom the body (1-467)
• Priam with Achilles (468-676)
• Priams return to Troy the burial of Hektor
• (677-804).
• Narrative Time
• 12 days after Hektors death (3 days of
• Patroklos funeral, 9 days of divine dispute)

7
Achilles Priam

• Priam enters unseen, goes beyond Hermes
  instructions by kissing Achilles hands, which
  had slain so many of his children.
• This gets Achilles attention (wonder).
• Priam appeals to Achilles love for his own
  father.

8
Community of Human Suffering

• Achilles recognizes that all people are united in
  their suffering.
• The lot of humanity is decided by Zeus and his
  urns.
• Greek pessimism.

9
Achilles Insight

• This encounter with Priam gives Achilles a deep
  moral vision about the universal suffering which
  unites all humanity, but he has no one to share
  it with (Priam just wants to take Hektors body
  and go home).
• Achilles ponders this, knowing that his own death
  is imminent.
• Iliad ends with the return of Hektors body and
  the laments of Andromache, Hecuba, and Helen.

10
Hektors Epitaph

• Helen says man-slaughtering Hektor was gentle
  of heart
• There was no other in all the wide Troad who was
  kind to me, and my friend all others shrank when
  they saw me.
• Rites for Hektor last 12 days (the truce given by
  Achilles).

11
Such was their burial of Hektor, breaker of
horses. (24.804)
12
The Odyssey, Books 1-8

• CNE/ENG 120
• 9/13/04

13
The Odyssey

• Culture Greek
• Author Homer
• Time 8th c. BCE
• Genre epic poetry
• Names to know Odysseus, Penelope, Telemakhos,
  Circe, Nausicaa, Polyphemos, Kalypso, Ithaka,
  Poseidon.

14
Theme of the Epic

• Nostos (Return, or Homecoming)
• Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists
  turns driven time and again off course, once he
  had plundered the hallowed heights of Troy. Many
  cities of men he saw learned their minds, many
  pains he suffered, heartsick on the open sea,
  fighting to save his life and bring his comrades
  home. . . By now, all the survivors . . . were
  safe at home, escaped the war waves. But one
  man alone . . . (1.1-15)

15
Large Narrative Units

• The Telemachy (adventures/wanderings of
  Telemakhos, Odysseus son) (Books 1-4)
• The Homecoming of Odysseus from Troy to Ithaka
  (Books 5-8, 13.1-187)
• The Great Wanderings of Odysseus (narrated by
  Odysseus himself)
• (Books 9-12)
• 4) Odysseus on Ithaka (Books 13.187-24).

16
Narrative/Cultural Elements

• Important epithets resourceful Odysseus,
  thoughtful Telemakhos, circumspect Penelope.
• Recurring theme xenia (the sacred guest - host
  relationship, overseen by Zeus).
• Role of the gods much diminished from the Iliad.
  Poseidon hinders Odysseus, Athena helps him
  other minor deities help or hinder him.
• Odysseus timeline 10 years fighting at Troy, 10
  years trying to get home. (wandering hero)

17
The Situation in Ithaka

• Odysseus oikos is in big trouble (hes been gone
  for 20 years). Over 100 aristocratic men are
  besieging his wife and eating up his wealth.
• Penelope mourns for her lost husband.

18
Function of the Telemachy

• Book 1 sets up important themes that we will see
  throughout the epic
• Homecoming (nostos)
• Family (compare those of Odysseus
• Agamemnon)
• Hospitality (xenia)
• Marriage (How many want to marry
• Odysseus? How many Penelope?)

19
Why do bad things happen to good people?

• In the Iliad, we learn about Zeus urns how
  some people get a mixed lot, others, unmixed.
• In the Odyssey, Zeus sounds the theme of human
  moral responsibility
• Look you now, how happy mortals are to blame the
  gods. It is from us, they say, that evils come,
  but they themselves, through their own blind
  folly, have sorrows beyond that which is
  allotted (1.32-34).

20
The Return is Set in Motion

• Hermes goes to Kalypso to tell her to let
  Odysseus go even as Athena travels to Telemakhos
  in disguise (woman as helper folktale motif).
• Athena characterizes the suitors for us (lines
  264-67).
• The first four books set up Odysseus eventual
  return and need for revenge.

21
Telemakhos speech (1.268-293)

• What does Telemakhos think has happened to his
  father?
• What does he say about his mother, Penelope?
• What does the disguised Athena tell Telemakhos he
  must do? (1.314-351)
• Lines 1.470-474 tell us much about Telemakhos
  emotional state. What have he and Penelope been
  enduring for so long?

22
Book 2

• Telemakhos needs to leave boyhood behind and
  become a man, before his father returns. The
  story of how a boy grows up and becomes a man has
  remained, since the Odyssey, a principal story
  type in Western literature.
• In Book 2, we get the assembly of the Ithakans
  and the departure of Telemakhos.

23
How to be a King (or not)

• This is the first assembly called in 20 years.
  What do we learn in it?
• Telemakhos throws down scepter, bursting into
  tears (2.85 ff.)
• Penelopes trick (demonstrates her metis).
• Telemakhos threatens divine retribution against
  the suitors (omen of eagles fighting)
  Halitherses predicts Odysseus return the
  slaughter of the suitors.
• Suitor response 2.200-230.

24
Book 3 Telemakhos in Pylos

• Athena has appeared three times so far, bodily,
  to help Telemakhos while Odysseus is lost at
  sea, she never appears.
• What are the people doing in Pylos when
  Telemakhos arrives?
• How does Telemakhos react when the boat lands?
  What does Athena/Mentor tell him to do? How does
  he explain himself to her? (3.16-27)
• How do the Pylians receive him?

25
Nestors Speech

• Nestor sings his own nostos, the sorrow of the
  Greeks at Troy, and what happened to Agamemnon
  (2nd mention in the epic, mentioned briefly twice
  then told in full at 288-352).
• Nestor tells of Odysseus close relationship with
  Athena (3.246-255).
• Nestor holds out the example of Orestes, a young
  man raised without his father, who nevertheless
  was man enough to kill his fathers killer
  (3.218-225).

26
Nestors Advice

• What does Nestor tell Telemakhos to do next?
• When does Telemakhos realize that Mentor was
  really Athena? (3.415 ff.)

27
Book 4 Telemakhos in Sparta

• What are the Spartans doing when Telemakhos
  arrives, and how do they receive him? Why is this
  important?
• Who recognizes Telemakhos first, Menelaos or
  Helen?

28
Tales of Odysseus

• Helen slips a drug that dulls pain into the wine.
• Who tells tales of Odysseus, and what kinds?
• Helen (O. in disguise as beggar, in Troy)

29
Menelaos Tale

• To counter Helens claim to have helped Odysseus
  in his Trojan-killing, Menelaos praises O. for
  keeping the Greeks inside the horse from
  responding when Helen imitated their wives
  voices!

30
Menelaos Nostos-Tale

• Parallels Odysseus on a smaller scale.
• He tells us
• Death of Lesser Ajax
• Death of Agamemnon (3rd time, from Proteus
  p.o.v.)
• Odysseus fate on Kalypsos island.

31
The Plot Thickens . . .

• What gift does Menelaos offer Telemakhos? What
  does Telemakhos ask for, instead? What does this
  tell us?
• Meanwhile, back at the ranch what are the
  suitors planning?

32
Book 5 Odysseus Kalypso

• What is Kalypso doing when we first see her?
• What is Odysseus doing?
• How does she react to Hermes news?
• Motif woman as hinderer
• What does she offer Odysseus?
• What happens to Odysseus after he leaves?

33
A Man Returns from the Dead

• In mythic terms, the Odyssey is the story of a
  man who returns from the dead. Odysseus is
  trapped at the navel of the sea, where our
  world meets the next. Kalypsos name means
  concealer, and Hades, the unseen, conceals
  the dead underground.
• Kalypsos offer of eternal life an eternal
  death for a man who loves experience his family
  (his oikos this is not a romance where he yearns
  for his wife).

34
Book 6 Nausikaa the Phaiacians

• Odysseus returns to life on the island of
  Skheria.
• What does Athena tell Nausikaa to do?
• How do Odysseus Nausikaa meet?
• How does Odysseus show his metis here?

35
Odysseus Predicament

• What does Athene do to Odysseus?
• Is Nausikaa a good host?
• What does Nausikaa tell Odysseus to do?

36
Book 7 In the Phaiakian Palace

• What special relationship do Alkinoos and Arete
  have? (7.77-89)
• What are the Phaiakians doing when Odysseus
  enters the palace?
• For what does he ask Arete?

37
Arete Odysseus

• What does Arete notice about the stranger
  Odysseus, and ask him about?
• What kind of a host is Alkinoos?
• What does Alkinoos wish (7.356-60)?

38
Book 8 Phaiakian Games

• Disguised Athena rouses the Phaiakians to go
  learn about Odysseus.
• Alkinoos calls an assembly, tells of Odysseus
  request for passage home, announces a feast.

39
The Song of Demodocus

• Of what does the bard sing?
• How does Odysseus react?
• When Alcinous notices this reaction, what does he
  do in response?

40
Tension at the Games

• When one of the Phaiakian young men challenges
  and insults Odysseus, Alcinous summons Demodocus
  again, who sings of the love between Ares and
  Aphrodite.

41
Leavetaking

• The Phaiacians give Odysseus gifts of friendship
  (stuff to take back to Ithaka to restore his
  wealth honor).
• Nausikaa says goodbye to Odysseus - he replies
  gently (8.513-526).
• What song does Odysseus ask Demodocus to sing?
  How does he react when he hears the song?
• Alkinous asks Odysseus his identity and story
  (8.616-657).