Ιλιάδα Β

by Homer

Cantul XIV - Cantul XXIV

719 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2005

About the author

Homer (Greek: Όμηρος born c. 8th century BC) was a Greek poet who is credited as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer is considered one of the most revered and influential authors in history.
Homer's Iliad centers on a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles during the last year of the Trojan War. The Odyssey chronicles the ten-year journey of Odysseus, king of Ithaca, back to his home after the fall of Troy. The poems are in Homeric Greek, also known as Epic Greek, a literary language which shows a mixture of features of the Ionic and Aeolic dialects from different centuries; the predominant influence is Eastern Ionic. Most researchers believe that the poems were originally transmitted orally. Despite being predominantly known for its tragic and serious themes, the Homeric poems also contain instances of comedy and laughter.
Homer's epic poems shaped aspects of ancient Greek culture and education, fostering ideals of heroism, glory, and honor. To Plato, Homer was simply the one who "has taught Greece" (τὴν Ἑλλάδα πεπαίδευκεν). In Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy, Virgil refers to Homer as "Poet sovereign", king of all poets; in the preface to his translation of the Iliad, Alexander Pope acknowledges that Homer has always been considered the "greatest of poets". From antiquity to the present day, Homeric epics have inspired many famous works of literature, music, art, and film.
The question of by whom, when, where and under what circumstances the Iliad and Odyssey were composed continues to be debated. Scholars remain divided as to whether the two works are the product of a single author. It is thought that the poems were composed at some point around the late eighth or early seventh century BC. Many accounts of Homer's life circulated in classical antiquity; the most widespread account was that he was a blind bard from Ionia, a region of central coastal Anatolia in present-day Turkey. Modern scholars consider these accounts legendary.

French: Homère, Italian: Omero, Portuguese, Spanish: Homero.

Reviews

[Kyriakos Sorokkou]

Διαβάστε και την κριτική μου στα ελληνικά στις βιβλιοαλχημείες.

Around the end of 2019 I and a friend of mine decided for our bookish resolutions for 2020. For me was to have 0 books on my TBR, and for her to finally read the impossibly tough novel by James Joyce Ulysses which was on her shelves unread for more than a decade.

We were planning to read it around Bloomsday early in June BUT thanks to the you-know-who-virus we decided to read it early in May.
And since I had time and no books, I decided to read the The Odyssey since Joyce's magnum opus is based on it.
But since I had a lot of time I decided to also read its prequel The Iliad
Et voilà! my last book for April was Homer's first epic poem.

We studied Iliad back at school but I never read it from cover to cover.
I knew though that it doesn't include the beginning of the war, or Achilles' death or even the Trojan Horse.
It begins with Achilles's anger after he was insulted by Agamemnon, and his decision to resign from fighting, but he will eventually return to the battlefield once he learns his dear friend is dead.
It is a book with countless names and a gazillion of fight descriptions.
It also includes laments of fallen heroes and relatives as well as the intrigues between Gods and their interferences in the matters of the mortals.

I didn't expect that I would like the Iliad, and of course I wasn't expecting so much violence.
Entrails being spilled on the ground, tongues being cut from the root, teeth pulverised with an axe, eyes squashed out of their sockets and more. 

If you are afraid to read it because it is a poem, don't be.
It's an epic poem, a narrative poem; it narrates events and scenes and has extensive dialogue.
It's not the usual poem of imagery and feelings and hidden meanings.

I was lucky for reading Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles before the Iliad because it is much more compressed and too sugarcoated and cute for my taste.
It also felt like Greek Mythology for Dummies.