ari’s Reviews > The Iliad > Status Update

— Everyone went to eat and sleep, but not Achilles. “He rolled around this way and that, and missed Patroclus—his lost youth, his manly strength, their numerous shared adventures and achievements, and all the troubles they endured together in deadly battles and across the waves. The memories made his tears fall thick and fast. Sometimes he lay down on his side, sometimes face-down, or on his back. And then at last he would stand up and wander on the seashore, out of his mind with grief. But every time Dawn shone along the beach and salty sea, he always noticed, and when he had yoked the lithe, quick horses to his chariot, he fastened Hector, to drag him behind. Three times around the tomb of dead Patroclus he rode, then stopped again at his own tent.”
— The gods are angered by Achilles dishonouring Hector by defiling his body and were about to send down Hermes to steal his body if not for Poseidon, Hera, and Athena who still hate on Paris and the Trojans by proxy. Apollo and Hera fight until Zeus breaks them up and says yes, they cannot steal Hector from Achilles, but they can tell Thetis of a plan to cause Achilles to accept a ransom from Priam. A grief-stricken Thetis arrives, already mourning her son who she knows will die soon, is told this by Zeus and then goes to Achilles to also tell him. Achilles doesn’t gaf much. Iris goes to Priam and Priam goes to the Greek camp.
— Hecuba to Priam after he told her of his plan to go meet Achilles with a ransom, “If he sets eyes on you and seizes you—that treacherous and flesh devouring man!—he will not show you pity your respect. We sit here in our great hall fall away, mourning our son, for whom strong Destiny assigned this ending when she spun his threat, when he was born, when I gave birth to him—that he would fall beneath some forceful man and glut the hunger of the swift-pawed dogs far from his parents. I wish I could latch my teeth into the centre of his liver and eat it! Only then would I have vengeance for what he did to my son, whom he killed but never made a coward. (…) He never thought of flight.” (he definitely did to some capacity lol.) Priam basically is like no but a goddess told me to do this so i’m going.
— Priam to nine of his sons, Helenus, Paris, Agathon, Pammon, Antiphonus, Polites, Deiphobus, Hippothous, and Dios, “Get to work for me, bad children! You are an embarrassment. If only you had died instead of Hector, all of you, dead beside those quick Greek ships! (…) He was not like the son of some mere mortal, but if a god. Those sons were killed by Ares, and only trash is left—you tricksters, dancers, superb at tapping rhythms with your feet, thieves of your neighbours’ lambs and baby goats. Come on now, will you not prepare the wagon, and load these things upon it? Hurry up, so I can start my journey!” BYE
— Prism travels with a disguised Hermes saying he is a Myrmidon
— “Great Priam came in unnoticed. He stood near Achilles, and touched his knees and kissed his hands—the terrible, murderous hands, which killed so many sons.” Achilles, Automedon, and Alcimus are shocked to see him there. “Godlike Achilles, think of your own father, who is as old as I am, standing over the final threshold between age and death. The people in the neighbouring estates probably threaten him, and there is no one to save him from the danger of destruction. And yet at least he hears you are alive, and so his heart is glad, and every day he hopes to see his own beloved son come home from Troy—while I have been the most unlucky man alive. (…) Please, Achilles, show reverence towards the gods and pity me, remembering your father, Peleus. I am more pitiable than him. I have endured what no man yet on earth has done—I pressed my mouth into the hand of him who killed my son.” Priam curls into a ball at Achilles feet where he cries for Hector, and Achilles for his father and sometimes Patroclus, until he had his full of tears and jumped up from his chair and brought Priam up with him in pity.
— “The gods have spun for all unlucky mortals a life of grief, while nothing troubles them. Two jars are set upon the floor of Zeus—from one, he gives good things, the other, bad. When thundering Zeus gives somebody a mixture, their life is sometimes bad as sometimes good. (…) Even so, the gods gave splendid gifts to Peleus from birth. (…) And yet the god laid suffering on him as well. He did not father any sons as heirs inside his halls, except one short-lived child. I will not care for him in his old age, because I sit so far away from home at Troy. My sole concern is causing pain to you and your children. And we hear that even you were lucky once, old man. (…) But ever since the gods who live in heaven brought you this pain, your town has been surrounded by constant carnage and unending warfare. You must endure it. Do not let your heart lament forever. You will do no good by grieving for your son. You cannot raise him to life again, and death will overtake you before you save your son.” Priam answered him, “Favourite of Zeus, do not ask me to sit down yet, while Hector lies neglected in your dwelling. Quickly, hurry, release him, let me see him with my eyes! And take this countless ransom I have brought you. I wish you joy of it and hope you reach your fatherland, because you spared my life and let me live and see the sun’s bright light.”
— This lowk pisses Achilles off a little, petty ass, and he says he’s aware of the gods meddling in all of this, but that he will accept the ransom and let him see Hector. “Patroclus, do not be angry with me if the news reaches you even in the house of Hades that when his loving father offered me a proper ransom, I gave Hector back. I will device the ransom gifts with you, and you shall have fair shares.”
— They feast and plan to rest (and marvel at each other). Achilles plans to hold back the war for as long as Priam needs to for Hector’s funeral, to which he says 12 days. “With this, he took the old man’s right hand by the wrist, to calm his heart, so that he would not be afraid.”
— Hermes escorts Priam out of the camp before the others notice he’s there and brings Hector back to Troy for everyone to grieve
— “In hollow ships the women will soon be taken as slaves, and I along with them. And you, my child, will either come with me, and do humiliating work, enslaved to some harsh overlord, or else a Greek will grab your arm and hurt you from the wall—a dreadful death—in anger because Hector had killed perhaps his brother, son, or father. (…) Your father was not gentle in grim battle. (…) In death, you did not reach your arms from bed to me, or leave me with some final words that I could have forever kept in mind while crying night and day.” …… “Now you lie here at home in dewy freshness, as if Apollo shot his silver bow and with his gentle arrows took your life.”
“No other in spacious Troy was kind to me like you. All of them shudder in disgust at me.” T_T
— Nine days they gathered wood until they lit Hector on his funeral pyre on the tenth. They then collected his bones, laid them in a chest, and buried the chest. After this, they had a banquet inside Priam’s house. Rip Hector T_T