Book X
- 1. What do we make of Book X? Is the behavior of Agamemnon characteristic of what we think of as a hero?
Book X is so bizarre compared to the rest of the Iliad and the Odyssey (among many other details "heroes" do not usually sneak around in the middle of the night cutting people’s throats while they sleep) that many scholars think it does not belong to the poem. How would you argue that, on the contrary, it it entierely appropriate to the situation at the end of Book 9? (Hint: the cunning of Odysseus represents one aspect of “heroic excellence,” the physical power represents another.
University of Arkansas.
- 2. Let’s look at the end of Book 9 , then, a minute. Three ambassadors were sent to Achilles, and each appealed to a different aspect of his personality. Some critics call this episode an example of triadic structure. He answered all three differently. Which of the three speeches do you think was the most powerful? Which one of Achilles’ speeches comes closest to what is actually going to happen? (UAK)
- 3. Homer presumably presumes that we the audience know our mythology and so he does not mention the famous mythical prophecy associated with King Rhesus of Thrace, (the major throat-slittee of Book X): if the horses of Rhesus eat the grass outside Troy and drink the water of the rivers near it, then the city wil never ever fall.
- How does knowing this affect your reading of the Rhesus episode (make for the sake of argument the ridiculous assumption that