The Iliad

Homer

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Reading The Iliad, perhaps the most curious trivia I came to learn of is that people consider it a gay novel. When they say this, they are primarily pointing fingers at the Achilles/Patroclus relationship. It’s not just a fan theory, there are books written on this perspective—legit ones. Meanwhile, I myself couldn’t see it while reading the Iliad, albeit when my buddy pointed that out, it did make a lot of sense. Of course, I first associated this with the new age woke tendency to find homosexuality in every classic (which is no better than genderbending or colorbending already established characters), but it turned out people in ancient Greece also questioned Achilles’ sexuality and the nature of his relationship with Patroclus. It actually favors the story and makes it a bit easier to make sense of Achilles’ actions when we consider the homosexual point of view as a given. After Patroclus’ death, Achilles becomes unhinged and so bloodthirsty that the whole ordeal only speaks of his undoings. There was a sense of bottomless guilt (as Achilles himself allowed Patroclus to take his armor and fight in his instead) and irretrievable loss — that can only be explained from a lover’s point of view. Loss of the love of your love can drive you to insanity, and enable you to cause mayhem you wouldn’t normally think of. It’s hard to write on Iliad, truly—as I don’t want to try (and will fail likely, to be honest) to explain the historical and literary significance of the book, it may sound like I’m trying to defend the book from naysayers and even from the other side of my mind that is not impressed. All the battle scenes where soldiers of ‘illustrious’ backgrounds keep stabbing each other in the nipples. What’s so great about male nipples and why would you want to stab there—is beyond me. If they tried to kiss ‘em (forcibly, hey it's a battlefield), I’d at least understand. Something else bothered me, almost everyone in the fight of Troy is ‘godlike’. Yet they surely die quite easily enough. What's so special about being godlike, eh? I made my peace with Homer using ‘winged words’ or ‘words had wings’ to describe any unfavorable sentiment. It was amusing at times though, I admit. In the end, the Iliad reads as what it is, an epic poem intended for the masses, as they flock around the fire on winter nights, listening to the blind man’s powerful oratory as he takes them to hell and back—singing the heroics and exploits of men. It is hard to read it like other literary classics from the last 600-700 years. And of course, the usual deal with old books is present throughout— troublesome traits of the depicted society, treatment of women, and the concept of greatness, and glory of battle, etc are so out of place and out of time that without literary significance attached to, it would be downright shitty. I don’t see anyone writing something like this in the modern age and getting away with it unscathed. Then, of course, that’s the whole argument of time relativity. And I’m no literary critic—I don’t usually ponder upon how Iliad influenced nearly all literature after that when I drop my tired body on the bed. Yet Iliad was an essential read, I can’t deny that, for better or worse. I enjoyed the silly dances, schemes, and manipulations arbitrarily performed by the olympian gods, their naive hypocrisy anent Zeus, and their pettiness.The humans in Iliad are better creatures for sure. I was thinking this whole Olympian angle can be applied to a political institution like a state, let's call it Mager Mulluk. Ministers/lobbyists are gods and Zeus is the prime minister. Everyone is always scheming and in the end they all end up giving bootlicking to Zeus. Citizens are the humans of both Greece and Troy. Realistic allegorical story it could be! The prose can be amazing too, sometimes, based on the topic and context. Although the reading experience will immensely vary based on the translator. I went with E. V. Rieu as his was the one that didn’t feel deliberately vague—while keeping the poetic quality of the prose intact. N.B. Odyssey seems to be much more enjoyable in comparison.

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