1. What role does fate play in the emotional and psychological
effect of the Iliad? Why does Homer make his characters aware of their
impending dooms?
Homer’s original audience would already have been intimately
familiar with the story The Iliad tells. Making his characters cognizant of
their fates merely puts them on par with the epic’s audience. In deciding to
make his characters knowledgeable about their own futures, he loses the effect
of dramatic irony, in which the audience watches characters stumble toward ends
that it alone knows in advance. But Homer doesn’t sacrifice drama; in fact,
this technique renders the characters more compelling. They do not fall to ruin
out of ignorance, but instead become tragic figures who go knowingly to their
doom because they have no real choice. In the case of Hector and Achilles,
their willing submission to a fate they recognize but cannot evade renders them
not only tragic but emphatically heroic.
2.How does Homer portray the relationship between gods
and men in the Odyssey? What roles do the gods play in human life? How does
this portrayal differ from that found in the Iliad?
In the Iliad, the gods relate to human
beings either as external powers that influence the lives of mortals from
without, as when Apollo unleashes plague upon the Achaeans, or from within, as
when Aphrodite incites Helen to make love to Paris or when Athena gives
Diomedes courage in battle. In the Odyssey, the gods are often much less grand.
They function more as spiritual guides and supporters for their human subjects,
sometimes assuming mortal disguises in order to do so. The actions of the gods
sometimes remain otherworldly, as when Poseidon decides to wreck the ship of
the Phaeacians, but generally they grant direct aid to particular individuals.
In a sense, the change in the behavior of the gods is wholly appropriate to the
shift in focus between the two epics. The Iliad depicts a violent and glorious
war, and the gods act as frighteningly powerful, supernatural forces. The
Odyssey, in contrast, chronicles a long journey, and the gods frequently act to
guide and advise the wandering hero.
No comments:
Post a Comment