I read the trio in the order listed above and the reading got better with each title.
The Iliad is epically epic, rendered in a stiff dactylic hexameter with many, many, many repeating phrases. Between “rosy-fingered dawn” and “the wine-dark sea,” Homer’s epithets lull the reader into a trance, which I suppose was the point in oral storytelling. As a result, the myriad battles and names start blending together.
But, man, those battles are brutal. The semi-divine soldiers are walking Cuisinarts, leading to lovely vignettes like this:
Next Erymas was doom’d his fate to feel,
His open’d mouth received the Cretan steel:
Beneath the brain the point a passage tore,
Crash’d the thin bones, and drown’d the teeth in gore:
His mouth, his eyes, his nostrils, pour a flood;
He sobs his soul out in the gush of blood.
Spoiler alert: Erymas didn’t make it. As you can see, I read the older translations of these works; the above is Alexander Pope’s translation. I wanted the feel of the original, so I didn’t hunt down the modern versions. All three books are decidedly un-“woke.”
For The Odyssey, I chose the Harvard Classics version translated by Samuel Butler. This epic was far more interesting (and fun!) than the grim, brain-splattered Iliad. Ulysses slides into a Mediterranean port, feasts on great food, charms exotic women, grabs a pile of loot, and is off to the next isle.
Granted, the fellow gets in a few scrapes along the way, even being forced into love slavery by an eternally gorgeous nymph (poor guy), but returns home after 20 years to wreak vengeance on the cads trying to bed his wife. (Monogamy was pretty much a one-way street in ancient Hellas.)
After reading both of Homer’s works, I think The Iliad is geared toward young men, especially those of a military mindset. It’s all heroism, glory, and honor. I really should have tackled this in my Navy days.
The Odyssey is an even better adventure, but its themes of home, wisdom, fatherhood, and marriage are aimed squarely at those of us with more mileage on the drivetrain. The heroes still kill their share of monsters and men, but Ulysses always chooses brains before brawn.
The real revelation for me was Anabasis by Xenophon. How Hollywood hasn’t released a trilogy of this epic is beyond me. (No, The Warriors doesn’t count.) Here are the Cliffs Notes for this real-life tale:
Cyrus the Younger wants to topple his brother Artaxerxes II from the Persian throne, so he recruits 10,000 Greek mercenaries (including Xenophon) to help. They march 1,500 miles from the east coast of modern-day Turkey to the middle of modern-day Iraq and, in the first big battle, Cyrus is killed.
Uh oh.
Now, the entire Persian army opposes the Greeks. The pro-Cyrus Persians say, “No actually, we were for Artaxerxes the whole time!” and turn against the Greeks. The Hellenic generals ask the King for safe passage … and he murders them.
Xenophon is more a philosopher than soldier, but he gives an inspiring speech, the troops elect him leader, and they all hightail it due north while anyone, everyone, and everything tries to kill them.
They cross deserts and rivers and mountains through searing heat, waist-deep snow, and constant attacks from ahead and behind by an ever-hostile collection of bronze-age barbarians. Upon hitting Turkey’s north shore, they finally enter a Greek colony. Happy ending, right? Well, that’s when the soldiers start turning on each other.
Granted, Anabasis is an amazing war story, but it also serves as a history, an ancient travel guide, and a primer in leadership, group dynamics, and human nature.
If you haven’t read any of these three books, you should make up that deficit.
Jon Gabriel, “My Month in Ancient Greece”, Ricochet, 2018-01-23.
