CAS CL 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 14: Kleos, Parataxis, Argos
Document Summary
Lecture 14: homer"s iliad 2: the epic hero. Before discussing what homeric epics are about, we discussed how they are made: things like similes, parataxis, other artistic devices. Note that homer"s poem focuses on one episode of history, rather than writing a seemingly boring historical catalogue . Both poems are built off of internal symmetries. In the iliad, the poem begins with wrath, and it ends with reconciliation. Main pursuit: search for fame, or kleos: what you leave after you die . Greek culture is a shame culture : a hero"s biggest fear is to lose his face . It is not bad to die in battle. It is however, bad to run away from a battle. If a warrior contributes more to the cause, he will receive more spoils: in the iliad; achilles" tim was ignored when agamemnon took away briseis. This disrespect caused achilles" to withdraw himself from war. Achilles doesn"t care about briseis, in a romantic way,