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Divine Dissension and the Narrative of the Iliad

2001; Texas Tech University Press; Volume: 28; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês

1935-0228

Rachel Anne Friedman,

Byzantine Studies and History

Recent scholars have fruitfully used the theories and methods of narratology to rediscover and rethink the stunning complexity of the Homeric poems. (1) Narratology has, in the first place, helped us to see that the poems are more multivocal than was once thought and that because important tensions and dissonances often exist among the poems' varying voices, we must carefully distinguish among them. Thus, scholars now routinely insist on distinctions between the poet, the narrator, the Muse, and the poems' internal characters; several take as their focus some or all of the dissonances that exist among these varied voices. (2) A related but distinct area of study calls our attention, not necessarily to different voices in the texts, but, on a larger scale, to different plot possibilities that are alluded to and incorporated within the poems themselves. While some studies done in this direction are based on what we know of oral poetics and speak of allusions in the poems to actual alternative versions of myths that existed in the epic cycle, others focus more on the poet's autonomy and ability to play with--and threaten to alter--the tradition that he has inherited, and thus point to alternatives that, suggested in the poems, have no known correspondence to anything in the mythic tradition. (3) What both of these trends in scholarship have in common is that they make it harder for us to see the poems as possessing simple, unified visions; they reveal the poems to be far more complex than might be thought, replete not only with different voices and perspectives often at odds with each other, but also with allusions to entirely opposite directions in which the poems could go. These theoretical models, however, have not been applied evenly to the various parts of the poems. I would like to focus on the middle books of the Iliad, in particular Books 13-15. Marked by a density of battle sequences, these so-called battle books are often overshadowed in critical studies by the more spectacularly dramatic parts of the poem. Within this central section, scholars regularly focus on Book 14 but bypass 13 and 15 as interstitial and narratively insignificant. I shall demonstrate, on the contrary, that these books at the poem's central turning point (immediately prior to Patroklos's reentry into battle) can give us crucial bearings on the poem's narrative concerns. To review what is familiar: when Zeus acquiesces to Thetis's request in Book 1, he establishes what his plan for the rest of the poem will be: the Trojans will be temporarily victorious so that he can honor Achilleus. (4) He specifies at 8.473-76 that Hektor will not be held back until Achilleus reenters the battle to fight over Patroklos's body; however, when Poseidon, in Book 13, and Hera, in Book 14, intervene in the battle, Zeus's plan and the trajectory established for the narrative are both interfered with. From the beginning of 13 until 15.384, the Greeks are allowed to prevail and the plot established in Book 1 is temporarily derailed. When the Trojans cross the wall at 15.384, the narrative situation is returned to exactly what it was at the end of Book 12. (5) While no permanent damage to Zeus's plan is done, it is nonetheless striking that for over 1500 lines in the very middle of the poem, the poet allows the poem to follow a course other than the one Zeus had established for it. Although it is co mmonly noted that these middle books represent a delaying of the wrath plot, I believe that insufficient attention has been paid as to what the significance of this delay might be. (6) I will argue that the poet takes advantage of this delay--or, more precisely, reversal--in the plot of the poem to explore other aspects of the narrative. Of particular interest is the possibility that the poet uses these books of divergence from the narrative's Zeus-ordained path to explore the possibility of a narrative that does not accord with Zeus's plan. Beginning when Zeus averts his eyes from the battle at the opening of Book 13 [LANGUAGE NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], and culminating in the [LANGUAGE NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] when Hera has him put to sleep and thus definitively dethroned from his position of narrative control, these books make it clear that the poem could function independently of Zeus's wishes for it. …