Your first writing assignment is a short scholarly essay on the Iliad, roughly five pages, double-spaced, with a Works Cited section at the end (a separate page 6, or place on the bottom of page 5).

Let me explain what I mean by a scholarly essay. Basically, we are trying to prepare you to write the kind of article that one might find in a scholarly journal. You could be published before you graduate! Those essays in journals are much longer than 5 pages—they are usually 18-30 pages in manuscript form.

What I want you to produce (just do your best) is a short scholarly essay where you cite from the Iliad and also from scholarly sources to support an argument or thesis to create the sort of essays that you are reading. Try to write in an objective manner, not using “I” very much.

You must have a real title (not “Assignment I”) and a thesis statement. I look for your thesis statement somewhere towards the end of the first paragraph or beginning of the second (I often underline it when I grade a paper). The title and thesis statement help to communicate to your reader what it is you are writing about. In your essay, you must argue your case (your thesis) using evidence from the text itself and scholarly sources. These sources must be cited according to MLA style guidelines.

Requirements for Assignment 1:

• Your paper MUST have a title and a thesis communicating the main point you are trying to argue.
• You MUST include and correctly cite at least one line from the work itself, but preferably a lot more. You should try to cite lines from the original text. For the Iliad, lines are cited (Book.Lines).
• You MUST include and correctly cite at least one scholarly source from an academic journal, but it will be easier to write if you reference more sources.  Take your sources from the library’s online databases to make sure they are scholarly.
• Your paper MUST include a Works Cited page with MLA formatted references.
• Please do not give me a running internal monologue of your thoughts and reactions to different aspects of the story. Try not to tell me what you think something means on a personal level (personal: “I know the kind of man Achilles is because my cousin was married to an abusive man. . . ”), or veer off into social justice issues–how unfairly women were treated in ancient Greece–but rather try to focus your research and argument on what Homer is trying to say, or how an 8th century Greek would have understood the story. Be brave! No one really knows for sure. That’s all part of the fun. Also, please do not tell me that Achilles is immortal (he is not in the Iliad), or say anything about his heel–that’s not in this story. Please base your essay on more than just Book I of the Iliad.

Some Iliad Essay Topics

1. Achilles also seems to believe that he is exchanging his life in exchange for honor, that he could have a long life of obscurity or a short life of glory and honor from Zeus at Troy. How does Achilles’ expectation that Zeus is supposed to grant him great honor (1.366ff) play into the story? Does he ever get the honor from Zeus he is seeking?

2. After Achilles seems to show compassion for all that Priam has endured, is it possible that he will have a change of heart and not attack Troy? Do we have any indication from the text as to what Achilles is going to do next? Does Homer want to give us hope that Hector’s family will be saved? Or do we think they are doomed? What does clues does Homer give us as to what will happen after the story ends?

3. Some believe that Achilles shows compassion for Priam (Priam reminds him of his own father), and this new found compassion is why he is able to finally let go of grief and anger over Patroclus. A close reading of the text in Book 24 and other books of the Iliad might lend itself to a very different interpretation of why god-like Achilles felt at peace and was able to sleep after Priam’s visit, one which has more to do with Achilles’ sense of his own honor. (In fact, after their cry, Achilles’s anger flares up and he fears he might kill Priam by accident, and therefore sin against Zeus by harming a guest.) Do you think Achilles shows genuine compassion for Priam? What do you make of the scene in which he accepts ransom in exchange for Hector’s body?

5. Homer ends the story ends with Hector’s funeral and lamentation of his family rather than with the fall of Troy. Funerals are very important in terms of the Greek concept of honor; notice that slave girls are forced to cry tears for dead Greeks—the funeral meant everything, especially since there’s no afterlife–or no good one at least–even for the best of heroes. Being remembered in a songs of lamentations or praise is another viable way to be immortalized within Greek Warrior society. If Achilles is the hero, why does Homer end the Iliad with the death of Hector rather than the death of Achilles or the Fall of Troy?

6. The Shield of Achilles is interesting as it seems to invite interpretation. It appears to be like an image of the whole world on the shield. However, no one has been able to explain its meaning. Many speculate that it was actually a separate poem that was embedded into the Iliad. What reason might Homer have had for including it in the story? Is there anything there that might help is to elucidate the meaning of the Iliad?

7. In the Geneology of Morals, the German philosopher Nietzsche (and later Nazis) celebrated the pitiless Homeric Greeks , their “will to power,” their seeming to be above morality and lack of empathy; but are Homer’s audiences not meant to feel pity and cry? There seems to be a lot of pathos and sentimentality in the Iliad, long speeches that appeal to the emotions. Consider what Ion says in Plato’s Dialog by that name, that purpose of the Homeric rhapsode is to make (a well-healed) audience cry. The more audiences cry, the rhapsode Ion says, the more money he makes. Consider pathos in Homer (See the article “Pity and Pathos in Homer”). Is there any contradiction between the Bronze Age warrior ethos and the sentimentality of their literature? Is there a morality in all of the pity we are supposed to be feeling? (See articles in the SM folder).

8. Blood money/ransom is mentioned throughout the Iliad (it’s even on the Shield) as a mechanism for resolving conflict and preserving the social order. It begins and ends with ransom. Knowing what you know about the Greek heroic code and the traits of ancient gods, why might ransom be a preferable method to reconciliation? How might accepting ransom avoided conflict and bloodshed? Please use examples from the Iliad to support your argument.

9. Achilles seems to parallel Zeus in many ways in the Iliad. How does, or how might, the Iliad invite us to understand Achilles’ Wrath as Divine Wrath? For this essay you might want to assume what certain other commentators on Homer (“scholia”) did, that Achilles’s wrath is to be understood as an instrument of Divine Will, not as a character flaw.

10. The Trojan War seems pointless. It seems to try our patience, because there is no noble cause we can discern; heroes seems to be out more to demonstrate battle prowess and obtain social status for themselves. The Trojans are not evil people–they seem like good guys. Achilles most of all is poignantly aware of the pointlessness of it, which is why he is always on the brink of sailing home. If not for divine interference, and Zeus’s plan that all these people die, the war would have ended. People are fighting over corpses. One of the most surprising thing about the Iliad is the honest portrayal of war and death, the fact that might Achilles even doubts whether it is worthwhile. I haven’t thought this topic through yet, maybe someone can do something more with it.

11. One of the easiest and most efficient ways to write a scholarly paper is to react against what another scholar has written, or at least reference it heavily in your own essay. Look in JSTOR or the Supplemental Materials folder for a scholarly article that interests you.  React to them in the form of one extended essay, for example, on the morality of the Iliad or whether Achilles is the actual hero of the story. Just be sure to quote from the Iliad  itself, not just summarizing the point of view of others.

12. New topic for 2020! Black people, known as Ethiopians (Aethiopians) were at the Trojan War. It is held by many that some of the oldest references to Africans are in the Iliad and Greek Epic Cycle, the material which slightly pre-dated the Iliad. In fact, the Ethiopian Prince Memnon (look him us) parallels Achilles in some interesting ways. Drawing upon scholarly books and articles (I can help with this), provide a brief survey of some of the scholarship discussing Blacks in Antiquity, including myth. You could mention also the controversial BBC production of the Fall of Troy with a Black Achilles and Zeus. Downside—it is easy to go off the rails with this one and write a book! This topic might be better for the final research paper for the class because it is a bit ambitious.