The Iliad

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579-5 lines from bottom- do not mourn forever for your dead son. Prium succeeds in getting that body back to that Achilles encouragement that he buries the sufferings that he has. He’ll break the express from Zeus. 582/3 after the exchange of the body they had dinner together. There’s almost admiration for each other, that even enemies if they got to know each other don’t have to be enemies that both the greeks and the Trojans have honor and wars only happen with groups of individuals not with individuals. Achilles how long do you need to wait before you bury your son? Prium “11 days” agreed that on the 12 day they would resume the war. They both share some kind of respect for each other. Cant enter fully into the underworld until the body has been buried. Not burying your enemies doesn’t allow their souls to go into the underworld. It dooms them to a kind of restless wondering. By giving this body back to prium, and allowing hector to be buried is allowing hectors soul to be put to rest. The ending on his funeral is surprising because the story, the illiad, is about troy, and yet troy doesn’t fall, we see Achilles threatened w death throughtout the book, his death is always approachingbut he doesn’t die, we see hector die. Who is this story about? Achilles is always remembered as the hero but in this book he is the lion in the beastial sense, pushes boundries in what it means to be human. Shows himself not being able to form very many relationships, hector is the family man, whos death is celebrated at the end of this book. Why is he not remembered as the hero in this work? Point of showing Achilles death but doesn’t show it- why not show us? Lack of reality in a way. We know we are to die but we are not facing it directly for It to affedct us. Troy falling isn’t the real meaning. Story of troy but hector is troy maybe. Hector is the hero. He is oddly peripheral to how we rememeber this story he is both heroic but cowardly, very human. Humanity is presented in the midst of unimaginebale pain and suffering. War being the most extreme situation and hector has manintained some symbolance to being human in an unhuman environment

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