The Iliad by Homer, Books 11-15
Creative Assignments:
While the hoards of Greek and Trojan fighters are compared in their number to swarms of bees, a lot of that swarm gets left on the field, dead. Write a elegy for one of the dead warriors. Use bold metaphors and stark imagery like Homer, and follow Homer's mood and tone as closely as you can.
For brave souls who would like to suffer formal constraints, write your elegy in the form of elegiac couplets. (Note: Not all elegiac poems are elegies for the dead, but yours will be.) Dactylic meter, in couplets of a line in hexameter followed by a line in pentameter. Good luck.
OR
The artist Matt Kish is currently at work on creating a collection of images representing all the people who died in The Iliad. You might remember Matt Kish from his illustrations of Heart of Darkness that we studied last year. You can see this ongoing project, called "Only the Dead," in this public Facebook album. He was inspired by Alice Oswald's version of The Iliad, which is called Memorial and boils down the poem to only the deaths. You can read more about Memorial in its NYT Review, which calls it "a poem that blooms out of slaughter" and I will bring my copy of this book to class for you to examine and read.
Here is Matt Kish's statement about his work: "My aim with these has been to juxtapose images of death and violence with text from comic books which promote a kind of toxic adolescent male power fantasy and to hopefully create visual tension between what the imagery communicates and the collaged text conveys. It's a kind of propaganda that will hopefully encourage the viewer to consider what is promised by those who want our young men and women to go to war, what the reality of war is, and the vast gulf between the two." Your assignment is to create an image in the style of Matt Kish, memorializing one of the dead in The Iliad, using newspaper clippings or other found words to augment your illustration. Here are a few examples of his work from "Only the Dead."
Writing Assignments:
Consider our civilization's fascination with war stories. The Iliad is one of the goriest, with the highest death count, and is by certain metrics the most popular of all time. Movies like Saving Private Ryan, Dunkirk, and Apocalypse Now, books like Catch-22, The Things They Carried, and War and Peace are among the most popular books and films ever created. Write a 500-word persuasive essay in which you answer the question: Why are war stories so enduringly popular? To answer this you will need to establish a warrant: what makes stories popular with readers? You don't need to specifically identify your warrant in the essay, but you should know what it is. You can use The Iliad as an example, or any other specific book or movie that you have read or seen. If you use other essays or articles to get ideas, make sure you reference your sources clearly. Your task is primarily to argue your own position, not to reference others. Figure out what you think about this question, and then construct an essay to support that idea.
OR
Same as above, but answer the question: How should war stories be told? You can find movies and books that gloss over the harsh realities of war, and you can also find movies and books that show war with gritty realism. In arguing this point, you will have to establish a warrant: what is the purpose of war literature? Should it be to glorify and ennoble warfare, or to warn against it? You don't need to clearly state your warrant in your essay, but you should know what it is. You can use The Iliad as an example, or any other specific book or movie that you have read or seen. If you use other essays or articles to get ideas, make sure you reference your sources clearly. Your task is primarily to argue your own position, not to reference others. Figure out what you think about this question, and then construct an essay to support that idea.
AP Lang:
Print out and fill out as much as you can of the data sheet for "Letter from Birmingham Jail" by MLK. Please make sure you've ordered the practice book, as we are soon going to begin tackling multiple choice questions in class.
Quiz:
1. What do Bienor, Oileus, Pisander, Hippolochos, Iphidamas, and Koon have in common, and what is different about Koon?
2. At the end of book 11, Nestor gives a big speech to Patroclus to inspire him to get the Myrmidons fighting. Give an example of one rhetorical strategy he uses.
3. When an eagle flies on your left, carrying a snake, what does this mean? (According to the Trojans)
4. Before Hektor smashes the gates of the wall the Greeks have built, another Trojan rips a hole in it. Who?
5. What god takes on various disguises to try and inspire the Greeks to battle in book 13?
6. When an eagle flies by on your right, what does this mean? (According to the Greeks)
7. Agamemnon, Odysseus, and Diomedes are all wounded. Agamemnon wants to leave, Odysseus thinks there's no way to get out safely. What does Diomedes think?
8. Why is Zeus sleeping through the battle, at the end of book 14?
9. Hektor leads the Trojans to fight the Greeks all the way back to what location?
10. What god is helping the Trojans make this furious attack?
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