Iliad Aeneid Homer and Virgil:

Iliad Aeneid

Homer and Virgil: Poetic deflations of war, poetic inflations of national origin

Both the "Aeneid" of the Roman Poet Virgil, as translated by Allen Mandelbaum, and the "Iliad" of Homer, as translated by Robert Fagles chronicle tales of nations. However, the "Aeneid," although it is also comprises many tales of war and warriors, as well as travel and lovers, is fundamentally a positive tale of nation building, namely the founding of the city of Rome. The more mournful and elegiac "Iliad" is a tale of nation's imminent destruction, that of Troy, and thus has a far less positive tone towards the theme of war and warfare.

Neither text is anti-war. The theme of a male's need to prove himself in warfare runs through both texts, as Paris is criticized by Homer's Greeks for his chariness about fighting for Helen's hand, and Aeneas is reproached for dallying too long with the Queen of Carthage, the lovely Dido. However, the "Aeneid" focuses mainly on an individual's positive quest to establish the Roman capital, as opposed to the more disparately focused "Iliad" which chronicles the petty squabbling of the Greeks and Trojans, and the futility, ultimately of their aims to end a conflict that neither side really has much desire to win, given it is over a woman no warrior may enjoy -- even her rightful husband has lost his drive for Helen. But the more spare, fierce, and elemental poetic diction of the Greek author stresses the futility of war in contrast to the poetic, elevated language and themes of the "Aeneid." The "Aeneid" also combines themes of travel and romance as well as relationships between men and battle, bringing them to the forefront while in the "Iliad," such wrangling over women are only of interest in terms of how they affect the war and create conflict between men.

Even the repetitive references to the characteristics of the different warriors in Homer's text stresses the repetitive and cyclical nature of violent conflict, as opposed to the more elegant and varied style of Virgil. The Roman author's greater variety and cleaner sentence structure creates a more propulsive narrative, and a more complex sense of character. The complexity of psychology, however, is not simply due to Virgil's verbal skill but also the Aeneid's singular focus on the central, founding character of Aeneias, while Homer must focus on two different sides of the Trojan War.

For instance, in one instance of Homer's description of a battle scene, the Greek author descends into almost cave-man like images, as Ajax, one of the greatest warriors is described as thus:

He brought him down with a glinting jagged rock, massive, top of the heap behind the rampart's edge, no easy lift for a fighter even in prime strength, working with both hands, weak as men are now.

Giant Ajax hoisted it high and hurled it down, crushed the rim of the fighter's four-horned helmet and cracked his skull to splinters, bloody pulp..."

Iliad, Fagles, 12.435-443

In this description, Homer's skill as a critic of war through his style and choice of images becomes clear. There is nothing beautiful or glorious about a man being killed by a rock by a stronger man. This is not a fair fight, and the description of how the helmet of the fighter is of no defense when pummeled by Ajax's in combination with a boulder would have been horrifying to Homer's listeners as it is to a contemporary reader. Even if one accepts that Homer's age was more barbaric than our own, the description conveys nothing of a balanced match between equals, only blood and death. This is not to say that the "Iliad" is lacking in tales of great warriors, but that the author was not enamored with conflict and war to the degree that he was immune to its seeder side. Even though Ajax's display is impressive, and merits the man being called by the word "Great" as he often is because of his size and strength, his deployment of this strength in brutal fashion is not given equal admiration as it is warriors that fight fairly, with proper weapons, and with valor.

In contrast, Virgil's chronicle of the sacking of Troy, even in the words of one who suffered greatly because of the unfair, tricked destruction of his native city with the infamous "wooden horse," seems almost beautiful in comparison. While sailing away from the wrecked city that was once his homeland, and facing the turbulent waves stirred up by Poseidon, Aeneas cries:

O, three and four times blessed were those who died before their fathers' eyes beneath the walls of Troy. Strongest of all the Danaans, o Diomedes, why did your right hand not spill my lifeblood, why did I not fall upon the Ilian fields, there where ferocious Hector lies, pierced by Achilles' javelin, where the enormous

Sarpedon now is still, and Simois has seized and sweeps beneath its waves so many helmets and shields and bodies of the brave!" [1.130-144]