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Narrative
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Sing, O muse, of the rage of Achilles, son of Peleus, that brought countless ills upon the Achaeans. Many a brave soul it sent hurrying to Hades; many a hero did it leave prey to dogs and vultures ...
So begins The Iliad, the oldest tale in western literature, attributed to Homer, the first author whose name is still remembered. There are older stories, perhaps including parts of the Bible, but they are anonymous, and their canonical form was not established until later.
The Iliad starts in the ninth year of the Trojan War, when a quarrel among the Greek leaders ends with Achilles sulking in his tent. His best friend (and in some versions, cousin), Patrocles, dresses in his armour, and goes out to fight in his place, but is killed by Hector. Furious, Achilles charges into battle, kills Hector and desecrates his corpse, then stages an elaborate funeral for Patrocles, which ends with a sports contest. The epic ends with King Priam visiting Achilles in his tent to ask for the return of Hector's body to give his son proper funeral rites. Moved, Achilles apologizes to Priam and complies to the old king's request.
Along the way, there are many epic fights, and flashbacks to the causes of the war.
The sequel, The Odyssey, also begins at the end of the story. Ten years after the Trojan War ended, Odysseus's son Telemachus sails round Greece asking the surviving heroes about his father, who has still not returned home. He's eventually told that Odysseus has been held captive by the nymph Calypso.
The story then switches to Odysseus, who escapes from Calypso on a raft, only to be shipwrecked naked on the island of the Phaeacians, where he is found by the local princess, Nausicaa (no, not THAT one). Odysseus stays with her parents for a few days, listens to a bard singing about the Trojan Horse, then reveals his identity and tell the Phaeaians all his adventures to date.
Odysseus had tricked a Cyclops, spent a year with the sorceress Circe, who had fallen in love with him, and got advice from a dead prophet before his crew committed sacrilege. The gods punished Odysseus by killing his entire crew and shipwrecking him on Calypso's isle, where the eternally young and supernaturally beautiful nymph forced him to spend seven years as her lover, and offered him immortality. Odysseus preferred his human wife, Penelope, so escaped on the raft.
After this long flashback, taking up about a third of the entire story, Odysseus returns home, where he finds that his wife is being bothered by One Hundred And Eight suitors. Odysseus and Athena, both in disguise, skulk around the palace, plotting. The next day, Odysseus kills all the suitors, twelve housemaids who slept with them (and talked too much about the kingdom's secrets), and a goatherd who insulted him, then reveals his true identity to his wife. All ends more or less happily. Well, after Athena faces down half of Ithaca when they try to kill Odysseus, Telemachus, and Laertes in revenge.
And no, not that Homer.
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