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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), Patroclus, 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 Patroclus, 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.
Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns driven time and time and again off course, once he had plundered the hallowed heights of Troy...
The Odyssey, a sequel of sorts to The Iliad, also begins at the end of the story. It tells the story of Telemachus, Odysseus' son, manning up and taking his home back from 108 suitors who were attempting to seduce his mother, and Odysseus'...odyssey back home from the Trojan war. Odysseus' story is told in flashback, and is long. He pretty much flitted around a whole bunch of islands, had sex, blinded Poseidon's son, had sex, chilled with Circe, had sex, went to Hades, chilled with Calypso, had sex, and cried on a rock. Telemachus meets up with Odysseus, and the two of them massacre the suitors and the story ends with a lovely gift of aid from Athena.
The author himself was most certainly illiterate, and probably blind as well, which may explain why peoples' livers fall out while blood stains their chests, how people break swords in two over the heads of others, and how they slice off limbs and heads (and sometimes, heads in two) with the ease of a lightsaber. Homer memorized both The Iliad and The Odyssey, and probably changed the story each time he told it. There are some historians who believe that Homer was not the poet, and that both The Iliad and The Odyssey were written either by a woman or a Jewish man.
And no, not that Homer.
This author's works include examples of:
- Achilles Heel: Trope Namer, or at least trope originator since it wasn't actually called that by Homer.
- Achilles In His Tent
- An Aesop: In The Iliad:
- Solve conflicts through words and compromise, not violence or insult. Becomes more obvious in the penultimate book where we see several altercations (e.g. Ajax vs. Idomeneus, Antilochus vs. Achilles, Antilochus vs. Menelaus) over prizes in the Funeral Games that mirror Achilles and Agamemnon's initial argument but are settled peaceably. While this may seem something of a Broken Aesop as the setting is an enormous war, it's worth noting that if the Trojans had returned Helen and apologized at the beginning, they probably wouldn't have gotten their whole city destroyed.
- Welcome constructive criticism and counsel. Whenever characters refuse advice (which is often) it never ends well.
- Bad Ass: Achilles, Aeneas, Agamemnon, Ajax, the other Ajax, Diomedes, Glaucus, Hector, Odysseus, Sarpedon- pretty much everybody, in fact.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Achilles asks Zeus to help the Trojans to punish the Greeks, which ends in his friend Patroclus' death fighting the empowered Trojans.
- Because Destiny Says So: The prophecy that the newborn Paris would grow up to bring doom to Troy. Thus, the Trojan war and everything connected with it happen because of destiny.
- The Big Guy: Telamonean/Big Ajax
- Bond One Liner: After spearing Cebriones and causing him to backflip out of his chariot, Patroclus remarks that'd he'd make a good oyster diver. Of course, this being The Iliad, it's a bit longer than one line.
- Book Ends: The Iliad begins and ends with an initially refused ransom that is eventually accepted.
- Break The Haughty: Achilles
- The Cassandra: While the Trope Namer herself makes a minor appearance, she actually doesn't qualify in this case. Polydamus, on the other hand, is a Trojan of good standing and well-recognized intelligence whose advice Hector violently rejects on multiple occasions, leading to massive losses for the Trojans and their allies and Hector's eventual death.
- Character Filibuster: Goes with the territory for epic poetry, but often characters have huge monologues even in the middle of battles.
- Combat By Champion: Menelaus vs. Paris, Hector vs. Ajax
- Dead Sidekick: Patroclus for Achilles
- Deus Ex Machina: All over the place, naturally.
- Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu: In books five and six of The Iliad, Diomedes goes on a god-stabbing rampage with the help of Athena. First he slashes Aphrodite's arm when she tries to rescue Aeneas. After she runs and tattles to her lover, Ares, the god of slaughter arrives to lay down the law. Instead, he gets Impaled With Extreme Prejudice by Diomedes's spear, causing him to squeal like a girl and run away. Diomedes becomes the only mortal to injure two gods in a single day. Some scholars believes that this whole episode pre-dates The Iliad, and Homer lumped it into his own epic.
- Dressing As The Enemy
- Due To The Dead: Proper respect towards corpses is very, very, very important in The Iliad.
- El Cid Ploy: Patroclus pulls one by dressing as Achilles while he's In His Tent
- Eye Scream: More than one character gets their eyes bashed out.
- Fatal Family Photo: Obviously, photos, fatal or otherwise, don't exist in the context of The Iliad, but it's notable that the only family shown are Hector's obviously beloved wife and child, which adds to the pathos at his death.
- Fatal Flaw: Hector's refusal to listen to advice that contradicts his own desires leads to massive losses for his side and eventually his death.
- Achilles and Agamemnon both suffer greatly from their pride and wrath.
- Final Speech: Sarpedon and Patroclus get these in The Iliad.
- Foregone Conclusion: Homer's audience would have been very familiar with the myths behind the story, and known how it all ended. In The Iliad, the fact that the Trojans are doomed to lose is known even by Hector himself.
- Genius Bruiser: Odysseus. The Greeks wouldn't take no for an answer from him because of his famed intelligence.
- Grey And Gray Morality: Very much so in The Iliad. While largely centering on the Greek point of view, the Trojans are also described largely as noble, especially Hector.
- Hello Nurse: Helen of Troy.
- Hero Antagonist: Hector is in many ways far more noble than Achilles.
- Heroic BSOD: Achilles is so depressed after Patroclus' death, Patroclus' ghost has to come back to tell him to stop moping and burn his corpse, already!
- Historical Fantasy: Both poems are set during the Greek Bronze Age and although the actually date of their composition was debated, it was at least a few hundred years later.
- How We Got Here
- Ho Yay: Hey, they're Greeks.
- Its All My Fault: Achilles after Patroclus' death — he's right.
- Its Personal
- The Last Temptation
- Living Mac Guffin: Helen of
Sparta Troy.
- The Load: Paris may be the Ur Example. Even the other Trojans think he's a philandering, cowardly jerk who's responsible for the war. His prefered weapon is a "cowardly" bow, is humiliated in his only proper fight, and relies on the Goddess of Love to get him out of trouble. In one translation, he gets called a "desperate, womanizing pretty boy" by his Bad Ass older brother Hector, and a "sissy, curly-haired pimp of a bowman" by Diomedes. Of course, in part of the myth not covered in the Iliad, he gets one over Achilles by hitting his heel with his poisoned arrows.
- Ludicrous Gibs: Sometimes the deaths in The Iliad are... messy.
- Minor Injury Overreaction: When Diomedes slashes and stabs Aphrodite and Ares, respectively, it's the first time either of them have been injured, and they apparently aren't accustomed to pain. They both scream in agony and flee back to Olympus. Most of the mortal heroes, on the other hand, take a number of wounds and continue slaughtering each other for years.
- My Girl Is Not A Slut: Penelope.
- Notably, despite the fact that she was taken as a war prize by Achilles, Agamemnon has to swear that he did not sleep with Breseis when giving her back to Achilles.
- Narrative Poem: Not quite the Ur Example...
- No Matter How Much I Beg: Odysseus with the Sirens.
- Nominal Importance: Heavily averted. We learn the names, and usually the fathers' names, of hundreds of characters whose only purpose is to be slaughtered.
- Red Shirt Army: Hundreds die in The Iliad, but only about four have any emotional import.
- Ret Con: Common scholarly consensus is that Aphrodite and Apollo didn't even exist in the Greek pantheon at the time The Iliad takes place (the Greek Bronze Age), despite being relatively major characters in it. Admittedly, Homer composed it hundreds of years after the fact and had no way of knowing this.
- Roaring Rampage Of Revenge: Achilles loses it when Patroclus bites the dust. Odysseus slaughters every suitor and twelve maids in his home once he returns.
- Sacred Hospitality
- Sadly Mythtaken: It seems that a good many people do not understand that the Trojan Horse, the death of Achilles, the theft of the Palladium, the fall of Troy, and good many other stories set around the Trojan War do not occur in the Iliad proper. At most, they are mentioned in the Odyssey.
- Smite Me Oh Mighty Smiter
- Straight Arrow: Paris and Odysseus
- Take Our Word For It: In all of Helen's appearances she is never given a full description. Instead Homer uses the reactions of those around Helen to emphasize her beauty.
- Talking Is A Free Action: Several characters give speeches in the middle of battle, both to the other men and the enemy. Patroclos both lampshades and plays this straight in The Iliad, when he points in the middle of battle that words are good for debate and not in war, and that in the time you'll give a nice speech a whole bunch of people will have probably died.
- The Three Faces Of Adam: Achilles (Hunter), Agamemnon (Lord), Nestor (Prophet); Paris (Hunter), Hector (Lord), Priam (Prophet); Telemachos (Hunter), Odysseus (Lord), Laertes (Prophet).
- Tragic Hero: So many
- Tricksters
- Trojan Horse: Given a mention in the Odyssey, but despite common perceptions never shows up personally in Homer's works.
- Unreliable Narrator: Odysseus is hinted to be one of these, talking about stuff that he couldn't possibly know.
- Unstoppable Rage
- Values Dissonance: It is difficult for many modern readers to not instinctively side with the Trojans as a whole and Hector in particular; the mindset of Achilles was valid back then but is now somewhat alien, while the values that Hector embodies are still widely held.
- The Vamp: Circe and Calypso to Odysseus.
- What Happened To The Mouse: Aeneas. Just as Achilles is about to kill him, the Gods save his life and declare that after the war, he shall be the leader of all future Trojans. He is never mentioned again; neither in the Iliad or the Odyssey. 800 years later, Virgil turned this into a Brick Joke.
- It's more of a Forgotten Trope. The Greeks early on realized the Undead Author problem. "Kill everyone - but one guy" shows up quite frequently, and might even be Truth In Television in some of the wars. Aeneas got tapped for the role. It's also not quite accurate to say that he was never mentioned again. He's mentioned a few times, before and after, but with nowhere near as much fanfare as that moment.
- What The Hell Hero: Patroclos calls Achilles out on his moping over Briseis instead of fighting the Trojans.
- Wordof Dante: Many of the elements now centrally linked to the Trojan War story - Paris killing Achilles, the Trojan Horse - were invented by later authors writing in the same tradition.
- You Cant Fight Fate: What we would call an Overused Running Gag.
- You Cant Go Home Again
- You Have Waited Long Enough: Penelope
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