theme 11- charactistion Flashcards
Homeric characterisation, dolands view
DONLAN (1970): thinks Homer had a special talent for enlivening these stock characters by emphasising their core traits. With minor characters, that’s as far as it goes: the trait defines the character, and so they don’t develop (e.g., Odysseus as the ‘organisation man’). They add variety and show complexity of major characters by contrast.
Yet with major characters – Achilles, Hector, Agamemnon – Homer creates situations to which the character must respond, giving them psychological depth. They even become symbols of personality types: Achilles, the ideal hero; Hector, the doomed perseverer; Agamemnon, the proud man whose responsibilities outstrip his ability to cope with them.
is dolans view right
Is there good evidence that Homer may have drawn on stock types to create some of his characters? Consider, for instance, Achilles and Meleager as different instances of the ‘sulking hero’ idea.
And is he right that minor characters serve to highlight the complexity of the major ones?
Is it their situations, combined with their underlying traits, which give the big three characters psychological depth and complexity?
Is Achilles a symbol of the ideal hero; Hector that of the doomed perseverer; Agamemnon, that of the proud man out of his depth?
achillies characterisation
Hard to know how to interpret him. 3 big problems: Homer is ambivalent about how we are to understand him; Homer gives us few direct clues about how to evaluate him overall; we no longer share the cultural context that may have helped us to understand him.
Allegory and symbol – the idea here is that A must mean something. CHAPMAN made him the suffering hero (he failed); we have just seen DONLAN’s symbolic interpretation.
Renaissance: saw him as a human character, not a symbol, but didn’t like him. VOLTAIRE thought Achilles idle, RAPIN thought him more violent than noble; SAINT-EVREMOND said ‘we hate him for his virtues’, meaning all that he holds dear is distasteful to ‘us’.
Analysts: Achilles’ inconsistent character is all that we can expect from a poem which really consists of a patchwork of older poems.
Anthropological insights: Dodds and others have shown us more about Achilles’ social context, enabling us to see him in a light more sensitive to Homer’s world. This helps us reject Renaissance views.
agamemnon characterisation
DONLAN sees him as a symbol of the out-of-depth leader (as previously discussed); but he also says that he is ‘one of the most brilliantly conceived characterisations in literature’ – consider how his situation draws out revealing reactions from him. A valid case?
Scholars agree that he improves after the first book (DONLAN, POPE, even the Renaissance scholars thought so).
POPE thought him insecure and uncertain, but a man with whom we can come to sympathise.
Renaissance scholars had more time for Agamemnon than many modern readers do. SPENSER: overall, ‘a good governor and a virtuous man’.
hectors characterisation
Generally better-liked than Achilles. PERRAULT (Renaissance) particularly liked that he seemed to be motivated by genuine love of country, not just by selfish things.
LA MOTTE (Renaissance): it is disappointing that Hector is motivated to fight by shame, rather than a sense of duty. He also thought that it disappointing that Homer makes Hector a coward in Book 22. Are these valid points?
CLARKE (1981) – Hector will be the real ‘hero’ for most modern readers, but his character is still problematic. His admirable features are combined with serious flaws, including hubris.
andromache characterisation
One anonymous ancient commentator was not impressed with Andromache’s suggestion that Hector should leave his soldiers vulnerable while he himself stays safe at the walls: ‘Andromache gives counter-military advice to Hector’, perhaps implying disapproval.
But another ancient commentator, followed centuries later by POPE, was more sympathetic, seeing what Homer meant by this ‘counter-military’ advice: her speech is ‘not typical of women, but typical of her, because she loves Hector’. This commentator understood that Homer was playing with gender roles to make a point.
patroclus characterisation
vThe main problem is, why is he not properly developed before Bk 16?
Analyst HOWALD (1924) – similarity of name between Cleopatra (Meleager episode, Bk 9) and Patroclus suggests the latter was invented for the current form of the poem.
JANKO explains the problem by arguing that the character was traditional, but the poet broke with tradition by augmenting his role.
FINLAY (1980) argues that the relationship is a father-son-style one. This is deeply controversial.
DONLAN (1970): P the ‘embodiment of gentleness and faithfulness.’
paris characterisation
A favourite of didactic interpreters as a ‘how-not-to’. CONTI (1616): Paris serves as a warning against pursuing a life of pleasure. HORACE, the Roman poet, saw him as part of the evidence that Homer in general teaches us ‘what is good, what is bad’ (Paris is ‘bad’, selfish…)
Modern scholars tend to sidestep the didactic potential of Paris and see him more as an interesting, comical figure. SCODEL (2011) believes the audience already knew about Paris, and Homer’s aim was to make sure they saw him as a comic, detestable figure (notice how he’s introduced to us in Book 3).
helen characterisation
Surely one of the Iliad’s most interesting characters.
Allegorists like POPE saw her failed struggle against Aphrodite in Book 3 (she gives in and sleeps with Paris) as an allegory about the power of lust over the will. It can be read on that level, and if so, should we sympathise with her?
POPE thought not, but CLARKE thinks we could: she appears natural, charming and sensitive. Yet he adds that it is possible to read her entirely differently, as a faker who is ‘just putting it on’ to escape the sharpest reproaches for his anomalous conduct
odysseus characterisation
For DONLAN (1970), a stock character of the epic tradition, whose central traits (intelligence, organisational ability) have been emphasised by Homer to give him personality. Any validity in this?
Is his function mainly to serve as a contrast with less ‘grounded’ and rational heroes?
diomedes characterisation
DONLAN (1970) sees him as the type of a keen and talented young warrior, ever ready to please.
CLARKE (1981) is sympathetic towards Diomedes. He is not insecure like Agamemnon (he is not overly-fussed by the latter’s insults in Book 4), and he is sufficiently like Achilles to remind us of him even while the latter is absent, yet without replacing him. Clarke thus suggests that one of Diomedes’ functions is to keep Achilles in the reader’s mind, even during his long absence from the fighting.
nestor characterisation
CLARKE (1981) finds Nestor feisty and garrulous, a wise councillor offering vague and obvious advice. To some extent he is therefore a mildly comic figure in Clarke’s eyes.
Maybe, then, DONLAN (1970) just doesn’t get him: ‘rather long-winded, something of a bore’.
menelaus characterisation
CLARKE (1981) sympathises with Menelaus. He is beaten in love by Paris and in status by Agamemnon. He is also the victim of Aphrodite’s trickery (Book 3) and of Pandarus’ arrow. Yet he is one of few characters addressed directly by Homer, and he is brave (note his behaviour is Books 3, 4, 10 and 17).
DONLAN (1970) is notably harsher: ‘the willing but somewhat incompetent warrior, over whom his older brother Agamemnon clucks like a frightened mother hen’ (?).
