Pride as a Tragic Flaw or Heroic Trait Essay

In the modern world, people, as a society, have always given themselves a goal or goals that they would like to attain at some point during their lifetime. Many people seek to attain riches, love, happiness or high stature within society. When we people set that goal, we tend to mold our lifestyles around it. As people work throughout their lives to achieve this ultimate goal, it becomes apparent to others what it is we are working so hard for. Just as this pattern is evident in modern society, it can also be seen in the times of Homer, particularly in the great Greek epic, the Iliad. This distinct pattern can be seen in Achilles, one of the most vital characters in the story. Achilles, being the ultimate most powerful warrior of all

Through the history of the world, man has always been driven by self gain and each man believes he is self justified. When Agamemnon and Achilles argue over the return of Chryseis and the prize Briseis, they both think they are right. Achilles convinces Agamemnon to return the stolen Chryseis but King Agamemnon takes Achilles’ Briseis as compensation. Agamemnon is most justified in his actions. No, he did not fight on the front lines with Achilles and his men, but as the king he has every right to stay behind his army and lead. A king should be ready to give everything for his kingdom, but that does not mean they should lead every charge. Many people have pointed out that if it were expected of a King to fight in every battle it would be impossible for him to

In death’s atrocity, Achilles and the Athenians turn towards their self-interests in hopes to regain control and dignity. Achilles withdraws from the army in hopes they will recognize his worth, thus restoring honor to him. The Greeks “were stricken with unendurable grief” yet his “proud spirit” kept him from letting go of his anger. (Il. 9.4, 259). His inability to understand his mortality and resulting lack of philotēs “pitched countless souls of heroes into Hades’ dark” (Il. 1.3-4). Falling into fits of self-pity, Achilles is unable to recognize others’ sufferings, even of his own people. He complains to his mother that Agamemnon “has taken away [his] prize and dishonored” him and playing a lyre by the shore, away from the war displaying death’s reality (Il. 1.370). In his isolating mēnis, Achilles hardens into an apathetic death-like figure. Similarly, the Athenians begin to lack pity as their city turned towards “unprecedented lawlessness,… acts of self-indulgence,” and immorality during the plague (HPW 2.53). The Athenians even abandon their own people in fear of falling ill as well. Their civilization reveals it shallow-nature as they result to only considering present desires as honorable. In the face

King Agamemnon has demanded Achilles give up his maiden to him after Apollo has forced him to give up his own prize (Homer 5). Achilles feels shamed that Agamemnon would demand such a thing but eventually does give up his prize (Homer 6). It makes him seem inferior. Because of this, he refuses to participate in battle because he is returning home (Homer 172). Refusing to fight is a shameful thing that brings honor to nobody. He can fight and seem inferior to Agamemnon or he can sit out and let his comrades die. There is no honor in this.

“‘Patroklos’ has fallen, and now they are fighting over his body / which is naked. Hektor of the shining helm has taken his armor,’” Nestor explains to Achilleus (18.20-21). This heartbreaking news overtakes him with such grief that he “led the thronging chant of their lamentation,” according to book 18 line 316. The poet, Homer, compares Achilleus to a great bearded lion and Hektor to a deer hunter. The lion, after leaving his cubs alone, comes back too late and realizes that they have been taken. The lion getting his cubs stolen away by a deer hunter is representative of Achilleus losing his dear friend at the hands of Hektor. Similarly, Achilleus refuses to fight and lets Patroklos fight alone in his armor, according to the beginning of book 16. Both the lion and Achilleus are anguished and angry over their losses, and each vows to avenge their loved ones. Achilleus refers to his future revenge directly after the simile, “I will not bury you till I bring to this place the armor / and the head of Hektor, since he was your great-hearted murderer (18.334-335).” The lion “quartering after the man’s trail”

Here is one of the greatest if not the greatest of the gods, Zeus, complying with Thetis' plea to help the Trojans, and his biggest concern is upsetting his wife. This scene contrasts how the humans lives are in the hands of feeble gods who are sometimes unable to make uninfluenced decisions without the influence of others or worrying about what another will think or say to them simply because she will be ‘scolding all day long'. Another favor which helped turn the tide of war in favor of the Achaeans again involves Achilles and Thetis, however this time she seeks the aid of Hephaestus. Thetis goes to Hephaestus because Achilles armor is in the hands of Hector who killed Achilles dear friend Patroclus.

home, he did not suspect his wife to kill him. Through this grievance, Agamemnon warns Odysseus of what may await him in Ithaca and reminds him that no man is above the spite of others; more specifically, Agamemnon warns Odysseus of the possibility that his wife may plot against him in his absence. “‘Say not a word,’ he answered, ‘in death’s favour; I would rather be a paid servant in a poor man’s house and be above ground than king among kings of the dead’” (157). Achilles, the best of the Achaeans, expresses his regret to Odysseus; he wishes that he had chosen a long and peaceful life without glory rather than one of immortal greatness in the battlefield. Odysseus must confront that the war is truly over. No longer does any past heroism matter

In book one of the Iliad, a plague is placed on the Achaian army because Agamemnon wouldn’t release Chryseis, a maiden he’d taken as a prize for sacking a Trojan-allied town. Agamemnon refuses to give up Chryseis until Achilleus surrenders Briseis, another maiden, to him as consultation. This insults Achilleus’ pride and is the first event in the epic to fuel his burning rage (1.8-1.611). Due to his leader, Agamemnon, wounding his pride, he refuses to fight for the Achaians for the first 15 books. However, the tide turns in book 16 when Patroklos, Achilleus’ friend, is killed (16.816-16.821). His rage causes him to join the Achaians once more and develope aristeia, where a hero in battle has his finest moments. He nearly single-handedly slaughters the Trojan army by splitting their ranks and pursuing half of them into the river, where he recognizes Lykaon (21.1-21.35).

Before his death the Trojan leader Hector exclaims, “Well let me die⎼but not without struggle, not without glory, no, in some great clash of arms that even men to come will hear of down the years,” (22.359-362). This proclamation reveals an important theme in Homer’s Iliad. Throughout the epic poem, the concept of honor and shame constantly reappears, from being the cause of the plot to personification as Greek and Trojan heroes to the dichotomy of honor and shame within the gods. Homer uses honor and shame as a major theme of the Iliad to show how important these attributes are to the human condition.

Additionally, he appeals to pathos, or emotions, as he mentions their comrades who are lost without Achilleus and urges him to fight on for the pitiful whose suffering can only end with the war. However, Achilleus seems to be more persuaded by Phoinix’s speech. Phoinix, calls out to Achilleus, whom he had “loved out of [his] heart” (Il.9.486) and “made [his] own child” (Il.9.495), to protect his aged fatherly figure. He also shares the story of Meleagros, a hero whose arrogance causes him his bounty, and advises that Achilleus accepts the offer with the promised reward, since “if without gifts [Achilleus] went into the fighting where men perish, [Achilleus’s] honor will no longer be great” (Il.9.604-605) By presenting his case as such, Phoinix simultaneously imposes filial responsibility on Achilleus and looks out for Achilleus’s future like a parent would. Achilleus, while still refusing to help the Achaians, requests Phoinix to stay and suggests that they “decide tomorrow, as dawn shows, whether to go back home again or else to remain here” (Il.9.618-619) Of the three messengers, Phoinix is the only one who manages to get Achilleus to consider his options instead of

And this shall be a great oath before you: some day longing for Achilleus will come to the sons of the Achaians, all of them. Then stricken at heart though you be, you will be able to do nothing, when in their numbers before man-slaughtering Hektor they drop and die. And then you will eat the heart within you in sorrow, that you did no honor to the best of the Achaians (65; bk.1, ln.239-244).

In The Iliad, the first of many quarrels between Agamemnon and Achilles is ignited by Briseis and Chryseis. Because Agamemnon is forced to relinquish his prize,

This decision of prideful betrayal brings many casualties to the Achaean army. Once Agamemnon apologetically offers Achilles many valuable gifts along with the return of his war prize, Achilles refuses. In this rejection, Achilles is putting his own animosity toward Agamemnon above the needs of his fellow Achaeans. His friend Phoenix tells him to think of his diminishing honor, but Achilles answers, “…what do I need with honor such as that ?/ … It degrades you to curry favor with [Agamemnon],/ and I will hate you for it, I who love you./ It does you proud to stand by me, my friend,/ to attack the man who attacks me…”(p 147). Not only does Achilles reject honor, but he egotistically asks his father figure, Phoenix, to give up his in order to take his side.

quarrel arose and Achilleus was asked to allow Briseis, a prize that he won in battle, to go

His good character and moral makes up for what their leader lacked. Despite being enraged and provoked as Agamemnon threatens to take Briseis, in the end, Akhilleus gives in and chooses to ask help from Thetis, his mother, instead. In order to resolve this conflict, he chose the common good of the people, which is to stop the plague, and was forced to impart up the prize offered by his soldiers; his own woman. But, the outcome of that event may create a greater impact in the later story. As a result, Akhilleus did not only give up Briseis, but he also threw away all the respect and loyalty he had for