Here it is--the new blog for the week! Sorry for the delay, but you can respond to this any time next week with a COMMENT. Just watch the video first. :) And don't forget about the Paper #1 assignment posted a few posts down...the due dates are coming up!
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Be sure to get a copy of our next book, Lao Tzu's Tao te Ching, so you can answer the questions for next week (I'll post them soon)...
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An actual fragment of Sappho' s poetry Be sure to read the few fragments in the last chapter, "The Wisdom of Sappho" befo... -
Here's a short video that talks about how much translation matters, especially in an old and mysterious work like the Tao te Ching . W...
YHelm:
ReplyDeleteI hear a man's voice in the Iliad. There is too much insight related to the fighting. Also, there is a callousness toward the women being stolen, kept, and given to other men that would seem odd coming from a woman's voice. Agememnon's list of gifts to Achilles includes "surpassingly beautiful women from Lesbos" that Agememnon chose for "himself when captured the town"(59).
Although the women are offered as a gift, there still is an undercurrent of Agememnon's ego letting Achilles know that the women belonged to him first. Almost as if the women are Agememnon's cast offs, so it is okay to gift them to Achilles. This just seems like a guy thing to do . (sorry guys!)
Great points--I agree with you on the whole, since it would be hard to imagine a woman would keep quiet about this arrangement. Unless it was so taken for granted, and a part of history, that it was simply how things were. Remember that the events of The Iliad took place hundreds of years before the poem was written...it was basically a myth even then. So maybe that would make it easier for a woman to deal with? And it would also allow her to slyly comment on it, as the poet seems to do with his/her female characters. But otherwise, I think you're right.
DeleteWilliam Carter
ReplyDeleteWhenever I read The Iliad, I always picture a man reading it, possibly Zeus. He has a commanding tone when he talks. He does talk a little about human relationships, like that meeting with Briseis and her friends talking about stopping the war in Book 19, but when I read it, it pretty much just talks the war that's still going on. Honestly, women are too smart to go to war, since they'd probably sit and try to compromise and try to stop the conflict, and men just barrel forth into conflict. Men just enjoy conflict too much.
That's an interesting reading...this could be the narration of a god, especially since only a god would have the omnipotent awareness of what's going on in both sides of the war. And yes, women would try to avoid the conflict altogether...and there's a famous Greek play, Lysistrata, where the women put an end to the war going on between Athens and Sparta, by finding the one crucial weakness of men. But I won't tell you about that here--you'll have to read the play! :)
DeleteWhenever I read the Iliad, I imagine a both male and female narrators, depending on the lines I read. I imagine a male narrator when the book is mostly talking about the seriousness of battle, but also when talking about the women. The women are dropped in and often referred to, in a sense, as objects a lot of the time throughout the book. Though there is love, and fighting for love, the book still exemplifies many cases of arrogance when it comes to stealing other people's "prizes" and women coming and going throughout the war. A man would typically neglect writing about how wrong it must have been to be a woman in this time, or any time. Men focus mainly on the war heroes and their victories. There are several moments and phrases throughout the novel, however, that leads me to thinking a woman could have something to do with it. For instance, in book 12, when describing the Greeks and Lycians tearing down the wall, the narrator says "like two men/ disputing boundary stones in a common field/ and defending their turf with measuring rods/ they had brought with them to stake their claims." I feel like a female narrator is trying to describe, in an almost joking kind of way, that breaking down this wall was like two men both fighting for land and refusing to give up. A male writer from this time would probably take a more serious approach to help create a visual than joking about each side acting like two arrogant men. Women of this time may find the analogy a little more appropriate.
ReplyDeleteThat's a great point--I think we can hear two voices narrating this poem, and I think it might be interesting to imagine the poem being 'performed' by co-hosts, a man and a woman (or a god and a goddess), each one taking turns to show us the events and place them in different contexts. The scene in Book 12 is a great example of this. And while a man could certainly imagine this (just like a woman could imagine and even relish warfare) it's fun to think that we could be getting multiple views of the Greek world from these two different authors.
DeleteI think the poem is consisted of several men and women who wrote it. Either one could have written it to recite to an audience. In Book 22, Andromache is talking to the women on page 136 to 137 about something terrible that happened to one of Priam's son. Just the way the person described her in detail, it sounded like a women from that point of view. I think a women would think the same way about others and how they feel. There are a lot of parts that seem like a women wrote it and others that a man might have written it. In Book 22 also, Achilles raised up his spear at Hector on page 132. That part could have been written by a man because how he killed him was in detail. It makes sense to me that men would talk about war and killing other men during the battle they're in. But, we honestly don't really if it was or not. I thought it sounded like a man than a woman and vice versa with the part about Andromache. That's what it sounded like to me from each of those lines.
ReplyDelete-Brittney Taylor
*don't really know if it was or not.
DeleteYes, this is a great reading of the poem, and indeed, the poem we have now is probably the result of dozens of different poets performing it throughout the ages, until it was finally written down. So we might have a few books from one poet, a few from another, and all of them revised and re-worked by ten other poets. So we might have a mixture of many different male and female voices in this poem, each one adding a crucial perspective that changes how we understand the war and the people in it. But no one knows for sure!
DeleteWhen reading the Illiad, to me I feel like there is both male and female Narrators. When the women talk it feels like it comes from one just from the emotion they put out. And when a man speaks in the Illiad it really feels like a male narrator. the narrators are writing from the persepectives of the relationships that come out of war. Like when Briseis' family was all killed when they got invaded and then she was given to Achilles to marry. An example of when there is a male narrator is when Achilles is speaking to Patroclus and says, "But I take it hard when someone in power/ Uses his authority to rob his equal/ And strip him of his honor" (81). You can just hear Achilles talking in his powerful manly voice. An example when a female narrator comes in is when Briseis is crying over Patroclus' body and says, "My poor Patroclus. You were so dear to me./ When I left this hut you were were alive,/ And now I find you, the army's leader, dead/ When I come back" (117). I feel when this book was written you need those different narrators to get the initial emotion and action throughout the book.
ReplyDeleteYes, good passages to examine! And while I don't mean to say that only a man could depict heroic men, and only a woman could depict sorrowful women, I do think that there are parts of the poem which suggest a woman's voice and experience behind it, just as it would be hard for a woman of this time to imagine some of the battle scenes with such documentary realism. But who knows? I think it's likely that this poem is a collaboration between many different poets, which is what makes it such a masterpiece. It's not the vision of just one person, so we can see and relate to so many different characters and moments no matter who we are.
DeleteWhen reading The Iliad, I hear both a male and a female voice. I hear the man's voice whenever one the the male characters speaks directly and when the poet is talk about the war itself and what the war is about. I hear the woman's, as if she were mocking men for being so consumed with war. Like when Achilles' friend, Patroclus, dies. The woman is saying "you fool, you were so consumed with the war that you let your own friend die in your place." Or when the men in the book are talking about gift that one will receive if they win the war. It is almost like a man and a woman are having an argument about war, within the book itself. The man is arguing that war is a big deal and the honor and the gifts you will receive if the war is won. And the woman is arguing that war is just a battle of egos and in the end all that is left is destruction and death, what good will all the gifts you receive be if you have no one by your side.
ReplyDeleteWhen reading the Iliad I hear a man's voice. There is too much talk of war, fighting, and honor. Which back then was basically all men would write about. There is obduracy toward the women being stolen, kept as slaves, and given to other men as gifts and if the Iliad was written by a woman I believe their would be so much emotion and hurt unlike how it is written in the Iliad it would be peculiar coming from a woman considering the conditions. An example of the woman being stolen and being given as gifts is when Agememnon's list of gifts to Achilles includes "surpassingly beautiful women from Lesbos" that Agememnon chose for "himself when captured the town"(59).
ReplyDeleteBut I also feel like also men could have borrowed work from women like Sappho to add that emotion to their work. An example of this would be "If you're his friend you're no longer mine, although I love you. Hate him because I hate him. It's simple as that." To me personally I feel like you hear women say this all the time when they get jealous so it's possibly written by a woman or women. So this argument is a very hard one to take sides with.
While I was reading the Iliad, I would've thought that the narrator would've been a man. The way that he talked about how Patroclus was acting like a small child and he was begging for death (80). A woman wouldn't have compared the death wish of a man to a child. I think that he was much more interested in the violence parts.
ReplyDeleteI believe The Iliad would be narrated by a man. Most of the poem is from a male point of view so I believe it would be told by a man. The way they talk of battle and family and honor really reminds me of the war a man would tell a war story. A woman would focus on different points such as loss and emotions, but a woman would also talk of family the way the men do.
ReplyDeleteAlex Smith
In the Iliad I hear more of a male voice. A lot of the poem its in a makes perspective and there is a lot about war and honor. In the beginning they also have it to where women are prizes to the men and the war started over Helen leaving the king and in my opinion a women wouldn't start a war if her husband left her. In this quote Agamemnon is getting mad because he is going to give the girl he has so that Apollo will forgive them so they don't have to sail back because of the plague and he is talking about taking Achilles prize since he has to give up his "Give the girl back, just like that? Now maybe If the army, in a generous spirit, voted me Some suitable prize of their own choice, something fair— But if it doesn’t, I’ll just go take something myself, Your prize perhaps, or Ajax’s, or Odysseus’, And whoever she belongs to, it’ll stick in his throat." In my perspective it just seems like this is in a mans point of view just by how they talk about certain things.
ReplyDeleteBrooklyn Barnes^
DeleteMatthew Throneberry
ReplyDeleteWhen I read the book I hear a male voice. The way the book is set up and the way women are described I couldn’t hear a woman voice. An example would be when Achilles and Agamemnon were arguing. Agamemnon was comparing the girl he took as his, “prize.” In the book the women are described with much disrespect so to hear a woman voice while I read seems unreasonable.
When reading The Iliad I quickly turn to think that a man wrote this poem. The talks of war, honor, pride, and women as prizes all seem to be from a man's perspective, yet interestingly enough I get the sense that it was more than one man that wrote The Iliad. I see hints of women-like perspectives throughout The Iliad. Things such as Achellis deep love or desire for Briseis, or how the poem in many instances portrays war as nothing other than evil, where the only result is loss, it is these few things in The Iliad that lead me to believe that maybe a woman did have an impact on the creation of this poem. I do see how little women are portrayed in The Iliad, but I think this is a result of the culture at that time period. It is what it is, women weren't viewed that importantly back then. Although The Iliad comes off as being mostly made by a man I can also see influences from women ideologies. It is possible that it was a sole man that thought outside of the norm of what men thought at that time, but I think The Iliad was created by multiple people, Male and Female.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteReading the Iliad makes me believe that I hear a man’s voice narrating it.
I feel like since they talk about war, honor and battle so much it would be a male since that was pretty much all men's personalities back then. But, that’s also a stereotypical too, because it could be a female. Sappho talked about war and battle as well but she was also very compassionate, and empathetic towards family and her lovers.
The Iliad is claimed to be written by men but the way the tone shifts, and the emotion brought in some of the events that happen throughout the book I believe a woman or women helped write the Iliad and some components came from or were inspired by Sappho. Sappho is reflected in many aspects but sparsely throughout book which help convey the story even better. So, in conclusion i think the illiad is written by men but has hints of a womens writing in it.
ReplyDeleteMonica Guajardo:
ReplyDeleteI think that this book is written by a man. I think this because the concepts like honor are a big part of the Iliad. It is a manly thing to want to be honored in battle. Also, the talk of wanting a woman (slave) makes it seem like a man wrote it too. But, Sappho had these ideas as well in her poems. So the Iliad is either a man writing or a woman writing like a man (because we know women were not supposed to be doing such things).
when i read the Iliad i hear a mans voice there are a lot of men characters so i think that's why but i could also hear a women's voice in come parts of it i think its up ion the air they way its right is more aggressive and more manly to me and has a lot of harsher words then i think i women would say i think a women would be more diligent with her words
ReplyDeleteIt is hard for me to decide whether or not this was written by either gender. I believe, by the way the fighting is described, that aman has written those parts. Only a man, at this time, would fully understand the thoughts and emotions that go into fighting. I only say this because at the time of the trojan war, the only female fighters in the world were "Amazonians" and they were not fighting in this war. This would leave only men to write about the struggles of war. However, I believe only a woman could have depicted the sorrows of the woman in this book(Andromache, Achilles mom, etc) No man would be able to put himself in either of these women's place. If I had to choose a gender that wrote this story, I would not, seeing as both sides have hints to who could have written it.
ReplyDeleteWhen reading The Iliad honestly, it sounds like it's coming from the point of view of a man. Particularly because we barely see any women share their point of view besides those moments like Hera and Andromache and sometimes Helen and others. Although there are moments where women are put to light in this poem, it's almost like we are forced to see it from a man's eyes. Achilles feeling heartache from losing Briseis, Hector telling his wife it's his destiny to fight in the Trojan War, Zeus being the cheater that he is. There is an unequal sharing of views between the sexes in this work. If the story were seen a little more from a woman's POV maybe we would have a different outlook on The Iliad in its entirety.
ReplyDeleteWhenever i read the Iliad, I have a picture in my head that whosoever wrote it was a man. There was a lot of writings about war and little about human relationship. A lady couldn't have written the Iliad because women are more compassionate and would hardly write a lot about war.
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