Homer Without Heroes

In Book 9 of homer’s Iliad, the Greek army chieftains of Achaea send five choice men on a diplomatic mission to plead with Achilles, their best fighter in the war against Troy. He has been insubordinate ever since the grand general Agamemnon presumed to expropriate his favorite concubine. This high-handed insult deprived Achilles of his one consolation for his looming death in war: honor among the Greeks. So, he has withdrawn to let Agamemnon’s troops die in their multitudes without his protection, nursing his lethal fury by the shores of Troy. The envoys find him soothing his wounded heart with a cherished prize from an old conquest, a stringed instrument adorned with pure silver. “And with this,” says the narrator, “he lightened his spirits, singing the glorious deeds of men.”