It was thanks to Cathy’s mention of reading this that I decided to dive back into Greek myth territory. My last book there was the wonderful Ithaca by Claire North.
This one takes us to Achilles, and reminds us of that vulnerable bit of our body, the Achilles tendon. I have to say right up front that in this version, he doesn’t die from an arrow shot into that part of his body, the only body part his mother, the sea nymph and goddess of water, didn’t dip into the Styx to make him invulnerable to injury. It turns out that myth was not part of Homer’s Iliad but appeared in later works.
This is the story of the connection between Achilles and his childhood friend and later beloved Patroclus with lots of jealousy, parental intervention, and war thrown in, along with Odysseus, Agamemnon, and the Trojan War. The story is told by Patroclus, an ordinary, but especially luckless son of a minor king. He was exiled when very young and there met the beautiful and talented Achilles who took Patroclus under his wing. The two became inseparable and were unwilling recruits to the Trojan War.
When the Greeks were ready to set sail, the wind died down and after a month of calm, Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter Iphigenia for a favorable wind to the horror of Patroclus. As the war continued for ten years, Patroclus, not a talented fighter, tended to the wounded and became close to many warriors. For complicated reasons, Patroclus, posing as Achilles, went into battle and was briefly successful before being killed by Hector. This resulted in Achilles going after Hector, a catastrophic turn of events because the prophesy was that Achilles would be safe as long as Hector was alive. And then Paris kills Achilles.
It’s interesting to think about the implications of the fact that the stories the Greeks told involve interactions between mortals and gods. Perhaps it’s as simple as that all stories humans tell themselves and each other involve the non-ordinary, the exceptional. But human interaction with that whole pantheon of gods with all their various gifts and levels of power makes this an interesting question.
So much to appreciate in this book.
Madeline Miller, Song of Achilles, Ecco, 2012, 378 pages (I listened to the audiobook). Available in the public library.