|
Three
goddesses argue over who is fairest They
decide to let a human decide Paris,
son of the king of Troy, is chosen He selects Aphrodite
They
flee to Troy
They
attack Troy The
Trojan War lasts for ten years and leads to much brutality and savagery
The
Greeks pretend to leave
The
Trojans are suspicious of the gift of the horse The
Greeks fool them Cassandra
is ignored
The
Greeks commit terrible crimes Greeks
win the war, but at great cost |
On Mount Olympus, home of the gods, the three most powerful goddesses get into an argument. It began when Eris, the goddess of discord, who was angry at not being invited to a wedding, decided to start a fight at the wedding party. She threw a golden apple inscribed "For the Fairest" in between Hera, the wife of the supreme Greek god Zeus, Athena, the goddess of wisdom and war, and Aphrodite, the goddess of love. The three goddesses argued over who should get the golden apple, and finally settled on letting a human judge which goddesses is most beautiful. The three goddesses agreed to let Paris decide. Paris was the son of Priam, king of Troy, and the handsomest man in the world. Immediately, the goddesses tried to influence Paris' choice. Hera offered him fame and greatness, Athena offered him warlike prowess, and Aphrodite offered him the love of the most beautiful woman in the world. Probably to no one's surprise, Paris chose Aphrodite, which of course made Hera and Athena very angry. Unfortunately, Helen, the most beautiful woman in the world, was already married to a very powerful Greek king named Menelaus. However, with Aphrodite's help Paris stole Helen away from the Greek king and took her across the sea to Troy. Troy was a great and powerful city on the shores of the Mediterranean whose walls had been built by Poseidon, the god of the sea. Within those impenetrable walls, Paris and Helen lived. Menelaus, angry over the abduction of Helen, assembled all of the great kings of Greece. They formed a mighty alliance of armies and sailed for Troy to take Helen back by force. Led by the ferocious Achilles, the greatest Greek warrior, and by the Greek heroes Ajax, Odysseus and Agamemnon, the Greek armies surrounded the city. For ten years the Greeks and the Trojans (the people of Troy) engaged in a bloody and savage war, which came to be known as the Trojan War. Representative of that savagery were the actions of the great Achilles. Achilles killed the greatest Trojan warrior, Hector, the oldest son of King Priam and brother to Paris. He then strapped the mangled body to his chariot and dragged the dead Hector around the city walls. Only after much pleading by Priam was Hector's body returned to his grieving family for burial. Frustrated by ten years of fruitless war and disheartened by the death of their own great warrior Achilles, the Greek heroes sought to bring the war to an end. Odysseus convinced the Greeks to build a giant wooden horse large enough to hide many soldiers. The Greeks built the horse, placed warriors inside, rolled the horse up to the gates of Troy, and pretended to withdraw their entire army from Troy. When the Trojans saw the large wooden horse, they were immediately suspicious. Some proposed burning the horse immediately while others thought it might be an omen from the gods. Sinon, a Greek soldier left behind by the withdrawing Greek troops, pretended to be a victim himself of Greek treachery. He convinced the Trojans of his sincerity by pretending to hate the Greeks, and he convinced them that the horse was a gift to the gods left by the retreating Greeks. The Trojans, convinced by Sinon's lies and by their distrust of the prophetess Cassandra's warnings, wheeled the giant horse through the city gates. That night, the Greek soldiers crept out of the horse and opened the city gates to the Greek armies waiting outside. The city was overwhelmed by the Greeks, who in a murderous and savage rampage set fire to the city, tore down the walls, killed virtually all of the Trojan men, and captured the Trojan women and children as slaves. The killing was ferocious. Pyrrhus, the son of Achilles, killed Priam's son right before Priam's eyes and then killed Priam as he prayed at the altar. The Greek warrior Ajax assaulted Cassandra as she clung to Athena's temple. While the Greeks may have won the war, their savagery and trickery earned them the anger of many of the gods. Ajax was driven mad, Odysseus was forced to wander for ten years before returning home, Agamemnon was killed by his wife and her lover when he returned home, and Pyrrhus is killed by Orestes in a fight over a woman. Of the great heroes, only Menelaus returns without incident, taking with him his wife Helen, the cause of all the turmoil. |
Achilles was the greatest Greek warrior. He was Pyrrhus' father.
Agamemnon was a Greek hero who sacrificed his daughter to the gods to gain good sailing weather. When he returned from the war, he was killed by his wife Clytemnestra.
Andromache was the wife of Hector. She became the slave of Pyrrhus.
Astyanax was the son of Hector and Andromache, and grandson of Priam and Hecuba.
Cassandra was a daughter of Priam and Hecuba; she was a prophetess who was doomed to always be disbelieved.
Hector was the oldest son of Priam and Hecuba and the greatest warrior of Troy. He was married to Andromache.
Hecuba was the wife of Priam and Queen of Troy.
Helen was the wife of Menelaus and the most beautiful woman in the world. Her abduction by Paris began the war.
Menelaus was an important Greek king and the husband of Helen.
Odysseus was an important Greek king known for his wiliness and trickery. Because of his trickery the gods punished him by forcing him to wander for ten years before returning home.
Polyxena was a daughter of Priam and Hecuba and sister of Andromache and Hector.
Priam was King of Troy.
Pyrrhus (Neoptolemus) was a son of Achilles. He killed King Priam and took Andromache as his slave.
characters
are the persons presented in a dramatic or narrative work, who are interpreted
by the viewer or reader as having morals, ethics, qualities, and desires which
are reflected in what they say—the dialogue—and what they do—the action.
chorus. Among the ancient Greeks the chorus was a group, wearing
masks, who sang or chanted verse while performing dance-like movements at
religious festivals. Greek tragedy developed when one member of the chorus (Thespis)
spoke independent of the chorus. Later,
the chorus served mainly as commentators on the characters and events who
expressed traditional moral, religious, and social attitudes. While the chorus
often appears to represent the author’s perspective, the chorus should be seen
as a dramatic character (that is, as having mixed motives and intentions).
figurative
language is
language that departs from what speakers of a particular language understand to
be the standard meaning of words, or the standard order of words in order to
achieve a specific rhetorical effect. Figurative
language is sometimes called ornamental or poetic language, but virtually all
language contains figures of speech.
irony. There are many forms of irony.
The most common is verbal irony, when a person’s or character’s
implicit (or implied) meaning differs greatly from the ostensible (or outward)
meaning. Dramatic irony occurs when
the audience knows more about the dramatic situation than the character (or
characters) do.
plot. The plot in a dramatic or narrative work is the structure of
its actions. Plot and character
are, of course, dependent upon one another, since character determines action,
and actions are illustrations of character.