Which hero from the three Greco-Roman epics is /lit/'s favorite? Picture of X-fags missing the point of the Iliad attached for entertainment purposes.
Responding to my own thread, but Odysseus has always been my favorite.
I like Menelaus.
>>25178878Odysseus > Aeneas > Achilles > HectorI like Odyssey the least out of all 3 though
>>25178878The tension between the two with their respective strengths and shortcomings is very much the point of the Iliad.Topic: Odyssey
Who cares when Diomedes mogs both?
>>25178878Hector
>>25178878Aeneas is my FUARKING HERO and I'll find my Italy yet..
>>25178878I'll throw in Dionysus in the Dionisiaca to be contrarian.
>>25178878the real hero is the falcon, the silent hunter come to bring the pygmy-men their fate of murder and death
>>25178878Hector is. Achilles is a force of nature
>>25178878Achilles definitely has the best structured dramatic arc, much closer to a perfect tragic conflict as Aristotle would define it. Theres a brilliant tension in how before he joins the war, he is stuck between these two poles where he knows he will die if he goes into battle, but will also gain eternal fame. His feud with Aggamemnon is implicitly also his refusal to accept that bargain. That fate he is forestalling only gets fulfilled the second he loses that which makes him care about either life and fame (i.e Patroclus, the one dearest to him), and in an ironic subversion, it gets fulfilled precisely because he doubted in accepting it (i.e Patroclus died because Achilles stalled his fate, thereby initiating his fate and guaranteeing his fame through his wrath).Odysseus feels like much more of an 'adventurer', encountering various ways of life and reacting to them, but he does not have this almost philosophical contradiction at the core of his being the way Achilles does. He is very likable in the way he uses his wits, the way he longs for home. But his arc isnt as interesting to me as Achilles.
>>25179164Why is Achilles the only character in the Iliad who has the privilege of choosing his fate?
>>25178878Whichever has the highest purity of spirit and good nature yet suffers the most
>>25179180Because his decision of joining the war or not that is central to the tide of the war in a way the other characters do not have the freedom of choosing. The other heroes are already in the war, and the war is in a deadlock. It is Achilles that tips the balance. Hence its not:>Sing goddess, of Hector's valiant defenseOne could argue in the end its primarily Odysseus's decision that ends the war, not Achilles, but that is the overarching narrative of the broader epic cycle, not the narrative of the illiad. The Trojan horse is famously not part of the Illad and the story it is trying to tell.
>>25179209That's a good answer, but the right answer is just that Achilles is a Gary Stu.
>>25179164Achilles' character arc ends in the Odyssey btw, few remember this.
>>25178878Orestes even though he is more of an anti-hero >>25178905>marry slut >she goes away with a handsome zoomer >go to war for her>your brother is forced to sacrifice his oldest daughter just to go to your slut-war >barely do anything in war>get your slut wife back and forgive her>your brother is killed by his wife, do nothing about it, in fact defend the criminals and betray your nephew when he gets revenge Holy cuck. What do you see in him?
>>25179245Oops, I didn't read the word "Epic". I guess it's Aeneas then. If you have read the tragedies then there's no way you don't absolutely hate Odysseus. Aeneas is like Achilles but with the morality of Hector.
>>25179250I was the first person saying Odysseus, and I haven't read any tragedies, actually. Which ones are connected to the Iliad/Odyssey/Aeneid narrative?
>>25179265Ajax of Sophocles is about Ajax going insane after the war because Odysseus was gifted Achilles’ armor through his craftiness (off screen/ outside the play that is) so the Gods made him go crazy and attack sheep so he wouldn’t actually hurt Odysseus who is protected of the gods. That is I assume, the play anon is referring to by calling Odysseus evil in that post.
>>25179265>>25179279Ajax was explained by that other anon, but he forgot that Ajax does a discourse of lots of evil and selfish acts of Odysseus. In Philoctetes, he abandons in an island a greek disabled man from his ship, after learning he has to get his bow due to a prophecy, he forces another man to manipulate for him in order to steal the only way for this disabled and betrayed man to survive. In Iphigenia at Aulis, he is the one who reveals to the army that the sacrifice must be Iiphigenia, applying the pressure of thousands men unto Agamemnon and practically securing the murder of a 13-14 year old girl. In Hecuba he is the one who oversees the sacrifice of Hecuba's daughter.
>>25179303Iphigenia isn’t really a fair one though because the Gods ordained it and the girl wasn’t even sacrificed anyway. It was rather an Abraham and Isaac deal where the Gods wanted to trick Agamemnon into proving his devotion by being willing to sacrifice his own child but then whisking her away at the last moment.
>>25179310In the original myth she does get murdered, only in Euripides she is not. And even though the gods ordered it, he could've talked to Agamemnon or Menelaus about it first. There was no reason to go directly to the army and snitch about it.
>>25179310Also, in contrast, Achilles wanted to defend Iphigenia with his life. Take in consideration that the whole war's purpose was to take a whore back, and that the gods only asked of this sacrifice to give them wiind to go to war. Achilles thought that Iphigenia's life was worth more than a useless war and was decided to fight the whole army over her. It's not until Iphigenia decides that her sacrifice is the correct choice until Achilles restrains himself. That's what a hero would do in this scenario.
Chiron is the greatest Greek hero. A true hero is someone who lifts others up and allows them to become better versions of themselves.
>>25179326Achilles and Odysseus are two different people. Odysseus narrowly avoided killing his own son with the plowshare, if you recall before going to war. His own son he wouldn’t see again for half his life and the kingdom of Ithaca he gave up for the fight. Achilles has nothing really tying him back and as well, he was brought into the Iphigenia affair by her mom claiming marriage as a pretext to save her so he felt it more of his duty to intervene. I just don’t see it the same way. They’re two separate people with separate personalities.
>>25179350Except neither of them wanted to go to war. Odysseus tried to fake being mentally ill and Achilles tried to dress as a woman to avoid being drafted. Plus, Agamemnon had already decided to sacrifice Iphigenia. He was suffering because of it. Odysseus did not make any difference regarding his decission, he just added coal to the fire. And even though he has a family to protect, I still think that defending an innocent, young, and pure life even if it means losing yours is more heroic than snitching to the army that they have to sacrifice her so that they can quickly go to a war where thousands will die and hundreds of families will be destroyed with the only purpose of getting back a whore. To finish, I have to add that even if we agree Odysseus having a family changes his choices, choosing the best for them which also includes the destruction of hundreds of other's families is a selfish and villainous act.
>>25178878Achilles is definitely my favorite. He is just way too cool to not be. But I gotta say, Diomedes is a close second. I totally forgot about what or who the Illiad is supposed to be about for the first half of the book. His whacky adventures were way too fun.Hector and Aeneas can eat dirt for all I care.
>>25179209It's a Greek poem so of course the subject of the poem is Greeks
>>25178878Weren't they all simps?
>>25179488Ok u pedantic dickhead you get what i mean. why does it not open with>Sing, goddess, of the wrath of Diomedes, who stabbed 2 gods.
>>25179468That nigga is underrated
>>25178945I'm reading the Illiand and boy, Why is Diomedes so overpowered, the Gods are afraid of himhe's %100 stronger thannHector
>>25178878Ahhhhhhhh SAVE ME ODYSSEUS I DONT WANT TO LIE IN HADES AND DO NOTHING FOREVER AAHHHHHHI'D RATHER BE A SLAVE AND ALIVE THAN AN EPIC HERO IN HADES
>>25178878Very hard question. I might say Achilles, once you read the Iliad he's a much more complex character than he's depicted outside. He isn't vulnerable at all, if anything, he's hypersensitive - prone to anger, sad for the death of his friend, empathic towards the father of his enemy by the end. I was very touched by the part where he fights with the Xanthous river: it felt like some kind of modern frustrations, where you think that events have some personality of sort and put obstacles in your way specifically to stop you. When you're so blinded by emotions that even your surroundings feel charged with evil intent towards you. Through the poem he's constantly frustrated in trying to achieve what he wants. Even Hector running away from him three times around Troy is at the same time both ridiculous and surreal, it's like he's chasing an enemy in a dream. Then he kills him and the kill achieves nothing.Achilles is a very sad character. Nothing goes the way he wants. Everything he attempts results in something horrible, or comes off as ridiculous and exaggerate.
>>25180565*he isn't INvulnerable
>>25180459Achilles got pwned kek
If every man raised their sons to be like Hector instead of emotional autistic retards like Achilles the world would be a better place. Hector wasn't perfect but he was a great man
>>25179066>Achilles is a force of natureTrue. But please, men, find yourselves other heroes to imitate and relate to because I don't want to keep being forced into bisexual scenarios to accommodate you.Only some of you will understand this lol
>>25180597I blame the hand women keep forcing in Achilles' life against his consent.Somehow because Achilles' loves men, women feel they have a kinship and can self-insert into his story??? I dont know the reason really.If women want to make a female version of Achilles a la Skyros, which then prompted the creation of plays in which women would act in his role then they would do better choosing a hero that even wants association to females in the first place so that kind of shit stain doesn't linger around my life.Good fucking lord Im sick of women and their sexuality. Such bad feelings all around.Youd understand if you were being sexually harassed by men.
>>25178878Achilles is not meant to be an emulatable ideal hero. He is basically a god-king trapped in mortal form because Zeus subverted the succession prophecy.>>25178905>>25179245Bizarrely he's the only one who goes to Elysium according to Homer. Is this some sort of compensation for fucking up his marriage? Who knows.
