This is the first of twenty-four posts, one on each book of Homer’s Iliad in Chapman’s translation.
“Achilles banefull wrath” is to be resounded by the Goddess, whom the poet invokes.
Strife between Achilles and Agamemnon is the story of the Iliad. It begins with Apollo, who has plagued the Greek army.
Homer denies no human responsibility. Apollo has plagued the army, because Agamemnon insists on keeping a man’s daughter as his slave. The woman’s father is a priest of Apollo called Chryses; we shall come to know the daughter’s name only as Chryseis. She has been taken in a Greek raid on her home town, which will be called Chrysa. We shall hear more about the raid later in Book I, when Achilles tells the story to his mother.
Thus Homer’s narrative is not sequential. In a technique that will become standard in literature, we start in medias res.
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