Achilles in The Iliad and The Odyssey by Homer
Achilles was the Achaian army’s best warrior, honorable, strong, and proud. The Iliad is about the Trojan Conflict, but it is mostly about how Achilles’ rage and power affect the war. Achilles’ primary character is vital to the story because of his inactivity or retreat from the combat. He is a sophisticated warrior who occasionally disregards his society’s cultural standards because he recognizes some of its fallacies, particularly many of the flaws in the frequently restricted and conflicting heroic code.
Achilles has a strong feeling of public order, which is demonstrated in his worry for the chaos in the Achaian camp at first; a fatal illness is destroying the warriors, and Achilles wants to know why. Since his king, Agamemnon, refuses to act, Achilles takes action: he summons the entire army (Homer). Achilles breaks the order of procedure by performing this deed; only Agamemnon has the authority to convene an assembly, but Achilles does so in an attempt to restore order to the Achaian camp. He partially succeeds in discovering why hundreds of Achaian troops are being killed by the illness. However, when it is proven that Agamemnon is to blame for the terrible epidemic, Achilles causes chaos. As a result, Achilles’ attempt to restore order to the Achaian camp eventually fails to complete it. Apollo lifts the disease, yet even after Achilles and his warriors leave the Achaian army, there is still unrest among the Achaians.
The mother of Achilles, Thetis, to give the child invulnerability, immersed him in the waters of the Styx River. Achilles was taken by the heel, which, because of this, remained the only vulnerable spot on the body of Achilles. Having slain many enemies, Achilles, in the last battle, reached the Skeian gates of Ilion, but here an arrow shot from the bow of Paris and guided by the hand of Apollo himself hit him in the only weak spot – the heel, and the hero died. There is a version of the legend in which Achilles is killed directly by Apollo himself or by the arrow of Apollo, who took the form of Paris.
Work Cited
Homer. World Classics Library: Homer: The Iliad and The Odyssey (Arcturus World Classics Library Book 6). Combined, Arcturus, 2020.