W03502683
HP 1020-05
10/3/08
When reading the Iliad a lot of people consider Achilles to be a selfish character and don’t really care for him or his actions throughout the novel. They might say he is not loyal to his country or doesn’t care about his country and only thinks about himself and his glory. I think the readers tend to judge Achilles too quickly and don’t recognize everything that he has to go through. Achilles is more of a sympathetic character and he proves that a couple times throughout the story and the war. The first time when readers tend to judge Achilles is when he refuses to fight in the war. He does this because Agamemnon betrayed him. A main reason for fighting in those times was that the warrior would get the spoils of the war. So Achilles decides to take Briseis as his war prize. Then Agamemnon who is supposed to be the leader of their army takes this war prize away from Achilles and in turn takes Achilles from the war and from his army. “Since Phoebus Apollo is taking Chryseis from me, I shall send her with my ship and my followers, but I shall come to your tent and take your own prize Briseis, that you may learn how much stronger I am than you are, and that another may fear to set himself up as equal or comparable with me” (Homer 1.183-1.188). This move causes a lot of Achilles and Agamemnon’s countrymen to die. So even though it is Achilles who is directly causing these deaths by not fighting, it is actually Agamemnon who is practically killing his own men by taking Achilles away from the battlefield. There is a possibility that Achilles overacts to Agamemnon’s actions, but I think that Achilles has every reason to not fight in this war. Why should he risk his life for Agamemnon if he is just going to betray him? Agamemnon is the leader of the army and is supposed to be representing his country and I don’t think he does a very good job of that. He does not act the way a leader should. Also, since Achilles is such a great...