read the illiad

...and reading this for a little while tonight. Maybe I can get to Chapter 3. At the very worst, I’ll fall asleep earlier than normal.

If I learn nothing further about the Iliad, I hope I can remember the very first sentence, which says that the whole story centers on the rage of Achilles.
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I had an experience of rage this morning. I was running behind (as usual), and upset because I could not find one folder that I needed for a meeting this afternoon, and I decided for some reason to look in my dining room.
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The only thing in my dining room this morning, besides a relatively inexpensive area rug on the floor and a small table with my sewing machine on it, was a collection of cardboard filing boxes filled with old (mostly financial) papers that I am supposed to be sorting through and purging. Most of the boxes (maybe 7 boxes) were lined up along the wall, sitting partly on the rug and partly on the wood floor along the wall. So this morning I discovered that one or both of the cats have been busy spraying all the boxes, and the edge of the carpet and the wood floor below are soaked and stained and smelly. It looks like it has been going on for longer than a few days.
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My immediate reaction was an incredible rage. I was so angry at both the cats and myself that I started screaming at the top of my lungs. There is no way to close off the dining room from the rest of the house, so I picked up the boxes and carted them upstairs to my “storage room”, where I spread a some plastic garbage bags out to set them on for now. Then I folded the filthy part of the rug up off the floor and attempted to clean the floor, and then I put newspapers under the stained part of the rug backing and left it and went off to my meetings, which lasted most of the day.
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The level of my rage scared the cats, I’m sure, and it scared me too. I like to think of myself as a mild-mannered person, and my dominant negative emotion is usually fear, although anger probably often lurks unrecognized beneath that fear. Thankfully, by the time I left the house I was feeling much calmer and more accepting about what has happened, and later this morning I talked with some friends about it. I still have a lot of work to do, but I’m thinking what happened may be for the best. It may be just the thing I needed to get me moving forward on my goal of getting rid of those old and probably mostly useless papers.
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I could have also put this entry under my “INNER CRITIC” goal, or my “purge files” goal, or my “when in doubt, throw it out” goal, or my “flylady routines” goal, or maybe my “be a crazy cat lady” goal. But hopefully, unlike Achilles, I can channel my initial rage into something useful and avoid future tragedy.

One thing worth defending, I suggest, is the imperative to imagine the lives of beings who are not ourselves and are not like ourselves: animals, plants, gods, spirits, people of other countries and other races, people of the other sex, places—and enemies. To mention only the earliest instance, the most attractive hero of the Iliad is not Greek but Trojan: Hector, a good man, a good family man, a good friend. It is over the body of Hector that Greek anger finally gives way to compassion.

Who hasn’t? I just need to sit down and read the whole thing at some point.

...and into Book 2. Then I got stuck on all the paragraphs of names of the different warriors and kings and their homes.

It reminded me of trying to read the Bible straight through in my childhood, and getting stuck on the “begats.”

I could have skipped over it, or quickly skimmed through it, but I decided instead to do a little research on ancient Greek history and geography.

I’m in no hurry.

I’ve been procrastinating, but I have an opportunity to get started today. I want remember to take this with me so that I have something to read while waiting for my friend to see her doctor.

ADDENDUM: I did study the first two pages of the introduction, which give a brief outline of the characters and what’s going on, while waiting in the doctor’s office. And I read the first few pages of Book 1. And then I got distracted by a Sudoku puzzle. Oh well, at least I made a start. Babysteps are good. :)

...the book out of the library today. It’s a translation by Robert Fagles. Looks like there are about a half dozen copies on the shelf, so even if it takes longer than 6 weeks, I’ll be able to read it.

I’m going to start with the Introduction by Bernard Knox.

I think it’s something that I should know.

It’s a good novel. I mean, much like shakespeare, there are just some elements that don’t translate to modern entertainment. But for it’s own era, good times.

Although perhaps the most violent book I have ever read, it was a good story centering on themes such as courage, honor, and doing the right thing no matter what the consequences.