the iliad study guide

Lorem Ipsum Dolor Spring 2012

Directed by Steve Wilson Featuring the young women of A Red Orchid Theatre’s Youth Ensemble

To whatever questions you might have that take a form something like, "Why on earth are you doing this play, this way, today?" all I can say is this -- It's not about men and women: it's about masculinity and femininity operating within both men and women. It's not about adults and children: it's about maturity and immaturity operating within both children and adults. And it is, like most of my work, concerned with the ways in which we find ourselves, sometimes partially, sometimes completely, trapped inside feelings, proclivities, waves of history, and (possibly) divinely-willed movements from which we have little or no power to extricate ourselves. Like characters in a play, we are all to some extent bugs in slowly crystallizing amber, trying to find our small muscles of freedom and move ourselves into a poetic position before it's finally too late.

---from playwright Craig Wright

The Iliad The Events of the Trojan War The Story of The Iliad The Players

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The Muse & Women The Homeric Muse Facts about The Iliad Women in Greek Theatre The World of the War

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Questions & Activities Ideas and Themes to think about before and after the show Activities for the Classroom

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A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010 Study Guide created by Kelli Marino


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It is the tenth year of the Trojan War. The Greek priest, Chryses asks for the release of his daughter from Agamemnon, who has kept her captive. Agamemnon refuses, leaving Chryses to pray to the god Apollo to bring a plague upon the Achaeans. After several days, the Achaeans have had enough of the plague and demand that Agamemnon return the girl, which he does. In return for the girl, though, Agamemnon requires that Achilles, his greatest warrior, give up his female captive Briseis. Achilles refuses this request and vows not to fight anymore until Agamemnon realizes how much he and his army need Achilles.

Praying to his mother, goddess Thetis, Achilles asks for the defeat of the Achaeans in the next battle. The gods agree to this prayer and soon the Trojans begin winning. After several days, the Trojans have pinned the Achaeans to the beach, threatening to set fire to their ships.

Patroclus, the best friend of Achilles, wants to help in the battle, so he asks to borrow Achilles’ armor, which he agrees. As he enters battle, the Trojans believe

Patroclus to be Achilles (because of the armor), and Hector, the Trojan’s greatest warrior, kills Patroclus, and proceeds to take the armor from his body.

Learning of his best friend’s death, Achilles is grief stricken and vows revenge against the Trojans. He asks Thetis for new armor, built by Hephaestus. Achilles enters into battle and kills many Trojans, including Hector (after a grueling duel). Still angry and bitter, Achilles abuses Hector’s body for days, even though Patroclus has been granted a proper funeral.

The gods ask Achilles to give up the body, but it is not until King Priam, Hector’s father, comes to Achilles and begs for his son’s body, does Achilles end his brutality toward Hector’s body.

Achilles declares a grace period to allow for funeral rites to be given to Hector. The poem ends with Hector’s funeral, and the foreshadowing of Achilles’ death and the capture of the city of Troy.

The Story of The Iliad The Epic poem originally written by Homer

The Events of the Trojan War

• A mortal, Peleus, and the sea-goddess Thetis are married.

• The fight for the Golden Apple for the fairest goddess results in Paris (the most handsome man) to judge a beauty contest between Hera, Aphrodite, and Athena. Athena offers wisdom and skill in battle, Hera offers King-dom, and Aphrodite offers Helen, the most beautiful woman on earth. Paris chooses Helen and abducts her from Menelaus.

• Menelaus and other suitors of Helen’s set sail to get her back, launching 1000 ships.

• Menelaus and Odysseus beg King Priam, Paris’s father, to return Helen, which he refuses.

• The Trojan War begins and ensues for 10 years. (Homer’s The Iliad depicts the final year.)

• Odysseus plans to take over Troy through fooling the Trojans into thinking that the Greeks have given up. They bring the wooden Trojan Horse as a peace offering, hide inside, and when the gates open, destroy Troy. (Homer’s The Odyssey follows this event).

A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010 A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010 Study Guide created by Kelli Marino


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The Players The Trojans. The Greeks. The Gods.

The Trojans

Priam: King of Troy. Hecuba: Wife of Priam and queen of Troy. Hector: Bravest and most accomplished of the Trojan warriors; son of Priam. Achilles slays him. Scamandrius: Son of Hector and Andromache. Paris: Trojan who took Helen From Menelaus. Pandarus: Trojan archer.

The Greeks (Achaeans)

Achilles: The greatest warrior in the world. Achilles is the son of Peleus, the former king of the Myrmidons, and a sea nymph named Thetis. Agamemnon: Commander-in-chief of the Greek armies and son of Atreus, the king of Mycenae. Menelaus: King of Sparta and brother of Agamemnon. Declares war on Troy. Helen: Wife of Menelaus, lover of Paris, and the most beautiful woman in the world. Odysseus: King of Ithaca and brilliant strategist. Ajax: Warrior who is second to Achilles in battlefield prowess. Patroclus: Greek warrior and beloved companion of Achilles. Calchas: Greek soothsayer who advises Agamemnon. Nestor: Wise old king who advises Agamemnon. Briseis: Beautiful captive of Achilles. Chryseis: Female captive of Agamemnon.

A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010 A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010 Study Guide created by Kelli Marino

The Gods

Zeus: King of the gods; prefers to remain neutral in the war but intervenes after a plea for help. Hera: Queen of the gods; favors the Greeks. Athena: Goddess of wisdom & war; favors the Greeks. Hephaestus: God of the forge; favors the Greeks. Aphrodite: Goddess of love & beauty; sides with the Trojans. Apollo: Highly revered & feared sun god; sides with the Trojans.

Ativity: What's Yours is Mine

Learning Objective: To recognize how easily we deceive ourselves and others when it comes to ownership.

In The Iliad you will discover how important people are as possessions. In our lives how easy is it to assume that what's yours is mine?

Ask students to secretly choose a personal item on their person or in the room (cellphone, watch, backpack, hairband etc.) and hide the item behind their back. On the teacher's signal, everyone deposits their item in the circle with their backs turned so as not to see who is putting in what. Ask students to choose an item which could be theirs but is not OR to actually choose their original personal item. Going around the circle each student shares the story and/or circumstances of how they came into possessing this item (the who, what, where, when, how). If student has something that is not theirs their goal is to make it appear as if it is. Listening to each story of under a minute, the class gets to vote on whether student is lying or telling the truth. Tellers then reveal the truth.


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A Red Orchid Theatre Fall 2010

Interesting Facts

The Iliad derives the first two syllables of its name from Ilios or Ilion (Greek for Troy) or, alternately, from Ilium (Latin for Troy). The suffix -ad means related to, concerning, having to do with, or associated with. Thus, Iliad means a story concerning Troy. It has also been known as the Song of Ilium. The walled city of Troy and the surrounding plains in northwestern Anatolia, a region that is part of modern-day Turkey. Anatolia is west of Greece (across the Aegean Sea) and north of Egypt (across the Mediterranean Sea).

One of Homer’s legacies as a writer is the epithet, a combination of a descriptive phrase and a noun. It identifies a person or thing by highlighting a prominent characteristic. Examples: fleet-footed Achilles, rosy-fingered dawn, wine-dark sea, earth-shaking Poseidon, and gray-eyed Athena. The Homeric epithet is an ancient relative of such later epithets as Richard the Lion-Hearted, Ivan the Terrible, and America the Beautiful.

The Homeric Muse The Homeric Muse is multi-faceted. The Muse is a character within the story, the storyteller, and the poet, Homer, himself. And yet, at the essence, the Muse is the narrator, the one character of the story who “has access to the consciousness of the characters, but also visually witnesses the evens recounted.”

Homer’s voice can be found within the passages directly addressing the Muse, also implying that Homer himself is the Muse-narrator, and thus calling attention to the self-consciousness of the poet. In The Iliad, the Muse is not so much an inspiration, but a source of information for those listening to the story and for some within it.

Hainsworth. The Iliad: A Commentary, vol. 3 Books 9-12. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1993. Rabel, Robert J. "Plot and Point of View in the Iliad." The University of Michigan Press. 1997.

Activity: Fate or Free Will


Learning Objective: To develop a personal opinion on whether fate or free will dominates one's life. Throughout The Iliad, the characters negotiate their conflicts based on their free will, but often it seems that the gods predetermine their destiny. Is your life the result of your own choices or determined by others?

Using the chart below, list as many major events of significance in your life as possible (anything goes: surprise birthdays, fights with friends, major accidents, family vacations etc.) mark whether you feel the event was fate or free will and why.

Life Event Fate or Free Will Why?


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Mycenae (Greece) is located on the left side of the map. This was home to the King Agamemnon, Achilles, Odysseus (Ithaca), and Menelaus (Sparta).

Across the Aegean Sea is the city of Troy, home to Paris, Priam, and Hector.

It is between the Greek colonies and Troy that the action of The Iliad takes place.

The World


For women in ancient Greece, the public was not often the place to be seen. It was thought that a woman should be silent and self-controlled, and serve her husband and family.

In Greek theatre, and through later theatrical periods as well, women were not allowed on the stage. The majority of plays were written and performed by men (even the female roles). It is also possible that women were not allowed in the audiences during any performances. Particular theatre festivals honoring the God Dionysus were multi-day events (usually many per year) where contests and events brought many men to watch the new plays; women were excluded from these festivals.

In plays, some of Greece’s writers created strong female characters who showed what it meant to be a female, attached to a man, and to have that man not be present in their lives. Sophocles’ Medea and Aeschylus’ Oresteia are prime examples of female representation on stage where the man is not present. Both women become vengeful, spiteful, aggressive, and assertive. The women take control of their lives (or lose control though madness), murder their loved ones, and cause havoc on the rest of the town.

Women in Greek Drama Silent. Strong.

Most of Greece’s female characters do not have this disposition and are created as strong yet obedient women, serving their community and obeying the rules of the classes. Yet, when faced with morality and honor, many of the women begin to speak with the pride and passion of Sophocles’ Antigone.

The philosopher Socrates was one of the few men in ancient Greece to celebrate the female. He did not want to see them personified as slaves or inferiors.

A Dictionary of the Drama. W. Davenport Adams. Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1904. http://www.fjkluth.com/gdrama.html

It would be many years until women were allowed onstage. In 1629, a group of French actors travelled to England to perform at the Blackfriars; this was the first recorded performance of females alongside men onstage. Although they were breaking ground, the women were booed. England did not easily transition into the idea that women could perform in public, and so they continued to have men play the women’s parts until around 1660.




Questions & Activities 1. What are the roles of the women in this production? How do they affect the story and the action? Does the

fact that they do not have a voice change the way you view the men’s actions and the purpose of the war? 2. How does seeing an all female production of The Iliad, where girls are playing all male roles, change the

way the story is told? What perspectives might come through? 3. What did the Greeks and Trojans value in their society? Can those be seen in this story? 4. What do you think about the theme of revenge in the play? How is it used? To what avail does it play out? 5. What devices did this production use to tell the story and bring it to life? 6. Was Achilles really a good friend to Patroclus? Was Patroclus really a good friend to Achilles? 7. How does jealousy play a role in the lives of the characters and the war? Was Patroclus jealous of

Achilles? Was Agamemnon jealous of Achilles? Was Achilles jealous of Agamemnon? 8. Why do people declare war, and then why do others fight in the war, even if it is not their personal fight?


Presented before live audiences, Greek performances and rituals incorporated percussion into its ceremonies and performances to emphasize key moments in storytelling. There are many themes in The Iliad including Honor, Pride, Love, Fear, Family and Loyalty. Another theme is Rage; rage causes Achilles to act as he does; it is present in times of war. In the beginning of our play, we use percussion in tandem with the feeling of Rage to launch our story into action.

Lead a discussion on the word Rage. What does it mean to the students? What is the difference between Anger and Rage? What are some circumstances that cause Rage? What happens to our bodies and minds when we are full of rage? Start the activity! Have students build their own percussion by clapping hands, pounding desktops or stomping feet.

Here is a step by step on creating your own percussion moment: Step 1: Select a leader from the class to conduct the group. It is important the group gives full focus to the leader. Step 2: The leader begins a very simple and steady beat. Step 3: The leader points to others in the class one at a time to join in the rhythm. The students join in by adding their own individual beat that blends with the established beats. Step 4: Once all the students have joined, then the leader can use hand motions to conduct the room. Make the sounds louder or softer, faster and slower, and so on. Step 5: Have your leader cue the group to speak the unison word “Rage”. The leader can conduct the percussion to a climax then clap 3 times which is the groups cue to speak the word.

Lead a discussion on what that felt like for the students. Were they able to use the action of creating percussion to support a feeling of Rage? Did they feel a sense of community through creating this rhythm? Try it again, choosing new conductors and using different themes/words. Encourage the students to choose their percussion beats and rhythms to best suit the theme.

Activity: Percussion and the Sound of War

Learning Objective: To empower student identity through the creation of personal epithets. Earlier in the study guide, you were introduced to the concept of Homer's epithet - a descriptive phrase often helping to characterize a person's name. Try creating your own epithet by filling in the blanks with this formula:

Your First Name:______________________ son/daughter of______________________ player of______________________________ collector of__________________________ friend of______________________________ owner of ____________________________

Activity: Epithet, King of Descriptive Nicknames

Did you enjoy your classroom drama experience with A Red Orchid? Did you find yourself watching the show and wishing you were in it? Theatrical and educational opportunities at A Red Orchid are always growing.

If you would like to find out more and want to join our mailing list, e-mail us at [email protected]

the iliad study guide

Documents

achilles armor

achilles abuses hectors

best friend of achilles

iliad women

muse women

agamemnon refuses

trojans greatest warrior

young women