The Epic Poem and Poet
Singing our origin stories into truth
The Greece of the Trojan War was not unified; these were individual palatial states, all ruled by kings. But the War bound these states together into a unified force, a collection of Greek states bearing down on Troy and her local allies. Hundreds of years later, when Homer was composing, Greece was beginning to coalesce into one nation, politically rather than just militarily. Homer’s epic poem memorializes the war and the connectivity it inspired among the disparate Greek states, binding the new Greek societies together again in their shared stories.
The Poet
Homer may never have existed as a single figure. Instead, “Homer” could be the name collectively given to those in the long tradition of epic poetry. In Ancient Greece, these poets traveled from town to town, island to island, singing tales of the Greek civilization’s shared myths and histories. These tales were meant to be heard out loud rather than read, and were important for teaching the Greek people their shared history and ethos, and for instilling in them a sense of heroism. The versions that were written down shifted and changed with each new generation of poets, shaped over many years of recitation.
The Poem
As a genre, the epic poem has several components. It is generally the tale of a ruler or warrior who lived during a heroic era in the past. For the Iliad, the deeds sung about were thought to have taken place nearly 500 years before the poem’s recitation. The poems relate a journey, either physical or emotional, and catalogue the deeds of the warrior along the way. The poems were usually quite long; in its original form, the Iliad was over 15,000 lines. Our Poet in An Iliad, however, strips the poem to its most essential parts. He is more interested in the human struggle between two powerful men than in the vast array of deeds that make up the Trojan War.
When Homer was composing, the Greek written word had disappeared. Without a written alphabet to work with, then, how were these long poems memorized? The poems were composed in rigid meter, meaning that each line generally had the same number of beats in it and similar patterns of emphasis. This rhythm was helpful for the poets, just as you might remember a song more easily than a block of plain text. There was also liberal use of repetition and anchor phrases, which were memory and meter aids for the poets. Dawn is almost always “rosy-fingered” and Hector is “shining” or “man-killing.” In An Iliad, multiple deaths are described using precisely the same words, quoting directly from the poem:
Death cut him short. The end closed in around him. / Flying free of his limbs, / his soul went winging down to the house of death.
Beyond Greece
This method of singing a society its own tales, weaving a shared and heroic past, can be found all over the early world. In addition Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, some other epic poems include:
Rāmāyaṇa is considered the first poem in the Hindu tradition. The written record dates from at least the 11th century AD, though the poem itself likely dates much earlier. It tells of the travels of Lord Rama and his eventual ascension to the throne. Like the Iliad, it hinges on the abduction of Sita, Rama’s wife, and the war that results in an effort to rescue her. The poem was 24,000 verses long.
Beowulf is the oldest surviving poem of Old English. As with other epics, the earliest manuscript (circa approximately 1000 AD) is likely newer than the poem itself. The poem tells of the hero Beowulf’s mighty deeds in early Scandinavia, and does not distinguish between fantastical myth and true historical events.
The Book of Invasions, or the Lebor Gabála Érenn, is a collection of narratives collected over hundreds of years and compiled into a manuscript in the 11th century. The book presents a history of Ireland from the creation of the world through the Middle Ages, ending with the people meant to represent the Irish of the time. Its authors blend Christian and native Irish pagan myth to provide Ireland with its own epic history and origin story.
Each of these poems are navigating the boundaries of history and storytelling — what is fact, and what is fiction? By singing the names of the ships, recording great battles, or singing of mythic creatures, these poets are memorializing their origin stories, providing a shared bedrock upon which to build a society. Today, it could be argued that we do this on an individual level, digitally recording and curating our lives to tell ourselves the story we most want to reflect. By recording the details we want to remember in pixels and code, we are saying these things are real and worth preserving. On a grander scale, this is what the epic bards were doing for their societies: memorializing the details of a history and a culture in order to make them true.
Join us for An Iliad, onstage at Lantern Theater Company now through December 11. Visit our website for tickets and information.
