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/lit/ - Literature

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6557570 No.6557570 [Reply] [Original]

How important is prerequisite knowledge to the understanding of the Iliad? I know some things (the seer prophecy and the snake, the myth and reality of Troy, some relationships between characters) and just want to start reading it already.

>> No.6557576

>>6557570
Just wiki any gods you're unfamiliar with and you'll be fine.

>> No.6557582

>>6557576
This.

>> No.6557734

Understand that it's about the kind of people that you already know.

It concerns their ironies, and the consistent elements of character which derive from it.

>> No.6557759

get a basic knowledge of the gods and the bronze/dark age greeks
read a summary of what happened before the plot of the iliad (judgment of paris etc.)

>> No.6557761

Start with the egyptians.

>> No.6558385

>>6557570
For understanding? Just read it not as a mere poetic presentation of already held Greek beliefs, but the attempt by Homer to show the Greeks how to live. For understanding, however, it's necessary to trace the divergences throughout the text, and all manner of conflicts and tensions, often between someone's speech and deed.

>> No.6558422

>>6557734
This. The characters are very recognizable human personalities.

>> No.6558433

I think the only important part, lore-wise, is that Aphrodite, Athena, and Hera came down to Paris and ask him to decide which one had the most rockin' bod. Paris couldn't decide, so Aphrodite told him that if he chose her she'd make the most beautiful woman in Greece fall in love with him, and so he took Helen away and started the whole war off.