I love the theory that Patroclus was a homeric invention regardless of whether is true or not.

Mostly because I imagine Homer saying:

"This is my OC Patroclus. He's an exiled prince and everyone loves him. He's so strong he killed a son of Zeus and also has 9 dogs. He's Achilles' boyfriend and best friend too btw uwu"

You will never be lovelier than you are right now.

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"Any moment might be our last. Everything is more beautiful because we're doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again."

- Homer , The Iliad @silentroad

The Parnassus, Raffaello Sanzio, 1509-11

Any moment might be our last. Everything is more beautiful because we're doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again.

Homer, The Iliad

[Of course, these are not Homer's words but those of David Benioff, now perhaps more famous for being the creator and show-runner of Game of Thrones]

The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer.

“And empty words are evil.”

Homer, The Odyssey

january, goodbye

that moly snowdrop to serve as a cure a flower tonic for a poison sullen and toxic

white petals signify a nascent Spring send forth a clarion call, for those dove wings to fall

february may it soon conjure relief from these dreary gray, listless, blank days

i’m sure people smarter than me have said this, but the odyssey is the sequel to the monomyth actually. in the hero’s journey the hero departs from home, from innocence, from safety, to fulfil his destiny. in homer’s the odyssey, the war is over, the destiny fulfilled. next comes the real fight, the unwinnable fight—to return to everything you left home to fight for.

in the first half of the poem, while odysseus fights tooth and nail to return home, his home fights with its last breath to give odysseus a home to return to. and time is running out. his wife penelope is down to her last desperate excuse. suitors have invaded his home, eating through his household and his wealth. his son, telemachus, almost grown, leaves home for the first time to find out if odysseus is still alive, if there is still a reason to keep fighting. having lost everything he had, over and over, odysseus is finally allowed to arrive in his homeland. at first he doesn’t recognise it. and he is cursed to look old and decrepit, so that none of his loved ones would recognise him.

for the second half of the poem, he has returned and miraculously, he has not been displaced or forgotten. but now he has to reclaim what was his. and removing the rot, restoring this place to the home odysseus remembers, is long and painful. instead of walking through the front door, he must sneak in through the back or risk being thrown out. not a single person knows him by sight; odysseus must prove his identity over and over, to every member of his household. he must retell story after story, share secret after secret, reveal every marking or scar upon his body, to finally be recognised by his own family. and then he destroys every last trace of the intruders—kills the men, kills the servants, wipes the slate clean.

by athena’s magic, he is restored to his former youth and glory as he reunites with his wife. the families of the slain suitors try to seek revenge, but zeus, lord of the skies, intervenes. odysseus, filled with his god-given strength, is home, and ready to fight to protect it.

it’s a complete sequel to the heroes journey, but what makes it part of the monomyth is the horrible truth about odysseus’ tale: that it’s impossible. that you will leave, and your home will change in your absence, and someone might fill your place; your family won’t recognise you, your wife met someone else, intruders have destroyed your home, and you will never be as young as you were. you will return and you will fight with every ounce of your strength and it won’t be enough to turn back the clock. it’s the terrible last chapter to every hero’s story that we don’t like to talk about.

and yet, of course, it’s the same story we tell over and over: we’ve won the war, now all we want is to return home, but home is no longer somewhere we can reach.

When Homer said, “We men are wretched things”

And when Khaled Hosseini said, “A man's heart is a wretched, wretched thing. It isn't like a mother's womb. It won't bleed. It won't stretch to make room for you.”

Iliad Book 1

I feel weird saying one of my favorite authors is Homer.

“Let me not then die ingloriously and without a struggle, but let me first do some great thing that shall be told among men hereafter.”

― Homer, The Iliad

"Any moment might be our last. Everything is more beautiful because we're doomed. You will never be lovelier than you are now. We will never be here again."

-Homer, The Iliad

People who've read my retelling of the Iliad , Silvertongue, what were the parts you liked best about it ?

And for those who do not know, hi - I wrote a retelling of the Iliad a few months back, from the POV of Odysseus, and named it Silvertongue. Check it out, pls

Link : https://archiveofourown.org/works/51546121/chapters/130278073