Theme Of Hope In The Iliad

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Homeric Epic: The Iliad

Homer’s “Iliad” is an epic poem that relays some of the important episodes of the last weeks of the Trojan War and Greek siege imposed of the city of Troy. Composed near the conclusion of the eight century BCE, marginally preceding the “Odyssey”, the 15 000 lines “Iliad” is commonly seen as the earliest surviving European literary work. While attributed to him, the era in Greek history to which both the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” date from, render it impossible to know for sure that they should be attributed to a single individual, as very scarcely any written records survive due to writing having not yet extensively widespread. Moreover, we realize that these epics were the result of “oral composition” instead of being composed with the help …show more content…

And while not ready to let her go just yet, the narrator points out the role of hope and its importance in life, declaring that even dreams can feel real if one has hope. The first stanza concludes with the narrator bringing the theme of the poem to the forefront, stating that everything around humans simply the product of their imagination, dreams from which they cannot escape.

In the second stanza, the narrator is on the beach trying desperately to hold unto grains of sand, pleading with God to let him enjoy this moment and savor it a little bit more, but, to no avail. Through the use of metaphors and personification (sand=time/deep=ocean), building on the saying “time and tide wait for none” and “the roaring surfs” hitting the shore, the narrator reiterates his earlier statement, that man’s existence is merely a dream inside a compartmentalized dream, but in the form of a question as to entice the reader to reflect on his own life, existence and