• In Iliad, the first line tells us that it is the story of the wrath of Achilles.
  
• Agamemnon had to give up Chryseis, his war slave, and so he demanded recompense and took Achilles' war slave, Bryseis.
• Achilles is certainly mad about that: his honor has been insulted, and he lost his war slave: he withdraws from the war and asks his mother to help: she gets Zeus to agree to deal setbacks to the Greeks.
• Then, when Patroklos is killed, Achilles grows even more wrathful, this time it is wrath and grief for his best friend and is aimed at Hektor and the Trojans: he requires vengeance. He kills Hektor and the abuses his body until Hektor's father, Priam, comes and begs for his son's body.
  
• Typically, those two sorts of wrath (honor grudge + rage for vengeance) and how they play out are 'the wrath of Achilles'
• they are the events talked of in Iliad I, 1-17, which sent the souls of so many to Hades.
  
• But, as we have seen, the Iliad also happens in a wider context, a larger war, and even larger than that, a larger geo-political situation. Achilles and his wrath are not why Troy fell.
  
• The Epic Cycle contains the prequels and the returns of the heroes from the war, and the larger situation.
• It tells the story in a chronological way and moves at a rather fast clip (shorter poems move thru larger swathes of history/mythology).
• So we have one long highly wrought epic about the wrath of Achilles
  
• But it forms a very small part of a much larger war.
• We have no sources about how these epics came to be other than Iliad and Odyssey themselves and perhaps the epic cycle, both written down later and surviving only in fragments and summaries.
  
• So a good question is, where is the story of the whole Trojan War, and how did it come to be that we have an epic about only one small part of it?

How do we figure out an answer?
First, we must admit that the whole thing must be based on speculation, but not blind speculation. We can marshal facts from the epics

• One way to tell the story of how the Iliad came to be is as follows.
• Assume that the larger war story arose out of some oral culture process of story telling, perhaps in many different forms, different songs, hearthside tales, things you tell your children, etc., but identifiably about the same war. Or maybe, just maybe, there was one epic dactylic hexameter version of story that told about the whole war in chronological order.
• In any case, this war story was available for most Greeks: they knew it from different tellings and could tell you this story.
  
• Then, along came the idea of making a poem about Achilles and his meteoric wrathful path.
• Who had that idea and why is a matter for different speculation, but it's obvious that somewhere it arose.
  
• How to tell that story?
• You could tell it in chronological order as part of the larger story.
• Or you could use it to turn the 'war story' inside out: tell the wrath story with the whole Trojan war story artfully woven into it.
  
• That is what Mabel Lang and others believe happened.
• That is laid out in her 'War Story into Wrath Story,' chapter 10 of The Ages of Homer, edd. Morris and Carter, 1995.
• the primary method of argument is to find tensions in the story (places where it seems the poem is not so well put together) as well as many things that have parallels elsewhere (heroes, duels, gods, events, speeches, etc.)
• none of it is proof: it is an attempt to explain why we have our Iliad and not an epic telling of the whole war.
  

• War Story: Lang thinks this existed before Iliad, was in dactylic hexameters, and bits of it can be found in ourIliad.
• Here are some of the facts Lang marshals:
  
• First, Note that Agamemnon and Menelaus are different from the other Achaian leaders:
• Agamemnon and Menelaus' backstory, the lore of their ancestors, is not at all pan-Hellenic: it involves a foreigner, Pelops, who founds the family in Greece, and his descendants, such as Thyestes and Atreus, who commit domestic atrocities within their own house
  
• Without Agamemnon and Menelaus, the Trojan War would not have taken place: they are central to it but not to stories outside their own family
• Their whole family's only pan-hellenic endeavor is the Trojan war.
  
• The other heroes, however, are sons or grandsons of other heroes who took part in pan-Hellenic endeavors that involved central and Northern Greeks more than Mycenaean/Peloponnesians (the Voyage of Argo, the Kalydonian Boar Hunt, the Battle of the Lapiths and the Centaurs, the Seven against Thebes, Herakles' adventures [including sacking Troy!])
• Thus Lang thinks that the Trojan War story arose in the Peloponnese around the towns that claim Menelaus and Agamemnon as theirs,
  
• They subsequently adopted the rest of the heroes into the Trojan War story: the southern Greek/Peloponnesian Mycenaeans likely adopted those central and northern Greek heroes as part of their rise to power over central and northern Greece in pre-historic times (that's what conquerors often do, they co-opt stories and culture of those they conquer)
• But also...
  
• The launching of the Greek expedition against Troy is covered in Iliad by references to it, perhaps most particularly the catalog of ships, which she argues predates the Iliad:
• If the same people who worked on and formulated the story of the wrath of Achilles also worked on the catalog of ships, it would reflect the forces reported elsewhere in the Iliad rather well. It does not.
  
• Also, it makes little sense for a poet working on the wrath story to stick a catalog like the catalog we have where it is in book 2:
  
• at that point, they were army units, not ships
• the temporal place of the catalog was back near the beginning of the war story, when the fleet was gathered and launched from Aulis
• but more than that, it is obviously not made to match the forces described elsewhere in Iliad
• It's not so much that it is inconsistent with the rest, but that it does not reflect the structure of the army as we see it in Iliad well.
• It makes better sense if the poets are reusing a familiar episode from the larger war story song in this Achilles' wrath story song
• Also, the catalog starts with a re-invocation of the muses: while that is not unimaginable midstream, still, starting it that way makes the catalog stick out like a beginning, not something told midstream.
  
• Large parts of Iliad, particularly many of the large battle scenes, are more suited to a generic telling of the war story than a telling of Achilles' wrath.
• books 1-17 are where Zeus has supposedly let the Trojans get the upper hand in agreement with the deal he made with Thetis to honor Achilles
  
• But the Trojans are very clearly the underdogs in books 3-17
  
• Many more Trojans die than Greeks: 52 Acheans and 162 Trojans.
• There is also much more and more effective divine intervention on behalf of the Greeks than the Trojans: this is not really a good fit with Zeus letting the Trojans have the upper hand.
  
• The sack of Troy is also frequently prophesied in the epic: the narrator knows that it will happen and says so, perhaps most explicitly at 15.69-71.
• Achilles' death is also prophesied many times, but is not part of Iliad.
  
• Lang's idea is that these elements are taken from a broader war story version(s) and inserted into the tapestry of Achilles' wrath story, i.e. the plot of our Iliad.
  
• Lang's next step:
  
• Iliad seems to require knowledge of the War Story and so to presuppose it:
  
• The city Troy is not even named in Book 1: it is "Priam's city"
• Except for Kalchas and Nestor, the characters have no introduction, no initial description that lets us know who they are
• thus this story fits best within a tradition that has a larger story that makes these things clear: it is parasitical upon that other story
•  it might explain how a war story epic could co-exist with and 'back up' a wrath story epic until the wrath story prevailed and telling the more simple chronological war story fell out of favor
  
• Achilles' wrath story
• Reflect on Achilles, the best of the Achaians. Apparently he can fight so well that no one can beat him.
  
• It seems that the reason the Greeks haven't won in 9 years of war is that Achilles was off raiding to supply the army?
• He is in the Catalog of ships, so there was an Achilles already in the story: he's not completely an ad hoc invention
• given that he has no fighting role in the non-wrath elements, Lang thinks he had a tiny role in the larger war story
• another problematic argument: of course he has no role in the non-wrath elements: he pulled out of the fighting: it's not as if the poets would have left him in there anywhere even though he had pulled out of the fighting
• remember, Lang is speculating, and she knows it: I am not trying to fully undermine her story: I am trying to point out that we should keep our critical eyes open about it
  
• Lang does not say it directly, but she seems to say he was absent from the epic cycle (she does say he is not in the Aethiopis)
  
• which is a better argument that Achilles' wrath and his fighting prowess is the ad hoc innovation of Iliad.

• "It must have been the effort to bring Achilles' wrath story into the Trojan War chronicle that resulted first in experimentation, then in the discovery of the tail-wagging-the-dog phenomenon, and finally in the inspiration to turn the whole thing inside out and enclose the Trojan War in the wrath story, with the Ur-Iliad as the result." P.150
• That needs some unpacking

• The challenge for the wrath-story-telling bards was to incorporate material from the larger war story that had the Achaeans winning the war into the wrath story which required a huge setback for the Achaeans.
• Lang's thesis is that reverberations and echoes and reflections are the mechanisms by which that is done, and that the neatness of the arrangement is as good an argument for that being how the poets shaped the poem ias any argument.
  
• Book 2
  
• Note that the war story arises from a cause (Helen) of war between two peoples
• The wrath story also arises from a cause (Briseis) of war between two individuals
• In the war story, Zeus assures Greeks' success after 10 years (2.319-25)
• In the wrath story, Zeus assures the Greeks' setback after Thetis' visit to him
  
• Note that Agamemnon's dream (2.55ff) that the Greeks will now be victorious is reflected in the war story as true: it is confirmed by Agamemnon's claim (2.111) that Zeus had promised him victory earlier, Kalchas' prophesy at the start of the war (2.236ff) and Nestor's memory of lightning at the launching of the ships from Aulis as a sign of Zeus' favor (2.350)
• this is all from the temporal beginning of the war story
• the dream was true, but it is acted on as false, which is required for the wrath story
• In the war story, there is no particular need to restart the fighting
  
• In the wrath story, after the dream, Agamemnon 'tests' the army and suggests going home, which makes way for the fighting to need to be restarted
• The Thersites episode is useful for the wrath story to give Odysseus a reason to retell the story of the launching of the ships at Aulis, which then launches the catalog of ships.
• In all, book 2 of the wrath story is full of good ways to retell the beginning of the war story
  
• Books 3-7 got to hear in Tuesday Lecture
  
• "while the wrath story acts as a vehicle to frame and intensify the war story, it is itself framed by the war story. This frame-within-a frame emphasizes the two stories' interconnections." P. 152
  
• The war story begins with Paris taking Helen from Menelaus
• The wrath story restarts the fighting with Paris dueling Menelaus
• why did this not occur in the first days of the war, not in the 9th year? Because it works nicely for the wrath story: it needs a way to restart the fighting at that point, and its hypothesized principle is to incorporate parts of the war story.
  
• The war story gives Aphrodite the role of awarding Helen to Paris.
• The wrath story has Aphrodite bring Helen and Paris together behind Trojan walls, thus recalling the overall war story roles
• An parallel/resonance of war story to wrath story:
• the duel of Paris and Menelaus is a mirror image of the Achilles-Agamemnon argument of book 1: one replays the cause of the overall war, the other relates the cause of the wrath, the taking of Briseis: Aphrodite's removal of Paris from the battlefield is mirrored by Athena holding Achilles back from attacking Agamemnon:
• these are parallels, but are they enough to make Lang's thesis attractive?
  
• The Teichoskopia, where Helen tells Priam about the Greek war heroes from the walls of Troy: it seems likely to have been a war story episode (does Priam really need to be told all this in the 9th year of the war?), but it is mighty convenient at the start of the wrath story to set the scene
• In book 4, after the duel, the wrath story needs to restart the fighting and so Pandaros is made to shoot
• That echoes the Trojan guilt (that is, Paris) for starting the fighting in the war story: both guilts ensure Trojan defeat and justify the fall of Troy
  
• Kind of a side-observation: Parallels between the substitution of Paris (archer) with Pandaros (archer) and the substitution of Achilles with Patroklos include:
• Both are substitutes, and made appropriate ones: both Paris and Pandaros are bowmen, and Patroklos is Achilles' alter ego and wears his armor
  
• both are cpds: to get the fighting going again and to push back the Trojans, respectively
• Both are urged to act: by 'Laodokos' (Athena) and Nestor, respectively
• Both fight an important enemy: Diomedes and Sarpedon, respectively
• Both are killed only with the help of a god: Athena and Apollo
• Lang wants to suggest that Pandaros was a necessary substitute for the war story (Paris had to survive, otherwise Helen would have no husband in Troy, and so a substitute was needed), while Patroklos was necessary for the wrath story (Achilles had to get back into battle without losing face).
• In book 4, Agamemnon urges on/bullies the Greek leaders out of fear that Menelaus might die
• Odysseus tells him to stop his silliness
• Sthenelos reminds him of Sthenelus' record of the past
• Diomedes makes excuses for him
• These reactions show how different heroes might have defused the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon in book I
• and so war story and wrath story complement each other (says Lang: how so? I ask) and offer commentary on Achilles and Agamemnon's handling of the quarrel
• in books 5-7, the poets are free to bring in war story material, because Achilles is absent
• these books serve as a buildup via prefiguration and magnification for Achilles' return
• Diomedes as prefiguration and foil for Achilles
  
• Lang thinks he was a major part of the war story that was brought into the wrath story as a foil for Achilles, to prefigure and magnify Achilles
• Diomedes is the main all-purpose hero while Achilles is out of action:
  
• uniquely, he has strong prior battle experience and is in the prime of his fighting life
  
• he had fought against Thebes as one of the Epigoni (offspring of the 7 against Thebes who had all been killed: the epigoni vowed to avenge their fathers' deaths) and so has a warrior backstory, unlike most of the heroes at Troy
  
• Nestor also has prior battle experience too, but he is explicitly called 'old'
  
• Diomedes is the only one who fights with gods, and wounds them!
• Diomedes is the most like Achilles and yet does not associate with Achilles
  
• both not only pray to Athena and talk with her (others only pray to her)
• others are generically helped by her, but for Achilles and Diomedes she personally gets involved: 'fairy godmother style'
• Athena buffs up both of them
• and advises them
• and both warriors are confident of her extensive help (see p. 154 col 1 bottom and col 2 top)
• both are contemptuous of Agamemnon
• both fight Aineas, the second best Trojan
• both of these fights are 'dress-rehearsals' for later fighting Hektor
• both fights have the same major elements:
• they involve great yelling, throwing of huge stones with superhuman strength, and Aeneas being rescued by a god
• both try to take action against Hektor (only Ajax does so aside from these two): Diomedes' encounter with Hektor book 11.338ff. foreshadows Achilles' encounter (20.419f.)
• cf. in particular the wording of 20.425-7 and 11.347-8
• they both make the same speech:
• 11.362-367 and 20.449-454: Achilles succeeds where Diomedes does not
• when Achilles comes back on the scene, we hear just about nothing more of Diomedes.
• Patroklos is more an alter ego of Achilles than a foil for him
  
• he dresses up as Achilles
• he has epithets mostly as a corpse, not as an active hero who is fighting
• he seems to be there to die: to redirect and provide fresh fuel for Achilles' rage
• The wounding of Diomedes and the killing of Patroklos, Lang thinks, are reverberations and precursors to the killing of Achilles
• Diomedes was wounded in the heel by Paris: the Iliad shows no other hint of the story that Achilles will die because he is shot in the heel, but ithis seems very precisely parallel to that story
  
• Achilles is not killed in the Iliad
• but dying Hektor prophesies Achilles' death at the hands of Paris and Apollo (22.359)
• and Achilles' horse, Bay, prophesies that Achilles will die at the hands of a god and a human (19.418)
• other premonitions of Achilles death include 18,95; 20.337, 21.276, 24.84 and 131
  
• Book 6
• Hektor returns from the battlefield to the town of Troy: that serves the wrath story by building up Hektor as the hero who embodies defense of Troy and to show what he is defending
• He clearly has a strong role in the war story: he is the Trojan warrior
  
• but highlighting his wife Andromache and his child Astyanax has such a great effect on the wrath story: it gives Hektor a specific personal purpose, and also Andromache echoes that Agamemnon, Achilles, and Paris are all motivated by honor related to a specific woman as well: there is a contrast of wife v. concubine/slave
  
• A contrast/parallel with Achilles, who also has a very specific purpose strongly motivated by the wrath story, particularly as described in books 9, 16, and 19
• Book 7
• Ajax v. Hektor duel: a neutral event for the events of the wrath story
• whereas the Menelaus v. Paris duel re-introduced into the wrath story the cause of the war, and then Pandaros' shooting of Menelaos made negotiations impossible and reaffirmed Trojan guilt and the justice of Troy's fall, this duel is different.
• But this duel is necessary to build the war story into the wrath story:
• you might think that in the 9 years of war preceeding the Iliad, the Greek wall to defend the ships would have already been built.
• but Lang's thesis is that the war story was incorporated into the wrath story
• thus the building of the wall, so important for the war story (much of the fighting is over the wall), had to be postponed until Iliad and then somehow motivated in the Iliad.
• The duel conveniently motivated the building of the wall (necessary for the war story, because much of that fighting occurs over the wall): its inconclusive ending opened up a space for a truce, and burying of the dead, and building of the wall
• building a wall indicates that the Greeks were on the defensive, which is necessary for the wrath story (remember Zeus' promise to Thetis to let the Trojans prevail to heighten Achilles' honor.
  
• but remember the tally of the dead: the Greeks killed far far more Trojans than vice versa
• the duel is also rule-bound, following conventions: each hero makes a boastful speech, takes a turn at attacking, hurls a boulder, then swordplay, then the herald announces that night is falling and they need to stop: it's almost ritualistic
• That is a strong parallel/contrast/foil to first Hektor's killing of Patroklos then even more so to Achilles' killing of Hektor with its subsequent atrocity of abusing the body.
  
• Hektor killing Patroklos doesn't so much prefigure Achilles' killing of Hektor: it motivates it and is a key event in the wrath story.
  
• In Book 8, the wrath story proper is taken back up: showing how Achilles' absence hurts the Achaeans
• Zeus banishes gods from the battlefield
• Zeus tips the scales against the Achaeans

There is another "story" that is not told: the mass army story:
the mass movement of the troops is completely and utterly ignored in Lang's telling

Another thing to consider: rage can fuel achievement: part of the wrath is that Achilles, already the best of the Achaeans, was turbo-charged by his wrath. That might be enough to explain the facts that Lang marshals to suggest that the wrath story was not really part of the war story: and if it is enough, then Lang's thesis becomes somewhat superfluous. The wrath story is but one warrior's story, one who burned extremely bright, accomplished a key part of defeating the Trojans (killing Hektor), and yet died before the end of the war. That might somewhat undermine Lang's thesis.

In the end, Lang's thesis is super-interesting and perhaps right: it gives one plausible answer for why Iliad is the epic and there is not an epic that tells the whole story or additional epics that recount other parts of the war.

Even if you do not buy it, it serves a great purpose: it highlights for us the many many echoes and reverberations and parallels between many heroes and their deeds, which makes the Iliad a highly wrought and complex work. It also highlights key parts of the narrative flow of Iliad. That there was a larger war story that happened all around the wrath story is surely true, whether or not the wrath story actually swallowed and incorporated the war story into itself as Lang tells it.