The Iliad Cover Description
In the legendary epic “The Iliad” by the poet Homer it is a story which begins in the 9th year of the Trojan War filled with despair, demise and hopelessness. Ironically the whole conflict was caused by a woman who decided to leave one king and go to the prince of another nation. This leads to the man’s loss of pride, and he leads and army of Greeks in an attempt to get his pride back. Throughout the novel female goddesses further escalate the situation, due to petty arguments are vengeance they desire against certain people. Gods in this story may seem reckless and cold hearted, but the female goddesses add a level of selfishness, and manipulation which leads to a long lasting war and countless more deaths. From the cover the goddess Athena who is seen looking above all, and even down at the battle, seems to be more like a destructive puppet master than a caring goddess. She is known to kill people on a whim, and protect the ones she favored. It is impossible to escape her grasp, and she even manipulates the other gods even the king of the gods Zeus himself, she is tied to the very fabric of the story so she is given the top spot looking down even though she is kind of in the background (Like any great controlling woman).
The bottom battle scene is between the two fiercest warriors of the two sides, Hektor of Troy and Odysseus of the Achanians (Greeks). In-between them is Helen, the woman who started the whole war by deciding to run away from the king of Greece. Women are seen as reckless and unaware of their surroundings as shown in the picture of her stepping in-between two men in the midst of a war. Further shown the recklessness of Helen is the fact that she forced her serving maids to come into the battle with her, and even the children in an attempt to pull the heartstrings of the men, but ironically putting them in the way of direct danger. The battle picture also displays the artistic nature homer is able to portray war and the heat of battle. There is an unparalleled flow, and it seems more like a dance in the way that it is described compared to the actually destructiveness of the outcome of conflict. The black in the background is in reinforcement of the bleak outcome of war, death. There is only darkness after war, the false glory these men desperately try to gain is unattainable and