Ransom

Part I

This section focuses on the Greek hero Achilles – part man, part mortal. It begins with Achilles deep in thought, looking over the ocean from the shores of Troy and reflecting on the origins of his mother, Thetis, a sea nymph. After nine long years of war, Achilles feels separated from his mother’s ‘element’ (Part 1) and this foreshadows his isolation in the text from all but Patroclus, his adopted brother. Despite feeling as though his mother had abandoned him, Achilles, a trained warrior, has learnt to bottle all that inside him and express only rage and aggression. In this small retrospect we learn Achilles is both father and son, widening the one-dimensional brute presented in Homer’s Iliad and exposing a far more dynamic and complicated character.
A further flashback takes readers back to the introduction of Achilles’ ‘companion and soul mate since childhood’ (Part 1), Patroclus. After murdering a boy he had been playing games with, Patroclus was banished to live in the Phthian courts of Peleus, Achilles’ father, in the hope of learning combat alongside Achilles that in turn might discipline his wild manner. In an instant the boys felt connected and were virtually inseparable, so naturally Patroclus fought alongside Achilles as he rose through the ranks in the military and commanded an elite force known as the Myrmidons. In this chapter we are presented with the concept that the relationship between Patroclus and Achilles is a forceful one and Achilles recognises they have been ‘mated’ to one another; there’s a sense that they cannot and will not ever be separated, not even in death.

Naturally they, both seeking their glory, have spent the last nine years engaged in war and Achilles laments that he has missed the growth of his son Neoptolemus who has grown up ‘without him’ (Part 1). Still, his stamina remains as he awaits ‘the break… something new and unimaginable’ (Part 1) to emerge from his despair. Days, maybe weeks, earlier there had been a feud between the arrogant Agamemnon when he had tried to claim Briseis (a Trojan priestess that had been awarded as a spoil to Achilles) for himself; Achilles refused him and retrenched his men from the battle until the girl was returned to him. Unable to bear the shame of no longer fighting, Patroclus donned Achilles’ armour and went into battle, only to be slain by Hector who believed he was ending the life of Achilles, the great fighter. Having ‘wept without restraint…rocking back and forth in his anguish…’ (Part 1) for the loss of Patroclus, Achilles promises vengeance on Hector in what he believes will be one of his ‘last encounter[s] out there under the walls of Troy’ (Part 1).

Despite being one of the greatest warriors of Troy, the noble Hector falls quickly under Achilles’ sword and the duel is watched by members of the Trojan royal family who sit atop their walls and grieve as Hector is felled. Moments before Hector takes his final breath, a ghost like voice, assumed by Achilles to be the voice of the gods, whispers that he too will die soon. Achilles feels his ‘soul change colour’ (Part 1) at the hex and it is clear that something has been set into motion that cannot be reversed.

Still full of rage, Achilles defiles the body of Hector and tows it behind his chariot, making laps up and down the battlements of Troy as Hector’s grieving family watch on. The indecency of his actions toward a soldier, albeit an enemy, and future King of Troy, speaks into the madness that has consumed him since the death of Patroclus and only once the corpse is ‘raw now from head to foot and caked with dust, bounded and tumbled…’ (Part 1) does he return to his camp, the body still in tow.

Some time passes, and Achilles’ Myrmidons begin to fret over their leader’s behaviour; believing he has become mad with grief they sit back and await his next order. Despite being fearful that some ‘rough-haired god has darkened his [Achilles’] mind’ (Part 1), the men obey Achilles’ strange orders to ready the chariot daily as he scrutinises them. Despite brutalising the body of Hector ever day anew, Achilles awakes to find the body healed and made new again, no doubt an action from the gods which he believes is in ‘defy[iance] [of] him’ (Part 1). Mounting the chariot, Achilles ties the body of Hector to the crossbar and races around the barrow where Patroclus’ ashes remain in a mad flurry; desperate to transform it into the bruised, broken and bloodied corpse that he believes might allay some of his pain. The repetitive act of doing this, day after day, weighs heavily upon Achilles until his men comment that he has become ‘as fouled with dust as the thing – bloody and unrecognisable – that he trails from his axle bar’ (Part 1) no more a victor. His grief consumes him and he is inconsolable, falling into a sleep of oblivion, a ‘clogging grey web that enfolds him’ (Part 1) only to repeat the action the very next day with equal fervour.

Part 1 Quotes

The sea has many voices. The voice this man is listening for is the voice of his mother. (Achilles) Part 1

He had grieved. But silently, never permitting himself to betray to others what he felt. (Achilles on losing his mother) Part 1

So it was settled. Patroclus was to be his [Achilles’] adoptive brother, and the world, for Achilles reassembled itself around a new centre… from this moment on he could conceive of nothing in the life he must live that Patroclus would not share in and approve. (Achilles and Patroclus’ relationship) Part 1

He was waiting for the rage to fill him that would be equal at last to the outrage he was committing. That would assuage his grief, and be so convincing to the witnesses of this barbaric spectacle that he might too believe there was a living man at the centre of it, and that man himself. (Achilles after he murders Hector) Part 1

Part 2

The second chapter focuses around Priam, the elderly King of Troy and father to the slaughtered Hector. His grief is all-consuming and aside from a brief description heralding the natural beauty of Troy, Malouf launches us into the old man’s misery, where ‘for eleven nights… he lies sleepless …’ (Part 2), bereft for his son but also tormented by a niggling idea that fate is pushing him in the direction of something ‘unprecedented’ (Part 2).

Priam experiences a vision that is gifted to him from the goddess Iris and although he senses the journey will be dangerous, it is one he feels compelled to take. His dedication to the mission is cemented when he envisages sitting ‘in full sunlight on the crossbench of a cart…the kind workmen use…’ (Part 2), the cart full to the brim with gold and jewels, with a ‘shaggy-headed fellow, rough but not fearsome’ (Part 2) at the reins. He feels full of vim and ventures to his wife’s chamber to tell her of his epiphany; he finds Queen Hecuba awake, unable to sleep through her grief either. Her reaction is natural for that of a wife, she believes he is acting out of grief and urges him to cease this ‘folly’ (Part 2), suggesting that he go before his other sons with the proposal. It is in this moment that he feels compelled to relate to her the story of how he came to be Priam, King of Troy. His story has never left his memory and the detail with which he recalls the happenings are testament to the memory of it haunting him throughout his time as leader of Troy. He tells her for the first time how he (previously named Podacres) was saved by his sister Hesione, who was destined to be a prize of war for Heracles, enemy of their father. He speaks of the intense fear that struck him whilst he stood among the other orphan boys, in the ‘panicky confusion’ (Part 2) of the aftermath of war, waiting for a soldier from the victorious enemy battalion to take one of them as a ‘plaything… his [their] prize of war’ (Part 2). Having been heir to the seat of Troy, a ‘pampered darling of your [his] father’s court, never more than twenty paces from your [his] nurse or some watchful steward’ (Part 2), Priam in his old age acknowledges the fall from power that he’d experienced at the edge of the sword and with this, foreshadows another time soon when he might need to drop his façade and become a mere citizen once more.

Priam’s need to scrub away the filth of that time when he had been captured and abused has stayed with him and he notes that ‘the smell of the slave’s life I was being dragged away to – I can never rub off’ (Part 2) and there’s a sense that he feels he must atone for the blessing that he escaped that life and was reappointed King of Troy. Podacres was spotted by his sister and therefore gifted to her by her captor Heracles, as a ‘fine gift’ (Part 2) and he was spared, to ‘caught [catch] the second breath they [the gods] offered me’ (Part 2). He was awarded the name Priam, meaning ‘the price paid’, a ransom. Hecuba’s reaction to this story aligns well with the snobbery of royalty and Priam is swift to move on and convince her that he must ‘be ransomed a second time…’ (Part 2).

Priam’s son Deiphobus agrees with Hecuba, and is quick to dismiss his father’s idea as grief and warns him as Hecuba did, that ‘a man who has no respect for the body of his enemy… that such a man would not take delight in hauling down your kingly image…’ (Part 2). He is concerned that Achilles will slaughter his father and show no mercy to the old man. Polydamas also begs his father not to go on the journey but with every claim, Priam remains more adamant in his quest.

Part 2 Quotes

He is obliged, in his role as king, to think of the king’s sacred body, this brief six feet of earth he moves and breathes in – aches and sneezes and all – as at once a body like any other and an abstract of the lands he represents, their living map. (Priam) Part 2

But where else could such a dangerous suggestion come from if from an immortal? One of those who are free to raise blasphemous questions, just because in being that, immortal, they will never be subject to what might follow from the answer. (Priam on the gods after they have given him the vision of the ransom) Part 2

‘The fact that it has never been done, that it is novel – unthinkable – except that I have thought of it – is just what makes me believe it should be attempted. It is possible because it is not possible. And because it is simple.’ (Priam trying to convince Hecuba that he must do the ransom) Part 2