The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
My rating: 4 of 5 stars Juggling with Achilles, or “the goddess and the mortal and the boy who was both” Because I love The Iliad, I embarked on Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles (2011) with high hopes. And I liked her novel a lot. Miller’s strategy is to have Patroclus, a minor character with few lines but a vital impact in Homer, narrate the events before, during, and after those depicted in The Iliad. Her novel is vividly realized, a convincing depiction of life in ancient Greece culturally and physically, and it’s very emotional, getting us to root for poor doomed Patroclus from his sad memories of his lonely childhood through his intense friendship, education, and sexual romance with Achilles all the way to the tragic end we expect from reading The Iliad and The Odyssey. Along the way Miller imagines the mother-in-law from hell (Thetis), ruthless, brutal, and manipulating kings (Agamemnon, Diomedes, and Odysseus), and appealing supporting characters like Chiron and Briseis. Miller’s Achilles is convincing: a demi-god with a soft spot for Patroclus (who keeps him human), full of unassuming beauty and unaffected grace and disarming honesty—and of terrifying martial ability. Apart from Thetis, the only gods to appear are Apollo and a Trojan river god in brief cameos, perhaps to focus the light of her novel on human folly, love, and violence, etc. and at the same time to highlight and enhance Thetis’ divinity and Achilles’ half divinity, as well as to explore motherhood. Although the sensual, spiritual, and tragic relationship between Achilles and Patroclus (reminiscent of the scenario typical of YA paranormal romance stories like Roswell and Twilight, wherein unpopular kids fall in love with supernatural beings) is foregrounded front and center, the fraught one between Thetis and Patroclus is finally at least as compelling. Miller departs from Homer in some ways: her Patroclus is slightly younger and much less martial than Achilles instead of substantially older and more experienced, Achilles doesn’t have an Achilles heel and is less monstrous than his son Pyrrhus, and Thetis is more of a force, frequently appearing and actively loathing the relationship between her son and Patroclus and doing her best to undermine it. Miller also presents Patroclus as a pacifist who prefers healing to fighting and music to war and who wishes that Achilles would be remembered for more than killing. Indeed, she is at such pains to present Patroclus as a gentle, non-violent soul that during the climax when the Trojans are starting to fire the Greek ships while Achilles is sulking to make the Greeks miss him so Patroclus dons the hero’s armor to pretend to be Achilles to save the Greeks from disaster, it feels funny when Patroclus gets carried away and starts channeling his inner Achilles and chasing after retreating Trojans and killing some and then trying to scale the walls of Troy itself (twice!). If Miller had hinted that some inimical god was riding Patroclus or influencing him in getting carried away by his Achilles impersonation, it would have been convincing, but as it was it doesn’t ring true and is left unanalyzed by the characters or implied author, so I don’t think it’s the case that Miller is saying that even a pacifist like Patroclus can become a killer like Achilles. Miller can write too much, as with “His presence was like a stone in my shoe, impossible to ignore,” when she should have stopped right after “shoe.” And she can write too cheaply, as with “His [Chalchis’] voice wheedled and ducked, like a weasel escaping the nest,” where the stereotypically negative image of the creature doesn’t fit the situation she’s describing, as Calchis is just telling the truth about why a god is down on the Greeks. But her writing is often very fine in her vivid descriptions and similes, when describing rocky islands or the chaos, din, and violence of ancient battle or Achilles’ physical beauty or his mother’s scary sublime aura: “Her black hair was loose down her back, and her skin shone luminous and impossibly pale, as if it drank light from the moon. She was so close I could smell her, sea water laced with dark brown honey. I did not breathe,” and “Her mouth was a gash of red, like the torn open stomach of a sacrifice, bloody and oracular. Behind it her teeth shone sharp and white as bone.” Although the audiobook reader Frazer Douglas is a bit monotonous with the base narration of Patroclus, he does a great “hoarse and rasping” Thetis, a fine wily Odysseus, and a spot on forthcoming and upright Achilles. Finally, Miller’s novel enriched me, but it mostly made me want to re-read The Iliad, which I will probably do a few more times before I die, whereas I bet I won’t re-read her book. But fans of Homer should read The Song of Achilles. Miller-Patroclus’ telling of a different kind of story about Achilles than that of his martial conquests is a potent and poignant achievement: “Will I feel his ashes as they fall against mine?” View all my reviews
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Jefferson Peters
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