Perfidy and Passion

Homer s Iliad is often considered a poem of blunt truthfulness, his characters motivation pleasingly simple. A closer look, however, reveals a complex interplay of characters who engage in an awful lot of lies. Beginning with Achilles, who hatches a secret plot to destroy his own people, Mark Buchan traces motifs of deception and betrayal throughout the poem. Homer s heroes offer bluster, their passion linked to and explained by their lack of authenticity. Buchan reads Homer s characters between the lies, showing how the plot is structured individual denial and what cannot be said."