RAGE: Homer made it easy to see!

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 5, 2026

The New York Times won't go there: As far as we know, there was no historical Homer. There wasn't even a Homer Price, he of the doughnut machine.   

(That Homer lived in a different time: "It [was] America laughing at itself with a broad and genial humanity....")  

There was a Homer Parrish in The Best Years of Our Lives (Best Picture, 1946), "the highest-grossing film in the United States since the release of Gone with the Wind."  In one of that film's most memorable scenes, his next-door sweetheart since childhood convinces him that of course she will, and of course she does, still love him despite the wounds he has brought back from the war. 

That portrait of classic (female) fidelity might perhaps recall the weaving and unweaving of Penelope in the poem which wasn't written by Homer, who apparently didn't exist:   

Homer   

Homer (possibly born c. 8th century BC) was an ancient Greek poet who is traditionally credited as the author of the Iliad and the Odyssey, two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Homer was highly revered in ancient Greek society and is considered one of the most influential authors in history. Today, the question of Homer's identity and existence—dubbed the "Homeric Question"—continues to be debated, and scholars generally regard the two poems as the works of separate authors.

The Iliad centers on a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles during the last year of the Trojan War...  

However it may have been composed, the Iliad does indeed "center on a quarrel between King Agamemnon and the warrior Achilles" during the last year of that fictional war. It's the rage of Achilles which triggers the action, leading on to the fall of Troy. 

Leading on to the fall of Troy.! We refresh you about that famous event, produced by a vast group rage:  

Bernard Knox, Introduction to Robert Fagles translation

[...]

The death of Hector seals the fate of Troy; it will fall to the Achaeans, to become the pattern for all time of the death of a city.

The images of that night assault—the blazing palaces, the blood running in the streets, old Priam butchered at the altar, Cassandra raped in the temple, Hector's baby son thrown from the battlements, his wife Andromache dragged off to slavery—all this, foreshadowed in the Iliad, will be stamped indelibly on the consciousness of the Greeks throughout their history...to reinforce the stern lesson of Homer's presentation of the war: that no civilization, no matter how rich. no matter how refined, can long survive once it loses the power to meet force with equal or superior force.   

Hector's sister unspeakably abused in the temple, with an old man butchered at the altar? Hector and Andromache's baby boy hurled to his death from the walls of the city? 

So it went in the group rage which followed the slaying of the endlessly valiant Hector. In his continuing rage, Achilles drags Hector's body behind his chariot, through the dust, as Hector's parents watch from the walls. Or, as Mary Lefkowitz put it in the Washington Post:   

It was [Homer] who first portrayed [women] in their important role as survivors and the continuers of the culture that the men sought in their violence to destroy.   

Regarding the baby boy in question, here's one small part of the scene, high atop the city's walls, as Hector prepares to go off to battle earlier in the poem. Andromache is begging him not to go:  

In the same breath, shining Hector reached down
for his son, but the boy recoiled,
cringing against his nurse's full breast,
screaming out at the sight of his own father,
terrified by the flashing bronze, the horsehair crest,
the great ridge of the helmet nodding, bristling terror
so it struck his eyes. 

And his loving father laughed,
his mother laughed as well, and glorious Hector,
quickly lifting the helmet from his head,
set it down on the ground, fiery in the sunlight,
and raising his son he kissed him, tossed him in his arms,
lifting a prayer to Zeus and the other deathless gods.

[...]

So Hector prayed
and placed his son in the arms of his loving wife.
Andromache pressed the child to her scented breast,
smiling through her tears. Her husband noticed,
and filled with pity now, Hector stroked her gently 
trying to reassure her, repeating her name...  

We thought that memorable scene should be mentioned today. 

The baby's loving parents laughed together at their baby boy's innocence. Loving parents and loving spouses were found inside the walls of Troy. Down by the shore it was different.

For the record, Hector returns from battle that day, succumbs to the rage of Achilles as the long poem nears its end. We emerge from these reveries with a curious type of question:   

Is it possible? Is it possible that Homer, who largely didn't exist, tells the story of our nation's current circumstance with greater clarity than can be derived from the well-intentioned news reports found in the New York Times? 

Just within the past week, we've seen the tribal rage of a group of Senate Republicans directed at the 85-year-old Anthony Fauci. As his colleagues prayed to the gods that Dr. Fauci might be imprisoned, the astonishing Senator Moreno was even inspired to say this:

Here I am sitting in front of you, six years later, saying "Who the fuck do you think you were for doing that?"   

Yes, he actually said it! And there was the grisly Senator Hawley, engaged in such undisguised clowning as this:   

HAWLEY (7/29/26): Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Well, nothing says honesty like taking the Fifth, huh, Doc? Let's try something:

What day of the week is it today?  

[...]

What color tie are you wearing?

[...]

What color is the carpet in front of you?  

More on that tomorrow.

Group rage was on display in the Senate last week, a type of rage which is likely to lead to societal disaster. On Sunday, Secretary Kennedy Jr. ranted and raged on CNN, repeating his most famous misstatements while inspiring the children of the Fox News Channel to fall on the floor, spilling with praise about his masterful outing.   

Can a society expect to survive the existence of so much tribal rage? We'd say the prospects are shaky at best. That said, consider this:

On the front page of today's New York Times, the relentless tribal fury in question is captured in a news report about the latest acts of madness. Online, the report appears beneath this dual headline:   

Inside the Oval Office Showdown Between Trump and Jeanine Pirro
Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, told President Trump that his interior secretary, Doug Burgum, had misled him with a self-serving cover story for his own mistakes.

The latest madness is detailed there, in the bulk of its complexity, though you'd hardly know it from those tapioca-adjacent headlines. Our question:

Is it possible that the human madness with which we're confronted is actually easier to see in the verses of the Iliad? Is it easier to see our current situation all the way back in Book One, where the rage of Achilles comes spilling out in a way we haven't yet reviewed?  

(At issue: A fight between Achilles and Agamemnon. With apologies, they're filled with rage about who will get his choice of the various stolen girls.)    

The madness of Agamemnon and Achilles is on clear display in Homer's text. The madness of our sitting president is once again on display this morning, though only at Mediaite:

Trump Fantasizes About Himself as Decorated General Alongside Patton and MacArthur In Bonkers AI Image   

President Donald Trump promoted himself to a decorated military general in his latest use of AI through Truth Social.

While making various posts about the military on Tuesday, Trump dropped an AI-generated image showing him in a military uniform and sporting various medals. Standing next to him were Gens. George S. Patton and Douglas MacArthur. Patton was a general known for his service leading forces in World War II, while MacArthur also commanded forces in World War II and the Korean War.   

The difference between those two men and the president is that the president has never served in the military.   

And so on from there, Zachary Leeman reporting. 

The madness involved in the rage of Achilles is undisguised in the Iliad, from Book One right on.

In our world, this latest Truth Social post by the sitting madman won't be reported in the New York Times. Unlike in the realm of the non-existent Homer, such orgs have agreed that the basic facts of modern life must never be reported and must never be discussed.

According to Homer, Hector stroked Andromache gently, gently repeating her name.

Tomorrow: The rage of the Senate machine