3. Q. What is the position of the Iliad of Homer in literature? A. It
is the leading poem of the world.
4. Q. From what is the Iliad entitled? A. From the word Ilium, which is
the alternative name of Troy.
5. Q. What episode in the siege of Troy is the real subject of the
Iliad? A. The wrath of Achilles.
6. Q. What occasioned the siege of Troy? A. The carrying off of Helen,
wife of Menelaus, a Grecian king, by Paris, son of Priam, king of Troy.
7. Q. Who engaged in the siege against Troy? A. The confederate kings
of all Greece, with Agamemnon as commander-in-chief.
8. Q. What was the occasion of the wrath of Achilles? A. The arbitrary
interference of Agamemnon to deprive Achilles of a female captive,
Briseïs, and usurp her to himself.
9. Q. What at length incites Achilles to again return to the field? A.
The death of Patroclus, his close friend, slain by the Trojans.
10. Q. What is the result as to Achilles? A. He slays Hector, the
Trojan champion, and is himself killed by Paris.
11. Q. What forms the subject of the Odyssey? A. The adventures of one
of the Greek chieftains, Ulysses, or Odysseus.
12. Q. When and how does the Iliad itself close? A. Before the fall of
Troy, and with the death and funeral rites of Hector.
13. Q. What are some of the best known translations of the Iliad? A.
Chapman’s, Pope’s, Cowper’s, Derby’s and Bryant’s.
14. Q. Of what are some of the most noted passages in the first book of
the Iliad descriptive? A. The descent of Apollo, the wrangle between
Achilles and Agamemnon, the promise of Jupiter to Thetis, and the feast
of the gods.
15. Q. What does the second book of the Iliad recount? A. How Jupiter
sends a deceiving dream to Agamemnon to induce that chieftain to make a
vain assault on the Trojans.
16. Q. With what does the book close? A. With a catalogue of the Greek
forces assembled.
17. Q. To us who read in the light of present views what is a feature
of the Iliad fatal to any genuine interest in the story? A. The
introduction of supernatural agencies into the action of the poem.
18. Q. What is one of the prominent scenes introduced in the third book
of the Iliad? A. A duel between Paris, the thief, and Menelaus, the
husband of Helen.
19. Q. What takes place at the crisis of the duel? A. Venus steps in
and carries Paris off to his bed-chamber in the palace of Priam.
20. Q. In the fourth book what is described by a simile, one of the
most nobly conceived and nobly expressed of all that occur in the
Iliad? A. The advance of the Achaians to battle.
21. Q. What noted hero is introduced in the fifth book of the Iliad?
A. Æneas, the Trojan hero of Virgil’s poem, the Æneid.
22. Q. Of what is one of the most famous passages in the sixth book of
the Iliad descriptive? A. The parting of Hector and Andromache, his
wife, bringing with her their little child.
23. Q. Who among the Greeks takes the honors of the seventh book of the
Iliad? A. Ajax.
24. Q. What constitutes a prominent feature in the eighth book of the
Iliad? A. Another account of the Olympian gods in council.
25. Q. Technically described what is Homer’s verse? A. Dactylic
hexameter.
26. Q. What is a dactyl? A. A foot of three syllables, of which the
first is long and the other two short.
27. Q. In dactylic hexameter how many of these feet are there in a
line? A. Six.
28. Q. Name a classic English poem written in dactylic hexameter. A.
Longfellow’s “Evangeline.”
29. Q. In what celebrated descriptive passage does Homer exhaust all
his art? A. In his description of the shield of Achilles.
30. Q. What does the Odyssey mean? A. The poem of Odysseus, or Ulysses,
king of the island of Ithaca.
31. Q. When Troy was taken, for what place did Odysseus and his
followers sail? A. Ithaca.
32. Q. On their way, to what land were they driven? A. That of the
Cyclops, a savage race of one-eyed giants.
33. Q. Here what did Odysseus do to the Cyclop Polyphemus? A. He
put out the eye of the monster after he had eaten six of the hero’s
comrades.
34. Q. What did Poseidon, the god of the sea and father of Polyphemus,
do in revenge? A. He doomed Odysseus to wander far and wide over the
sea to strange lands.
35. Q. When the Odyssey begins, ten years after the fall of Troy, where
is Odysseus? A. In the island of Ogygia, at the center of the sea,
where for seven years the nymph Calypso has detained him against his
will.
36. Q. Meanwhile what has befallen Penelope, the wife of Odysseus,
in Ithaca? A. She has been courted by more than a hundred suitors,
lawless, violent men, who feast riotously in the house of Odysseus as
if it were their own.
37. Q. When Odysseus at length gets permission to sail from Ogygia, and
starts on a raft, what occurs to him? A. Poseidon wrecks his raft, and
he is thrown upon the island of the Phæacians, a rich and happy people
near to the gods.
38. Q. Upon being entertained by the king of the Phæacians, what are
the subjects of some of the adventures he relates? A. The Enchantress
Circe, the sweet-singing sirens, and the passage between Scylla and
Charybdis.
39. Q. After Odysseus is taken back to Ithaca by a Phæacian crew,
what is the fate of the suitors of Penelope? A. They are all slain in
the palace by Odysseus, assisted by his son Telemachus and two trusty
servants.
40. Q. What are some of the most noted translations of the Odyssey? A.
Chapman’s, Pope’s, Cowper’s, Worsley’s, and Bryant’s.
41. Q. In what form is Worsley’s translation written? A. The Spenserian
Stanza, that adopted by Edmund Spenser for his great poem of the “Fairy
Queen.”
42. Q. Name some other well-known poems written in the Spenserian
Stanza. A. Thompson’s “Castle of Indolence,” Beattie’s “Minstrel,” and
Byron’s “Childe Harold.”
43. Q. What part of the adventures of Odysseus does our author first
give in an extended quotation from Worsley’s translation of the
Odyssey? A. His stay in the country of the Phæacians.
44. Q. What was the name of the king of the Phæacians, frequently
referred to in poetry containing classical allusions? A. Alcinous.
45. Q. What American author has written a version of the legend of
Circe? A. Hawthorne in his “Tanglewood Tales.”
46. Q. Of what is the next extended quotation descriptive that is
given by our author from Worsley’s translation of the Odyssey? A. The
slaughter of the suitors of Penelope by Odysseus and his son.
47. Q. Of what are the remaining quotations given descriptive? A.
Odysseus making himself known to Penelope, his wife, and to Laertes,
his father.