Syllabus
Honors 249Z: “Troy Matters:
An Ancient Tale Told and Retold”
Linda Coleman, Department of English
Spring Semester 2011
TuTh 2:00 – 3:15 p.m
3132 Tawes Hall
Email: LKC@umd.edu
Office: 3208 Tawes Hall
Phone: 301-405-7632
Office Hours: W 12:30-2:30 p.m.
or by appointment
Texts:
Our materials for the semester will consist of the following:
1. Textbooks available at the bookstores:
 Homer, The Iliad. Translated by Stanley Lombardo. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing
Company, 1997. ISBN 978-0872203525.
 Thompson, Diane P. The Trojan War: Literature and Legends from the Bronze Age to the
Present. Jefferson, NC.: McFarland & Co., 2004. ISBN978-0-7-8641737-7.
 Weil, Simone, and Rachel Bespaloff. War and the Iliad. New York: New York Review Books,
2005. ISBN 978-1-5-9017145-5.
2. Text to be acquired on your own:
 Giraudoux, Jean. Tiger at the Gates. Trans. Christopher Fry.
3. Texts available via library reserve on Blackboard (www.elms.umd.edu):
 de Grummond, Will W. “Virgil’s Diomedes.” Phoenix, 21.1 (1967):40-43.
 Parotti, Phillip,
(1) “Diomedes at Aulis.” Southern Humanities Review 17.4 (1983):343-348.
(2) Excerpts from The Greek Generals Talk. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1986.
(3) Excerpts from The Trojan Generals Talk. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1988.
4. Texts accessible via the internet (links will be available in our Blackboard space):
 Euripides. The Trojan Women. Trans. Gilbert Murray. Google Books (pdf).
http://books.google.com/books?id=IB88AAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=euripides+trojan
+women#PPA13,M1.
 Ford, John M. “Troy: The Movie.” Strange Horizons Poetry, [1994]2002.
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2002/20020429/troy.shtml.
 Gregory, Cherry, The Girl from Ithaca. http://www.authonomy.com/books/18921/the-girl-fromithaca-book-one-in-the-sister-trilogy/, 2010.
 Homer, The Odyssey. trans. Ian Johnston. https://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/ . Excerpts.
 Kasten, David Scott, and Tom Dale Keever. “Sir Peter Hall’s Troilus and Cressida and
the Traditions of the Play.” Theater for a New Audience, 2001.
http://www.tfana.org/2001/troilus/.
 Saunders, Ria, “The Younger Brother,” n.d.
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3519911/1/The_Younger_Brother.
 Seneca. The Trojan Women. Trans. Frank Justus Miller.
http://www.theoi.com/Text/SenecaTroades.html.
 Shakespeare, William. Troilus and Cressida. Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida. (The text is
readily available both in print and online, including from Project Gutenberg at
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1790.)
 Tatum, James. “The Poetry is in the Killing” in The Mourner’s Song.
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http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/789934chap6.html
Thucydides, The History of the Peloponnesian War, trans. Richard Crawley.
http://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.1.first.html. Excerpts.
Virgil, Aeneid, trans Theodore C. Williams. http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/. Excerpts.
Schedule of readings:
Readings are to be done before the class day for which they are scheduled. You should be
prepared to discuss the reading on the day on which it is listed. In addition to the readings listed
on the syllabus, plan for the following:
 Short additional readings may be assigned in connection with the online discussions.
 Additional readings will be assigned during the two weeks scheduled for student
presentations. (See Course Information.)
 We will discuss the movie Troy later in the semester. I will assign a few movie reviews to
prepare for that discussion. In that connection, as well, I ask that you view or re-view the
movie by April 19.
Modifications to syllabus:
It will almost certainly be necessary to make changes in the syllabus. These will be announced in
class and via email. You are responsible for all changes.
1. The starting points: the Iliad and the historical Troy.
We will spend the first three weeks looking at the starting point: Homer’s Iliad, which we
will read in Lombardo’s modern verse translation. Everything begins here, so it’s important
to be familiar with this book.
Week 1.
Tu, Jan. 25: Introduction; “Shakespeare in the Bush”
Th., Jan. 27: (1) Thompson, Ch. 1, “Bronze Age Mycenae and Troy:
Archeological Evidence” (pp. 13-24)*
(2) Iliad, Book 1 (pp. 1-19)
Week 2.
Tu, Feb. 1:
Th, Feb. 3:
Week 3.
Tu, Feb. 8:
Week 4.
Tu, Feb. 15: Iliad, books 17-22 (pp. 333-439)
Th, Feb. 17: (1) Iliad, books 23-24 (pp. 440-492).
(2) Thompson, Ch. 14, “The Tradition Continues: Troy in the
Twenty-First Century and Beyond” (pp. 203-218)
Iliad, books 2-5 (pp. 20-111).
Iliad, book 6-7 (pp. 112-142)
(1) Thompson, Ch. 2, “Oral Poetry and the Troy Cycle”
(pp. 25-34)
(2) Iliad, books 8-13 (pp. 143-264)
Th, Feb. 10: Iliad, books 14-16 (pp. 265-331)
Professor Thompson’s TROY website at http://novaonline.nvcc.edu/Eli/Troy/new/troyweb/index.html has pages
associated with each of these chapters; scroll down on each page for links and resources you will find worth
checking.
*
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2. Different perspectives: what Homer left out.
With the details of the Iliad fresh in our minds, we’ll start with some modern writers who
decide to ask questions about some issues Homer hints at, but doesn’t address.
Week 5.
Tu, Feb. 22: (1) Thompson, Ch. 3, “Homer’s Iliad: The War at Troy”
(pp. 35-58)
(2) Girl from Ithaca,
http://www.authonomy.com/books/18921/the-girl-from-ithacabook-one-in-the-sister-trilogy/
Th, Feb. 24: (1) Saunders, “The Younger Brother”
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3519911/1/The_Younger_Brother
(2) Ford, “Troy: The Movie”
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2002/20020429/troy.shtml

Assignment 1 due
3. The first re-visions: Greeks and Romans
The Iliad’s companion piece, the Odyssey, continues the story of the Trojan War and later
writers in the ancient world responded both to Homer’s work and to issues raised by the
legend of Troy. The Romans (and later the British) used Troy as an ancestral starting-point.
Week 6.
Tu, Mar. 1:
(1) Thompson, Ch. 4, “Homer’s Odyssey: The Long Journey
Home” (pp. 59-87)
(2) The Odyssey: Menelaus and Helen talk about the war, ll. 1-400,
https://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/homer/odyssey4.htm
(3) The Odyssey: Odysseus visits the underworld and meets the
ghosts of his dead comrades, Agamemnon, Ajax, and
Achilles. Background in lines 1-280—you may skim for
general comprehension; read closely the encounter with
Agamemnon, Ajax, and Achilles is in ll. 476-732. Actually,
the whole of Book XI is worth your looking at. It’s the
classic (so to speak) visit to the underworld.
https://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/homer/odyssey11.htm,
(4) Thucydides, Book I, Chapter 1, paragraphs 1-10 (through the
paragraph beginning, “Even after the Trojan War”)
http://classics.mit.edu/Thucydides/pelopwar.1.first.html
Th, Mar. 3:
Thompson, Chs. 5 and 6, “Aeschylus’ Agamemnon: Dead Heroes
and Wild Women—Controlling the Past” (pp. 88-99) and
“Euripides’ Two Iphigeneia Plays: Sacrifice and
Resolution” (pp. 100-111).
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Week 7.
Tu, Mar. 8:
(1) Thompson, Ch. 7, “Virgil’s Aeneid: Roman Transformation of
Homeric Myth” (pp. 112-125).
(2) Vergil, Aeneid:
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.
02.0054
(a) Book 1, lines 1-1-222: the introduction of the hero and
Trojan War connections; skim lines 563 to end.
(b) Book 2: Aeneas recounts the Trojan War.
(c) Book 11, ll. 243-295: Diomedes’ story.
(3) Will W. de Grummond, “Virgil’s Diomedes.” Phoenix, Vol.
21, No. 1 (Spring, 1967), pp. 40-43, available via JSTOR.
Th, Mar. 10: (1) Euripides, The Trojan Women: Gilbert Murray translation at
Google Books (downloadable as pdf.)
http://books.google.com/books?id=IB88AAAAIAAJ&print
sec=frontcover&dq=euripides+trojan+women#PPA13,M1
(2) Seneca, The Trojan Women
http://www.theoi.com/Text/SenecaTroades.html
4. The medieval stories: Troy as Christian romance.
Medieval writers had to adjust the Troy story to accommodate their very different
religious and social views. Christianity replaces the fickle (and active) Greek gods with
the concept of a just deity and a focus on preparing for the afterlife, and courtly love
creates a series of romantic encounters Homer would probably not have recognized.
Week 8.
Tu, Mar. 15: Readings from Thompson:
(1) “Introduction” (pp. 5-12)
(2) Ch. 8, “Transmission of Troy Stories to the Middle Ages”
(126-137),
(3) Ch. 9, “Love Redeems Eneas; Love Destroys Achilles: Troy as
Romance” (pp. 138-153),
(4) Ch. 10, “Chaucer’s Troilus and Criseyde: The Christian
Synthesis” (pp. 154-164)
Th, Mar. 17: TBA
MARCH 21-25: SPRING BREAK
5. A doubly mediated text: Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida and modern
performance.
The Troilus and Cressida story is not part of the original Trojan legend; rather, it
developed throughout the medieval and Renaissance periods. Shakespeare’s version of
the story appears to have been unpopular when originally written but has lately seen a
resurgence. We will look at this play, then, with a particular emphasis on its meaning for
modern audiences.
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Week 9.

Tu, Mar. 29: (1) Thompson, Ch. 11, “Shakespeare’s Troilus and Cressida:
Human Beings Alone” (pp. 165-177)
(2) The essays on production of Troilus and Cressida at the
Theatre for a New Audience website at
http://www.tfana.org/2001/troilus/.
Th, Mar. 31: Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida. The text is readily available
in print and online, including from Project Gutenberg at
http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/1790.
Assignment 2 due
6. In the shadow of the world wars.
We move on to the troubled mid-20th century to see how people faced with the prospect (or
the memory) of wars that brought together enormous coalitions of allies on both sides and
spanned the globe turned to the story of Troy to try to make sense of what was going on.
Week 10. Tu, Apr. 5:
(1) War and the Iliad, introduction, pp. 1-39 (Weil, “The Iliad
as a Poem of Force”), and pp. 43-100 (Bespaloff, “On the
Iliad”).
(2) James Tatum, “The Poetry is in the Killing” from The
Mourner’s Song at
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/789934chap6.html
Th, Apr. 7: Giraudoux, Tiger at the Gates (“The Trojan War Will Not Take
Place”)
7. The modern world looks back: Vietnam and Iraq.
Like their predecessors, contemporary writers see Troy's story in light of events they are
living through. Philip Parotti, a Navy veteran who knows how military people think,
imagines the Greek and Trojan heroes trying to make sense of their war and a major shift
in geopolitical boundaries and influences.
Week 11. Tu, Apr. 5:
Th, Apr 7:
Readings from Parotti
(1) The Greeks: “Diomedes at Aulis”; “Meriones at Gortyn”;
“Eurypylus at Dodona”; “Neoptolemus in Phthia.”
(2) The Trojans: “Keas on Ida”; “Odios at Alybe”; “Polydamas on
the Plain.”
Ford, “Troy: the Movie”
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2002/20020429/troy.shtml.
Week 12. Tu, Apr. 19: (1) Thompson, Ch. 13, “Firebrand and The Gate to Women’s
Country” (pp. 189-201).
(2) Troy (the movie)
Th, Apr 21: TBA
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8. Your turn: group project presentations.
Groups will present their work; for details, see Course Information handout.
Weeks 13-14. Tuesday, April 26, through Thursday, May 5.
Group presentations. Additional readings will be assigned during these weeks; the timing
and selection will depend upon the projects chosen by students and upon what areas of
interest have been uncovered during the first ten weeks.
Week 15.

Tu, May 10: Review and wrap-up.
Final date to hand in group project written materials.
Final Exam: due Tuesday, May 16, 10:30 – 12:30 p.m.
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