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Donna F. Wilson, Ransom, Revenge, and Heroic Identity in the Iliad. Cambridge: University Press, 2002. Pp. ix + 236. ISBN 0-521-80660-7, $55.00.
This book makes a point about Homeric society that is clearly right and that needs to be taken into account by all interpreters of the Iliad. Wilson shows that there are two quite distinct forms of compensation in Homer. Apoina consists of prestige goods, and it is paid by family members to ransom captives. The warrior who accepts apoina retains the increase in time he has won through his victory, and the disequilibrium remains. Poinê is taken by someone who has suffered a gratuitous injury. It may consist in human life, or prestige goods may be substituted ("composition"). Poinê restores a balance. Apoina is characteristically apeiresia, "boundless"; poinê is not. The poinê theme is to be recognized not just where the word itself appears, but when the characters use the related terminology of tisis. The Iliad several times shows a mixed theme, in which a warrior defeated in battle asks the victor to spare his life in order to receive apoina later. The victor, however, remembers wrongs done, and prefers poinê, killing the victim. Because these themes are so distinct, there is something peculiar when Agamemnon offers Achilles apoina at 9.120 (=19.138). So much, I think, Wilson proves.
She then argues that Achilles, contrary to the communis opinio, never rejects the heroic code or material compensation as such. Rather, Agamemnon tries to use one aspect of the system, in which he has a fixed position of power as sccptor-bcaring king, against Achilles' position as best within the fluid system of agonistic competition. Agamemnon seeks to compensate Achilles without admitting that he has wronged him. Achilles cannot take compensation in the form Agamemnon offers it without giving up his basic claim to dominance.
In locating its insight within broader questions about the interpretation of the Iliad, the book follows Rabel in its view of Achilles as imitating Chryses; Slatkin in claiming that Achilles seeks compensation from Zeus for being mortal instead of the son who would overthrow Zeus; Donlan in the argument that Agamemnon's offer is excessive and that to accept...