1 Introduction
In a recent paper from the field of social psychology Shereen Chaudhry and George Loewenstein studied the choices individuals make as they communicate with their colleagues in their work environment, with a special focus on their concern about how they are perceived by those around them.1 They developed both a hypothetical scenario study on which their subjects were to comment and a live interaction in which their subjects were asked to report orally on the outcomes of a shared project and their own contribution to that outcome. Chaudhry and Loewenstein observed in these oral reports a significant trade-off between their subjects’ preferences for verbal behaviors such as thanking their co-workers and/or apologizing to them on the one hand and highlighting their own contribution and/or attributing failures to their co-workers on the other. A readiness to thank others for their contribution or to apologize for their own mistakes enhances perceptions of cordiality and warmth in speakers even as it may leave a shadow over their claim to competence. By contrast, when participants magnify their own contributions, remaining silent about those of their partners, or when they blame their partners for shared failures, they do so at a marked cost to perceptions of their ability to work well with others.2
What is at stake in situations in which these behaviors come to the fore is the speakers’ concern with their social image, or, as Erving Goffman has described it, “face”.3 This concern is universal. We all care about the impression that we make on others, through words or actions. Each of the four forms of communication under discussion in this chapter is, therefore, a tool of impression-management, of self-presentation, designed to influence the way that others see us.4
The theory proposed by Chaudhry and Loewenstein, which underpins these observations, is the so-called Responsibility Exchange Theory (RET). It captures the value of those four forms of communication—thanking and apologizing, boasting and blaming—and draws connections between them. Despite the obvious connection between boasting and blaming and between thanking and apologizing, we see that those who boast and those who apologize each assume responsibility for actions that have been taken; those who blame co-workers and those who thank them each attribute responsibility for a particular outcome to someone else. These four behaviors are therefore intimately linked in a cohesive framework:5 hence the term “responsibility exchange”. This is the novelty of the theory, that it asks us to consider these contrasting behavioral choices in the workplace as a single package.
The exercise that I report on below is both a joint test and a reflection. It is a test of the applicability of the RET to the Iliad in concert with a test of DICES’s search functionality.6 To this end I seek information of two kinds from DICES with regard to the Iliad. First of all, I seek all speeches by certain speakers whose behavior may show traces of RET characteristics. Secondly, I seek speech acts of particular types associated with these speakers: thanking, apologizing, boasting, and blaming. That is, I shall search by the identifying tag (Taunt, Deliberation, Command, etc.) that has been attached to each Iliadic speech act in the DICES database. Finally, as I assess the poet’s understanding of and capacity to represent communicative behavior of this kind, I reflect on the experience of using the database in this way.
It is important at the outset to define and delimit the verbal behaviors that are relevant to my study of relationships in the Iliadic workplace—on the battlefield and in the related management meetings on the sidelines. This requires some care, since the battlefield, as the poet describes it, is a noisy environment: amongst the cries and shouts we discern not only the anticipatory bragging that is a strategic prelude to a one-on-one contest,7 but also the boasts of heroes who enjoy a fresh victory.8 We likewise find a general category of blame: the reproof that one hero will offer to his comrades, in order to spur them on in the fighting.9 My focus, however, in this present context, is on the heroes who have worked as a team. I seek moments when one hero takes all credit for a successful venture, although, in fact, he has not achieved this alone. And I seek, too, moments when a joint venture has not been successful and the hero deflects any responsibility for that failure from himself to others. As for the quieter behaviors, apologizing and thanking, we do not observe them on the battlefield but in exchanges between heroes on the sidelines. With respect to these I shall note whether those same Homeric heroes who boast and blame unfairly have the capacity to apologize sincerely for their own failures or to give genuine thanks to others for their assistance.
The study below focusses on four Iliadic speakers whose relationships with their colleagues have been singled out by the poet and who are, therefore, of special interest to the audience. The first is Agamemnon, who brought the Achaean forces together in their bid to recover Helen, and who now, in concert with other senior leaders, “runs” the campaign. As Taplin observes, Agamemnon is central amongst the Achaeans only because he, as Menelaus’s elder brother, is “the summoner” of the forces; his authority is not absolute—it is essential that there should be no “definitive hierarchy” within this simplified socio-political world.10 Agamemnon’s character has been thoroughly explored in scholarship.11 It is not my aim to go over that ground again. But I shall demonstrate that, in realizing this portrayal, the poet has drawn on a particular range of communicative behaviors, familiar to him and his audience from their own experience of life and crystallized for us now in the RET. I turn then to the leader of the Trojans and their allies, Hector, to see how his communicative choices in the workplace affect our reading of his character. Finally, I look at Antilochus and Menelaus, who model the ways in which a workplace relationship may be kept on an even keel. A notable absence from this discussion is Achilles, the exceptional hero, who, despite all his competence in warfare, remains aloof from the Achaean senior management team.12
This study, therefore, turns first to the speeches of these characters as isolated by DICES. I then compare DICES-tags with my own readings of relevant speeches in order to reflect on the role that DICES can play in this study of communicative choices and character.
2 The Iliadic Agamemnon: Boasting, Blaming, Thanking, “Apologizing”
I have culled the 46 speeches attributed in DICES to Agamemnon in search only of those that are related to workplace relationships. My initial observation is that these four critical verbal behaviors, boasting and blaming, thanking and apologizing, are not consistently marked in the text by the poet through relevant speech introductions and phrasal echoes. Nor are they rendered through recognizable speech formats such as we find in the epics for rebukes, protests, and refusals of invitations.13 Nor have they been selected as tags in DICES. In several speeches, however, I find embedded forms that correspond to the four verbal behaviors in which I am interested.
But how have I identified the behaviors of which I speak? In the absence of the easy prompts I described above, we must toggle between our initial response to direct speech (as indicated in the broad-brush tags offered by DICES) and our own Theory of Mind (ToM), now asking ourselves: “what is this speaker really saying here? what does this speaker hope to achieve by speaking thus? what does this speech actually do?”14 These questions, I suggest, have always been asked of the text. Our cognitive processes today mirror the cognitive processes of the poem’s first audiences.
The action of the Iliad is kindled by Agamemnon’s intemperate boast. Directing his words to Achilles, as their quarrel over Agamemnon’s claim for immediate compensation for the loss of Chryseis begins to build, the king disregards the considerable contributions that Achilles (and the rest of the Achaean force) have made to the Achaean enterprise. Setting the tone for the words that follow with a mock-polite phrase
But here is my threat to you (181,
ἀπειλήσω δε τοι ὧδε ) … I shall take the fair-haired Briseis, your prize, going to your shelter, that you may learn well (185,ὄφρ ’ἐῢ εἰδῇς ) how much greater I am than you (186,ὅσσον φέρτερός εἰμι σέθεν ). …
As we observe here, in the course of any one epic speech a speaker may transition from one discourse type or social function to another. DICES recognizes this transition (x + y), although its tags do not have the capacity to specify a particular subset of lines within the complete speech.17
The quarrel and Achilles’ consequent withdrawal from the fighting were observed by the entire Achaean army (2.239–240).18 Even so, Agamemnon does not accept responsibility for what has happened; he blames others for the poor decisions he himself has made. He tells the Achaean assembly that Zeus is to blame for driving him into that disastrous quarrel with Achilles (at both 2.375–378 and 9.17–25 [18,
I am not responsible (86,
ἐγὼ δ ’οὐκ αἴτιός εἰμι ), but Zeus is, and so is Destiny, and Erinyes the mist-walking, who in the assembly trapped my heart in savage delusion on that day when I myself stripped Achilles of his prize.
This cannot be counted as an apology. Agamemnon’s concern for his authority, his “face”, in the public sphere—and he is especially sensitive in the presence of Achilles20—prevents him from taking responsibility for his role in the quarrel, even at this moment of reconciliation.21 Indeed, whenever Agamemnon is concerned about his self-image and his status, he is quick to shift the blame for his own failings to another party.22
It is significant, however, that when Agamemnon is speaking in private, amongst sympathetic leaders, he is prepared to acknowledge his own errors.23 In a meeting of the management team Nestor delicately but firmly assigns blame to Agamemnon alone for the withdrawal of Achilles and its consequences (9.96–113): Agamemnon’s actions were “not at all in accordance with our will” (108,
For Agamemnon, however, the performance of a sincere apology is a bridge too far.25 When Nestor tactfully proposes (111–113) that “they” (the leaders) give some thought to appeasing the hero, “making things good (112,
And let him yield place to me, since I am the kinglier (160,
ὃσσον βασιλεύτερός εἰμι ) and since I can call myself the elder.29
Although Agamemnon’s words will be edited out by Odysseus as he conveys his message to Achilles, the ostentation of the gift offer itself reminds Achilles once more of the king’s arrogance. He will not agree to return to the fighting—yet.
Agamemnon’s insecurity as convenor of the Achaean force also makes it difficult for him to fairly acknowledge the contribution of others. Achilles makes this point as he rejects the Embassy (9.315–317 at 316,
These men are heroes with whom Agamemnon feels comfortable; they recognize and endorse his status. But, when he reaches Odysseus and Menestheus, Agamemnon cannot find it in himself to honor them or to express gratitude (338–348); he chooses instead to challenge them, accusing them of hanging back from battle. The king’s ill-judged chiding elicits an energetic protest from Odysseus (350–355). This leads to a hasty denial (359) and an offer to make amends. He issues what can only be described as a non-apology (362–363,
Agamemnon rashly boasts of his own achievements and consistently attributes blame to others for his mistakes. Critically, however, he cannot easily perform the remaining two communicative acts—apologizing and thanking. These two speech acts, which have been associated in the RET with warmth, are recognized in the Western world as indicators of a well-functioning workplace even as they represent a certain trade-off with the projection of individual competence.34 As we observe Agamemnon’s inability to apologize graciously, or to thank, we conclude, via our Theory of Mind, that he is arrogant, inept, and, importantly, insecure; we note his deep anxieties about “face”, about his own status vis-à-vis that of others. And this has consequences: his own insecurity as convenor of the Achaean force has inevitably led to the interpersonal problems that continue to plague him and the multiple setbacks on the battlefield that cloud his leadership.
It is clear from the discussion above that the poet has selected for Agamemnon a range of speech modes that construct a recognizable character-type.35 When Van Nortwick comments on the “subtle and consistent characterization of Agamemnon in the Iliad”,36 he is responding, I suggest, to the poet’s intuitive understanding of how to render relationships in a workplace through the spoken word. Chaudhry and Loewenstein’s RET package encourages us to focus on key elements of Agamemnon’s communicative style in this workplace of war.
These communicative choices are identifiable in the text, but not without cognitive effort on our part. The poet, as noted above, has not signposted these speech forms. Thus, although we register Agamemnon’s words at 9.160–161 (above) as a command (the DICES-tag), we modify this in the light of the boast that follows it. This is not simply a command; it is a boastful command. We may conclude at this point that whereas DICES tells us what each speech type might be, it does not tell us what each speech type, in its context, is designed to do.37 For example, in the discussion above two of Agamemnon’s speeches (9.115–120 and 4.358–363) were (accurately) tagged by DICES as Deliberation; but “deliberation” gets us only so far. What is masked here is the speaker’s intention (which we determine through the application of ToM), whether it is to acknowledge fault (9.115–120) or to exculpate himself (4.358–363) through a non-apology. I shall reflect, below, on the effect that this kind of cognitive activity has on our engagement both with the speaker and with the story.
3 Hector: Boasting, Blaming, and Failing to Thank
Of the 51 speeches attributed to Hector one stands out as a speech that refers to a joint project. Against the background clamor of the battlefield, Hector’s triumphant taunt over the body of the fallen Patroclus (16.830–842) offers a perfect parallel to a Chaudhry and Lowenstein test case. But what is critical here is that Hector is not simply taunting his opponent. When he declares that he is the prime defender of his city (833–836), that his horses are in the forefront as they rush into the fighting, that he himself (834,
How could Patroclus imagine, Hector suggests, that he could conquer Troy, when Hector was there to defend it? As the poet has told us, however, Hector may have been in the forefront, but he did not win this victory alone: the god Apollo and the Trojan Euphorbus had already brought Patroclus low (787–817). Hector quite simply administered the coup de grâce.38 His exultant, intemperate boast marks a critical moment in the action—and it is, for Hector, ill-omened.39 From this point on, as Zeus has foretold (15.68–71; 17.198–208), the tide of battle will gradually turn against Hector and his Trojan force.40
Hector, it appears, has a tendency to forget the support of others, particularly the Trojan allies. Glaucus complains to Hector, at 17.142–168, that he, Hector, has failed to recognize formally the hard work of the Lycians in defending Troy and the Trojans: “we received no thanks” (17.147 = 9.316,
Hector reveals some of the qualities that we identified in Agamemnon, in particular his readiness to boast and his reluctance to thank. Like Agamemnon too he has a capacity for rash decision-making. But, whereas Agamemnon lacks confidence in his capacity to hold his army together, Hector is over-confident, self-willed.43 His brisk dismissal of Polydamas’s advice (12.230–250; 18.284–309) is disastrous, as he himself ultimately admits (22.99–110). We remain sympathetic to Hector, however, since, early in the narrative, the poet removes him from the battlefield-workplace, where we observe his failures, and returns him briefly to the Trojan citadel. Here he presents the hero sympathetically through the depiction of his relationship with his mother, his wife, and Helen.44 Like Agamemnon, who is capable of admitting fault, in private, only with his leadership group, Hector, when he is no longer in the public eye, but with the women closest to him, loses the brash over-confidence that is, for him, fatal. In the same vein of honest self-reflection is his moving—and strangely intimate—soliloquy as he confronts his death at Achilles’ hands (22.297–305).
4 Antilochus and Menelaus: Apologizing and Thanking
Agamemnon’s inability to frame a genuine apology and his desire to shield himself from censure stand in strong contrast to the candor of one of the most likeable characters in the Achaean force, Antilochus. Unlike Agamemnon, who has his own high rank to defend, along with his role as convenor of the combined forces, and for whom any admission of error threatens to bring with it a loss of face, Antilochus has youth and energy—and no need to project leadership credentials—on his side. He would be content if his competence were demonstrated to all on the battlefield and in competitive games; he sees no need to project his reputation off the field at all costs. His lesser role in the Achaean force—and in the poem—is attested by the small number of speeches (5) attributed to him.
At the close of the chariot race that is part of the funeral games for Patroclus in Iliad 23, Menelaus has accused Antilochus—quite fairly—of obstructing his horses, causing him to finish in third place behind Antilochus in second (570–572). On hearing Menelaus’s accusation Antilochus responds promptly with a placatory imperative:
Antilochus’s quick empathy and his disarming apology lead to a correspondingly warm reaction from Menelaus (602–611):48 “I myself, who was angry, will now give way (602,
I will even give you the mare, though she is mine (610,
ἐμήν περ ἐοῦσαν ), so that these men too may be witnesses that the heart within me is never arrogant nor stubborn (611,ὡς ἐμὸς οὔ ποτε θυμὸς ὑπερφίαλος καὶ ἀπηνής ).
Menelaus makes it clear through his “gift” that he wishes to be seen by Nestor and his sons, as well as by his Achaean peers, as genuinely appreciative, as someone who values the assistance of others—and, indeed, who is prepared to acknowledge what they do for him and to thank them. The contrast of Menelaus’s verbal behavior with that of his brother is striking. Thus we observe the poet’s quiet insistence that might is not always right, that status does not trump everything all the time, and that good communicative practice is a valuable tool for maintaining good relationships in collective enterprises.50
5 Discussion
Throughout the Iliad we have observed the strong underpinning of an integrated package of communicative choices that guides our understanding of relationships, character, and the cause-and-effect sequence of narrative development. Thanks to DICES it has been possible to track all examples of a character’s speech and to study them as tagged examples of speech types. The role of these tags is indicative: focusing on form, they offer a quick and seamless route to the study of verbal behavior. DICES recognizes the possibility that within a single speech a speaker may move through a series of speech-types, as we see at 1.173–187, for example, which begins as a boast but concludes as a threat. A single speech may do two or more things at once. The tags, as I have noted, tell us only what each speech is; they do not tell us what, in the poet’s (and subsequently the audience’s) mind, each speech is intended to do, in its context.51 This latter function demands mind-based activity.
This is not, however, a failure of DICES. This is an essential step in the interpretation of a literary text. By exercising our own individual ToM, it is possible to evaluate those broader DICES-tagged speech-types pragmatically, in terms of the speaker’s intention. And we can simultaneously draw on our knowledge of the relationship between verbal behavior and the face-saving habits of individuals in the workplace (as codified in the RET) to understand how the words and deeds of each of the key heroes in the poem, their patterns of behavior, play out in interaction with those of others.52
The Homeric poet knows the value of indirectness. When he refrains from guiding us to a particular interpretation of the action, we listeners and readers are obliged to work for ourselves, forming hypotheses and drawing conclusions about the action on the basis of what we observe. As Deborah Tannen observed (and as Lisa Zunshine, Rutger Allan, and Jonathan Ready have each argued more recently), we therefore become immersed in the storyworld, involved both “with characters and with tellers of the stories”.53 A good storyteller knows instinctively that the experience of listening, or reading, is more satisfying for the audience when they are encouraged to invest cognitive effort in order to follow the storyline and evaluate its action. And this, I propose, is why audiences have been so engaged by the more complex characters of Agamemnon and Hector. It is not necessary that listeners and readers like each one; but they find that the requirement to exercise their own faculties, independently, in order to read the behavior of these two heroes draws them in. What then holds their interest is that the communicative choices of these and other characters, like Antilochus and Menelaus, resonate with their own observations of life in the everyday workplace. Thus our intuitive understanding of the RET in the workplace allows us to read these characters as vivid, and persuasive, creations—and this moment of understanding becomes a source of pleasure.
6 Conclusions
With regard to the RET, I have shown that the poet of the Iliad had a good intuitive understanding of relationships in a workplace—whether this might be true of relationships in the “fog of war” is, of course, another question. He knew how dependent good relations were on the goodwill and communicative choices of each participant, and he knew how to make these relationships real, and engaging, to his audiences.
In this exercise I have demonstrated just one way of working with DICES. In my task of assessing the value of the RET to an interpretation of the Iliad, DICES has handled initial stages well. But DICES is not an explanatory tool; rather, it points us to what is needed next. It is ToM that brings us to the next stage, where we can understand Agamemnon’s or Hector’s spoken behavior in its context and understand how the words each hero speaks reveal his concern for “face”. It is this stage, where ToM operates, which is, for us, the interesting stage. But the advantage of DICES is that has taken us quickly and efficiently to this point—the point at which we can observe the human mind at play.
Acknowledgements
I am particularly grateful to Berenice Verhelst for all her advice and assistance and to Deborah Beck, Ombretta Cesca, Mélissande Tomcik, and Jeff Rydberg Cox for their challenging comments and questions at various stages of this project.
Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019.
Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 331–335.
Goffman 1959. For studies of the Iliad in Goffman’s terms see Scodel 2008 and Mari 2021.
Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 331.
Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 332.
Forstall, Finkmann, Verhelst 2022, 974. The DICES database offers core data on direct speech loci, speakers and addressees. The database’s tentative content-based tags (often multiple tags per speech) build on the speech-type classification systems of Fingerle 1939, Highet 1972 and Dominik 1994. See the Introduction to this volume, esp. pp. 27–30. for more detailed information regarding this dataset.
Anticipatory boasters: Hector and Ajax son of Telamon parrying boasts at 7.226–232 and 234–243 (both tagged in DICES as Challenge); or Idomeneus (13.446–454) addressing Deiphobus (tagged in DICES as Challenge + Taunt).
Triumphant boasters, whose speeches are tagged in DICES as Taunt: Hector (8.161–166); Odysseus triumphant at 11.450–455; Idomeneus (13.374–382); Deiphobus (13.414–416); and Patroclus (16.745–750). See also Paris (11.380–383, tagged in DICES as Taunt + Desire and Wish).
Cf. Menelaus at 7.96–102 (tagged in DICES as Vituperation), introduced by
Taplin 1990, 67, 69.
Cf. Edwards 1987, 96 (“weak”, “insecure”); Taplin 1990, 65 (“a nasty piece of work”); Van Nortwick 2011, 14–16 (“strong-willed, jealous of his prerogatives, and insecure about his judgment, prone to rash and ill-advised decisions”); Porter 2019, 179–199 (“impetuous”, “arrogant”, “insulting”, “inept”).
Cf. 2.681–694; 9.185–191; 18.88–93. And see also the chapter by William Dominik in this volume (chapter 14).
Minchin 2007, 23–73, 145–174.
Theory of Mind (ToM) refers to our ability to understand something of our own mental states. On the basis of this understanding, we are able to form intuitions, or approximate intuitions, about the intentions of others, taking into account what they do and, as is particularly relevant to this study, what they say. For discussion, see, for example, Carlson, Koenig, Harris 2013 and Spaulding 2018, ch. 2. For the application of ToM in Classics see, for example, Minchin 2019; Budelmann and Sluiter 2023, esp. chs 1, 2, and 3.
Lloyd 2021, 17–18.
On the aggressive gesture in this “open identification” of the speech act to follow, see Lentini 2020, 21. Throughout this chapter I shall occasionally but not always cite DICES tags for the speech acts that I consider. See further below.
And the user must take care: the tags indicated may not appear in the correct order.
Cf. the words of Poseidon as Calchas at 13.11–16 and the implication that this is the general view amongst the army: Taplin 1990, 74.
See Teffeteller 2003, 17–19, on the use of
See Scodel 2008, 118–123, esp. at 120, on the reasons why this speech cannot be counted as an apology. On Agamemnon’s inability to name or to confront Achilles directly (cf. the third-person forms at 19.83 and 89, and, later, 188–189 and 194–195), see Coray 2016, 49–50, with references. For the exception, see 19.139–144.
Agamemnon’s gift-offer at this point serves as an implicit admission of error, a “somewhat half-hearted apology”: Coray 2016, 47.
When Agamemnon blames Zeus at 2.110–115 it is a matter of pretence. Even so, the pretence is a fair characterization of this leader’s customary behavior in the workplace. At 14.65–73 (DICES-tag: Deliberation), in another management meeting, Agamemnon does not directly blame Zeus for his woes; he simply states that the failure of all Achaean defence must be pleasing to Zeus (69–70).
On this point see Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 319 (on audience, context, and individual differences). Sammons 2009, 173, by contrast, sees Agamemnon as a consummate public figure; with the single exception of his speeches in Il. 10, he is always “on”.
DICES-tag: Deliberation. Nestor had mentioned “your proud heart’s anger” (
Ombretta Cesca asks whether an Achaean leader such as Agamemnon has apology in his DNA. I suggest that he does, but his concern for “face”, especially in public, stands in conflict with the prospect of making himself vulnerable.
In suggesting an apology from the leadership group Nestor is simply making it easier for Agamemnon to agree.
Redfield 1975, 15–16, 105; Edwards 1987, 235.
DICES-tag: Command.
The issuing of a command to Achilles is provocative: Lentini 2020, 26–27.
On the so-called epipolesis, see Beck 2005, 154–164; Scodel 2008, 60 and esp. 100. There is a further occasion: at a feast after the first day of fighting the king honors Aias, son of Telamon (7.321–322). The poet reports no words, simply the gesture.
DICES-tag (to Idomeneus): Praise and Laudation + Exhortation; DICES-tag (to the Aiantes): Desire and Wish; DICES-tag (to Nestor): Desire and Wish.
DICES-tag: Deliberation. Has Agamemnon’s apology been accepted? Because the poet records no response from Odysseus or Menestheus we have no guidance. One assumes grudging acceptance. By contrast, see below Menelaus’s warm response to Antilochus at 23.602–611. On Agamemnon’s ineptness, see Coray, Krieter-Spiro, and Visser 2020, 106–107; Porter 2019, 54–55. On “face”, see Scodel 2008, 60.
I pass over here Agamemnon’s words to Diomedes and Sthenelus. He will be challenged by the latter while the former remains carefully silent. For a brilliant analysis of the behavioral choices of each of the three heroes, see Barker and Christensen 2020, 69–75.
It could be argued that in Western cultures today there is a greater ambition (not always realized) for warmth and empathy amongst co-workers at all levels than in the individualistic, competitive culture depicted in the Iliad. See Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 332, on the difference that culture and status may make on patterns of communication.
We all recognize this pattern of behavior in our own world: in the workplace, in academia, in the political sphere. On character-types in the Iliad, see Minchin 2011.
Van Nortwick 2011, 15.
To illustrate my point, consider the different ways in which questions function in conversation. DICES simply tags each instance as Question. But, as I have shown elsewhere (Minchin 2007, 117–140), apart from information-questions we can identify several different question-strategies (deference-questions, counter-questions; control-questions, for example): the speaker in each case aims to achieve a different outcome.
Euphorbus too will claim glory for having been the first of the Trojans to wound Patroclus with his spear (17.16).
See Janko 1992, 417–418, on Hector’s self-delusion; Kozak 2017, 161, on Hector’s subjective reshaping of the events. Cf. Sarpedon’s accusation at 5.471–474: Hector is prone to the rash boast in the presence of colleagues.
For Patroclus, at least, Hector’s is an empty boast (16.844–850).
As Edwards 1991, 77 notes, “both Hektor and Agamemnon have problems in keeping their army in the field”.
DICES-tag: Vituperation. Kozak 2017, 166 downplays Hector’s deflection of blame, noting that the repetition of the idea (17.176–178 = 16.688–690; cf. 22.301–302) suggests that this is “just the rule of the world”. It is, nevertheless, a shedding of responsibility. Hector was not where he should have been.
Redfield 1975, 128, 150. The poet of the Iliad depicts both Agamemnon and Hector as leaders eager to protect their status in public; for them apology is costly, as is the offer of thanks. By contrast, in a Western culture today a person of high status who is considered competent “may have less need to project competence, resulting in more thanking and apologizing and less bragging and blaming” (Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 332). A good leader in the ancient world may have exhibited the same behaviors.
Hector’s tenderness with his mother (6.264–285); Helen (360–368); and his wife (441–465, 484–493) counters the less favorable image that we form of him on the battlefield: on audience attachment to Hector, see Kozak 2017, 52–68.
DICES-tag: Deliberation.
Mari 2021, 241–245.
The poet is remarkably consistent in his portrayal of Antilochus. A youthful risk-taker in both action and speech, Antilochus is the first into the fray and the first to kill a man (4.457–458). He stands up to Achilles, challenging one of his decisions (23.543–554)—this too a risk worth taking (23.555–562): on his relationship with Achilles, see Minchin 2021.
DICES-tag: Deliberation.
Scodel 2008, 44–47.
On apologies and conflict resolution, see Chaudhry, Loewenstein 2019, 313–314 for brief discussion and references.
See also Deborah Beck’s chapter 15 in this volume. She too reflects on the usefulness of digital resources such as DICES in connection with their ability to accurately encode philological judgments.
Do we find an equally strong underpinning of an RET-like package in the Odyssey? An RET-like package is not as clearly in evidence; but the poet of the Odyssey shows us a complex hero who readily boasts and blames even as he is prepared to thank and even to apologize.
Tannen 1982, 8, writing before the introduction of hypotheses regarding ToM, argued for the pleasure of making connections and filling gaps independently. Zunshine 2006, esp. 159–164 has drawn a close link between the reading of fiction (in her case, the novel) and the exercise of ToM; we read fiction, she argues, because it offers a “pleasurable and intensive workout” for our ToM (164). And see Allan 2020 and, most recently, Ready 2023 for important observations on immersion in ancient texts.