War is brutal, that’s plain and simple. Some people might beg to differ, but the authors of both the Iliad and “After Action Report” use their work to support this idea. The Iliad is an epic poem following the events of the Trojan War from the Greek perspective, filled with battle, blood, and lots of divine interference. “After Action Report,” though dealing with the same topic of war, follows Lance Corporal Suba, an innocent man taking the blame for killing a 13-14 year-old threatening to shoot Suba and his comrade Timhead. The Iliad and “After Action Report” are two very different stories with the same theme. Both stories portray the message that war brings out the worst of human nature. The Iliad shows how brutal and cruel people become while “After Action Report” highlights the emotional stress brought by people violently turning on each other. Both Homer, poet of the Iliad, and Phil Klay, author of “After Action Report”, use literary devices to support this shared theme, and while both works have great examples of imagery, connotative diction, and symbolism, they each have their own strengths. Homer is superior in using imagery and symbolism to convey theme while Klay uses connotative diction to emphasize theme of the story.
Both the Iliad and “After Action Report” use imagery to highlight topics regarding war and violence; although, Homer, poet of the Iliad, does use this literary device in a more effective way. With the poem’s theme of war bringing out the worst aspects of humanity, there are many examples of cowardice, selfishness, and cruelty throughout the work. These actions are reinforced by a variety of very emotional, dramatic, idealistic, intense or even somber imagery, such as seen in the beginning of Book 3. This shows Paris, prince of Troy, challenging any willing Greek to fight. He is characterized as “a challenger, lithe, magnificent as a god, the skin of a leopard slung across his shoulders, a reflex bow at his back and battle-sword at hip…” (Homer 129). This imagery presents Paris as incredibly confident as powerful, at least until a few lines later when Menelaus, king of Sparta, accepts the challenge. Lines 34-41 on the aforementioned page detail Paris retreating back to the Trojan lines to avoid fighting with Menelaus with plenty of imagery describing his actions such as, “…Paris’ spirit shook. Backing into his friendly ranks, he cringed from death as one who trips on a snake in a hilltop hollow recoils, suddenly, trembling grips his knees and pallor takes his cheeks and back he shrinks,” (Homer 129). This imagery highlights Paris’ fear, which itself would not be a negative aspect to humanity, but accompanied by putting other troops in danger of fighting, it shows sides to us as people that we should not admire. Along with cowardice, imagery throughout the Iliad shows brutality, cruelty, and overall inhumanity. Immediately following Hector’s death in Book 22, the malice of the Greeks is emphasized. This can be seen when Achilles, a Greek hero, was said to have “wrenched his bronze spear from the corpse, laid it aside and ripped the bloody armor off the back,” and, though not explicitly imagery, the last line of the page reads, “And not a man came forward who did not stab his body,” (Homer 553). These actions are portrayed to where the reader can imagine the scene as cruel and bloody despite the actions coming from the Greeks, the side the reader follows and more often than not roots for throughout the story. This portrayal of the Greeks shows that the poem is not about how great the Greeks are, it is about how war leads to inhumanity. Though “After Action Report” has lots of imagery in it as well, it is mostly reserved to just building the setting instead of reinforcing the theme. One of these piece of imagery is “The mine rollers weren’t even attached anymore. Their wheels were spread out everywhere, surrounded by bits of metal and other debris. One of the vehicle’s tires was sitting a few feet out, cloaked in dust, looking like the big granddaddy of all the little baby mine roller wheels around it,” (Klay 30). This doesn’t relate at all to the shared theme of war bringing out the worst of humanity, it even goes against it to some extent due to word choice. The closest relating piece of imagery to the theme is “There was a crack of rounds, like someone repeatedly snapping a bullwhip through the air,” (Klay 31). While this piece of imagery shows how war leads people to attempt to kill others, a trait that is certainly one of the worst in humanity, imagery like it are not as prevalent in “After Action Report” as it is in the Iliad. Since theme related imagery is much more prevalent in the Iliad, it shows that Homer used the literary much more effectively to establish theme in the epic.
While the Iliad may beat “After Action Report” in imagery, “After Action Report” uses connotative diction more effectively. The Iliad uses the literary device especially in the Rage of Achilles, with the attempt to emphasize the pain brought by war and battle. An example of this would be how Homer uses the opening lines. He uses words like “murderous, doomed,” followed a few lines later by the phrase “made their bodies carrion,” (Homer 77). This word choice introduces the reader to the bloody, violent world of the Iliad. A few pages later Homer yet again uses connotative diction to show another terrible aspect of humanity, selfishness and not seeing another person as a person. This is referring to Chryseis, the girl Agamemnon had captured and refused to release no matter the horrors brought by the wrath of Apollo. Homer shows Agamemnon’s view on this incident and his personality by having written the line, “my prize is snatched away!” (Homer 81). This line shows Agamemnon’s selfishness with both context and phrasing, and “snatched” also shows that he views Chryseis as an object instead of a person. If he hadn’t referred to her as a prize or said that she could be snatched away, Agamemnon’s actions wouldn’t change, but the reader wouldn’t view Agamemnon as the selfish leader that Homer intends him to be. The Iliad uses connotative diction to show terrible aspects of humanity that relate to the theme, but at least to modern readers, the word choice makes it seem to much like a relic of ancient times, and it does not allow the reader to connect much to the characters. Alienating the readers from the characters might hinder them from fully realizing the horrors of the Trojan War with the lack of connection leading to both desensitization of the events and a lack of empathy to the characters. If the connotative diction in a story doesn’t provide characters we could fully imagine in real life, we can’t see what’s affecting them as terrible as we would otherwise, leading to the theme not fully resonating with the reader. “After Action Report” already has an advantage here in not being an around 2,779 year old poem, but its connotative diction is less formal and gives the reader more of a connection to the story that will likely last throughout the ages. Klay uses profanity throughout his work. This often leads to a work being devalued and underappreciated, but people who think this way forget how cursing is often used in the real world. Klay might use something along the lines of “Holy sh*t” when the protagonist sees a corpse, but like in this instance he often does so to present very strong emotions, and in a story filled with characters under the constant stress of war, it seems reasonable to use that type of language (Klay 31). This use of profanity can allow the reader to connect more with the characters since it does add a lot of realism to the story. If a reader can connect with people suffering because war, the theme that war brings out the worst of humanity does not seem far-fetched. Klay also uses profanity to show the character’s views on different events taking place. The protagonist describes his situation falsely telling stories as “bullsh*t, but every time [he] told the story, it felt better,” (Klay 35). This specific instance gives the reader insight to what the character is thinking, using profanity emphasizes how much the protagonist’s views have shifted. Both stories’ word choices are crucial to drawing the reader in, but “After Action Report” uses it to make the reader connect with the themes presented while The Iliad’s use of connotative diction makes it seem to fanciful.
The Iliad is also superior to “After Action Report” in symbolism when it comes to supporting theme. While both works have lots of symbolism, the Iliad truly shines when it comes to using the literary device. One important symbol in the story is Hector’s son. He was orignally seen as a sign of happiness and a bit of worry shown in “Hector’s son, the darling of his eyes and radiant as a star… Hector would always call the boy Scamandrius, townsmen called him Astyanax, Lord of the City… The great man of war breaking into a broad smile, his gaze fixed on his son… [Hector’s] fiery courage will destroy [him]. Have you no pity for him, out helpless son?…” (Homer 209). After the death of Hector, the son was seen as a sign of pity through quotes such as “Because you are dead, her great guardian, you who always defended Troy, who kept her loyal wives and helpless children safe… And you, my child, will follow me to labor, somewhere, at harsh, degrading work, slaving under some heartless master’s eye- that or some Achaean marauder will seize you by the arm and hurl you headlong down from the ramparts-horrible death…” (Homer 612). This symbol is used to represent how war affects those not involved. The son is meant to show that while war can be seen as a sign of pride and courage, resulting casualties are more than just affecting an individual. This is a powerful symbol to use because readers can see how war bringing out terrible aspects of humanity is harmful all around and it can cause them to support the theme. In “After Action Report”, there is a symbol that relates to the theme, the narrator’s PSP. This object started off as an escape from the stress of society, a way to get away from discussing the events of the day as seen through the line “We didn’t want to talk to anybody else. I got on my PSP, played Grand Theft Auto, and Timhead pulled out his Nintendo DS and played Pokemon Diamond.” (Klay 35). This went on for a while until the narrator destroyed it after the constant threat of IEDs, the lack of sleep, overall stress, and more had finally caught up with him as seen in the quote, “One convoy we stopped for two hours for an IED that turned out to just be random junk… I was chugging Rip Its, jacked up so much on caffeine that my hands were shaking… When I got back I smashed my PSP with a rock.” (Klay 39). This symbol is used to represent emotional stress. Right after the incident regarding shooting the kid, it was seen as an escape, but as the stress of that built up over time, the PSP was destroyed. This symbol does support the theme in showing sides to people that would remain hidden without stress of war. While “After Action Report” uses symbols to show theme just like the Iliad, it doesn’t show large scale effects of war bringing out terrible aspects of humanity like the Iliad does.
It may seem that since “After Action Report” does not possess as much imagery or symbolism to support theme that the theme must be misidentified. War bringing out the worst of humanity as a theme truly works in this story, and despite it not having as much imagery or symbolism, it still has some as presented in the paragraphs above. The overall plot of the story is truly the most impactful regarding theme. Timhead killing a thirteen or fourteen-year-old shows how people turn to extreme violence and murder during war and the fact that a thirteen or fourteen-year-old was driven to attempted homicide shows how terrible war can be. This is not something to take lightly, it wouldn’t be put into a fictional story without having some sort of purpose behind it, and that purpose was likely to show the way morals disappear during war.
Overall, Homer’s use of imagery and symbolism is superior to Phil Klay’s; though, Klay has strength in use of connotative diction when reinforcing theme. The literary devices of each work support the idea and theme that war is brutal and that it brings out the worst of humanity. With Homer’s imagery and symbolism giving the reader a deep literary insight to this idea and Klay’s connotative diction giving the reader an emotional connection to the topic, it’s easy to fully understand this. Reading these works allows someone to understand how war is a hindrance to society because of what it causes people to act like.
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