Troy Books for Boys

Abstract

This chapter examines two short classical works read by students at a lower level, and the interlinear glosses are more basic. They imprint on us the intimate, detailed knowledge of the words of the texts that the students imbibed. Both poems focus on issues of masculinity. In the Achilleid, the protagonist's mentors mirror his transitions from wild child to female impersonator to warrior in training, and his time pretending to be his own sister is framed by the fears first of his mother and then his lover (later wife). In the Ilias latina the increasing focus on death in battle evokes relentlessly the pathos of male characters, dying themselves or killing others. Yet the narrative ends with the grief of Hector's wife, Andromache, at his funeral.