The Song of Achilles

I hate when I (either intentionally or subconsciously) resist reading a very popular bestseller for years only to discover when I finally crack the cover that everyone was right and it's absolutely incredible.

I've always been fascinated by the battle of Troy. There are so many different ways to tell that story, yet this one is completely new to me. Rather than following Achilles, this one follows in the first-person from Patroclus point of view, digging into his complicated relationship with Achilles. While the movie Troy does a great job of telling many things, it portrays Achilles much differently than Homer does in The Illiad. “The Song of Achilles” leans closer to Homers telling, shedding light on the secret affairs, dark prophecies and battle of egos.

Madeline Miller’s second book, Circe, is a book I really liked. I blew through it in a single day, because it was one of those books I just could not put down. I liked the ethereal, aloof, otherworldly character of Circe, whom I thought was very well-written as a character not-quite-of-this-earth. The whole thing felt strange, foreign, peculiar, which seemed appropriate. In The Song of Achilles, I learn that this is just how Madeline Miller writes her protagonists. And although very appropriate for a half-goddess recluse mystic, it’s less appropriate for an ancient twink. There is some good gay longing in this book, though. From Chapter 5:

“He was like a flame himself. He glittered, drew eyes. There was a glamour to him, even on waking, with his hair tousled and his face still muddied with sleep. Up close, his feet looked almost unearthly: the perfectly formed pads of the toes, the tendons that flickered like lyre strings.”

I have respect for the boldness of spirit and enterprising nature that it takes for a NYT best-selling book about Ancient Greek fan-fiction to give Patroclus from the Illiad a foot fetish. Like Cirice and Lavinia, this is a feminist re-telling of something plucked out of the world of classical antiquity, re-writing Achilles and Patroclus as kind of sympathetic pre-allies for their treatment of Briseis and their burgeoning throuple status. Despite some highlights and some genuinely emotionally charged moments, I generally didn’t like this book. It’s written to be so flighty, so aloof, and so unearthly. It feels too light.