The Story of the Iliad by Alfred John Church

The Story of the Iliad retells Homer's epic for young readers, tracing the final weeks of the Trojan War after Paris of Troy abducts Helen, wife of Menelaus, prompting the Greeks under Agamemnon to besiege Troy for nine years. The narrative opens with Agamemnon's insult to Apollo's priest Chryses, which brings a plague on the Greek camp; when the seer Calchas reveals the cause, Agamemnon surrenders the priest's daughter but seizes Achilles' prize, the maiden Briseis, provoking Achilles' famous wrath. Achilles withdraws from battle and, through his sea-goddess mother Thetis, persuades Zeus to favor the Trojans until Agamemnon makes amends. With Achilles absent, the war swings toward Troy. A duel between Menelaus and Paris is interrupted when the treacherous archer Pandarus, urged by scheming gods, breaks the truce by wounding Menelaus, reigniting full-scale war. Diomedes rises as the Greeks' champion, wounding even the gods Aphrodite and Ares on the battlefield. Hector, Troy's greatest warrior, bids an emotional farewell to his wife Andromache and infant son Astyanax before returning to the fighting, and later fights Ajax to an honorable draw. As Zeus tips the balance toward Troy, the Trojans breach the Greek wall and threaten to burn the ships; Agamemnon, humbled, sends an embassy—Odysseus, Ajax, and Phoenix—offering Achilles rich gifts and Briseis's return, but Achilles, still bitter, refuses and threatens to sail home. Desperate, Patroclus, Achilles' beloved companion, begs to wear Achilles' armor and lead the Myrmidons into battle to save the ships. Achilles agrees but warns him not to pursue the Trojans to their walls. Patroclus drives the Trojans back and kills the great ally Sarpedon, but, disobeying orders, presses toward Troy until the god Apollo strips him of his borrowed armor and Hector delivers the killing blow. Grief and rage over Patroclus's death transform Achilles: reconciled with Agamemnon, he receives magnificent new armor forged by Hephaestus (including the elaborately decorated shield) and returns to battle like an unstoppable force, even fighting the river-god Scamander and provoking a clash among the Olympian gods themselves. Achilles routs the Trojans and corners Hector outside the walls of Troy. Despite the pleas of his parents, Priam and Hecuba, Hector stands his ground, but at the last moment his courage fails and he flees; Achilles chases him three times around the city before the goddess Athena tricks Hector into turning to fight. Achilles kills him in single combat, then defiles the body by dragging it behind his chariot back to the Greek camp. Achilles holds elaborate funeral games in Patroclus's honor—chariot races, boxing, wrestling, and footraces among the Greek chiefs—while continuing to abuse Hector's corpse. Moved by the gods' pity, Zeus sends Thetis to persuade Achilles to release Hector's body for ransom. Old King Priam, guided secretly by Hermes, makes a perilous night journey to Achilles' tent, kneels before the man who killed so many of his sons, and begs for his son's body. Achilles, remembering his own father, is moved to compassion; the two share a meal and a moment of shared humanity before Priam returns to Troy with Hector's body. A truce allows the Trojans to mourn and give Hector a proper funeral, with lamentations from Andromache, Hecuba, and Helen closing the formal narrative. The book concludes with a brief coda beyond Homer's Iliad proper: Achilles himself is later killed by Paris's arrow, guided by Apollo, and the Greeks finally take Troy through the ruse of the Trojan Horse, smuggled into the city and opened from within to let the Greek army destroy it.

By Alfred John Church · First published 1891 · Genre: Epic, War Fiction, Mythology · 23 chapters · 58,760 words

First lines

Leda, Queen of Sparta, bare a daughter, Helen by name, that grew to / be the fairest of all women upon earth. She married Menelaus, son of / Atreus, and for a while dwelt in peace with her husband, bearing him / a daughter, Hermione by name. But there came to the court of / Menelaus, who was by this time King of Sparta, a certain Paris, / second in birth among the sons of Priam, King of Troy. Menelaus / entertained him hospitably, but Paris repaid his kindness with evil, / for he carried off his wife, the fair Helen, and took with her many / of the King's possessions.

/ Le'-da. Men-e-la'-us. Ag-a-mem'-non. Her-mi'-o-ne. A'-treus.

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The Story of the Iliad is listed on Textopian as a novella by Alfred John Church, dated 1891 CE.

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• Work type: Novella
• Author: Alfred John Church
• Date: 1891 CE
• Language: English
• Genres: Epic, War Fiction, Mythology, Adventure, Drama
• Length: 58,760 words
• Structure: 23 chapters, 670 paragraphs
• Reading fit: Easy (6th Grade)

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• Work identity for The Story of the Iliad by Alfred John Church
• Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
• Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
• Readability and classroom-planning context
• Passage-specific claims should cite the exact /read/ URL for the relevant chapter or paragraph

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Genres

• Epic — The narrative exemplifies the epic form with its grand scope, heroic protagonists, divine intervention, and extended narrative of the Trojan War spanning ten years of conflict.
• War Fiction — Military conflict and battle comprise the central narrative, with detailed descriptions of combat strategies, duels, sieges, and the tactical maneuvers of opposing armies.
• Mythology — Greek gods and goddesses actively shape events throughout, with Zeus, Athene, Apollo, Poseidon, and other immortals directly influencing mortal outcomes and appearing as characters.
• Adventure — The extended multi-year journey with perilous situations, dangerous encounters, and quests for glory and survival drive the overarching narrative structure.

Tags

epic · ancient-Greece · mythology · heroic · Trojan-War · classical-literature · adventure · warfare · gods · heroes · retelling · tragedy

Contents

• The Quarrel
• The Assembly
• The Duel of Paris and Menelaus
• The Broken Oath
• The Valiant Deeds of Diomed
• Glaucus and Diomed
• Hector and Andromache
• The Duel of Hector and Ajax
• The Battle on the Plain
• The Embassy to Achilles
• The Adventure of Ulysses and Diomed
• The Wounding of the Chiefs
• The Battle at the Wall
• The Battle at the Ships
• The Deeds and Death of Patroclus
• The Rousing of Achilles
• The Making of the Arms
• The Ending of the Strife
• The Battle at the River
• The Battle of the Gods
• The Slaying of Hector
• The Burning of Patroclus
• The Ransoming of Hector

More by Alfred John Church

• Stories of Charlemagne and the Twelve Peers of France (1902)
• All works by Alfred John Church