Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Song of Achilles, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Honor, Pride, and Legacy
Fate, Belief, and Control
Gender, Power, and Agency
Love, Violence, and Redemption
Selfhood and Responsibility
Summary
Analysis
While Patroclus was talking to Agamemnon, Achilles went to Thetis, and she came up with a plan: she’ll ask Zeus to ensure that the Greeks lose without Achilles fighting for them, so eventually Agamemnon will beg for him to return. After Achilles tells him this, Patroclus remembers a conversation he and Achilles once had with Chiron, in which Chiron disparaged the concept of a “nation,” telling them that no man’s life is more valuable than someone else’s. Achilles wondered at the time whether it matters if you know one person and not another, but Chiron protested that everyone is important to someone. In that light, he asked, whose life matters more? When they were 14, the question seemed impossible, and now that they’re 27 it still does. Patroclus knows that Achilles’s honor is his “child, his dearest self,” and Patroclus can’t save everyone who gets in the way of that honor, even though he saved Briseis. He now knows the answer to Chiron’s question: there’s no answer at all.
Earlier, the Greeks killed many Trojan farmers who had nothing to do with Paris or Helen. Now, Achilles will allow thousands of Greek soldiers to die who have nothing to do with Achilles’s quarrel with Agamemnon, and he’ll do so in order to maintain his honor. Again, this demonstrates how dishonorable Greek honor can be, since people’s lives are less important than the abstract concept of honor. Patroclus’s memory of Chiron demonstrates how radical Chiron really was: he essentially railed against the very concept of war itself, because wars are obviously founded on divisions between nations. That Achilles treats his honor like his child—when, in fact, he has an actual child—just shows how warping the Greek conception of honor is.
Themes
Patroclus goes to see Briseis. Achilles told Patroclus to say sorry to her on his behalf, though it’s not clear if Achilles is only sorry for what he did because he now has hit upon his new plan. Agamemnon has dressed Briseis in jewels, and has stipulated that Patroclus can come see her whenever he wants, though Agamemnon will remain in the room. When he arrives, Patroclus speaks to Briseis in her language, and asks if she’s alright. She says yes and asks how long it will be until she can leave, but Patroclus doesn’t know. The next morning, everyone but the Phthians go to fight. Patroclus and Achilles have as much free time as on Pelion, but it feels like they’re just waiting for something.
Achilles’s apology to Briseis does not indicate a larger change of heart. He still prioritizes his honor above all others, and is willing to see others hurt as he protects it. Briseis is in the same position she was going to be in when the war began. Agamemnon was planning to claim her as a war prize before Patroclus intervened, but she ended up as Agamemnon’s slave anyway, again suggesting that she never had any real agency. Even the fact that Agamemnon isn’t assaulting her is the result of someone else’s— Patroclus’s—intervention. Patroclus and Achilles are now in the same position they were in as children, able to spend their day freely, but this only reminds readers how far they’ve come since childhood: neither boy is innocent anymore, and their free time is the result of Achilles’s monstrous actions.
Themes
