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Act 3, Scene 2
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Troilus and Cressida, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
War
Love and Selfishness
Honor
Commodification of Women
Fate and Fortune
Summary
Analysis
In the Greek camp, Trojan defector Calchas asks Agamemnon to once again try ransoming his daughter from the city. The Greeks have several times offered to trade captured Trojans for Cressida but thus far have been rebuffed. But now that one of the Trojans’ more valuable warriors—Antenor—has been captured, Calchas is confident that they’ll agree. Agamemnon tells Diomedes to take the Trojan hostage to the city walls with the demand when he goes to tell Hector that Ajax will be ready to fight him the next morning.
No sooner have Cressida and Troilus consummated their love than Calchas begins scheming to tear his daughter away from Troy. They don’t know it yet, but the audience have front-row seats to the turn of fortune’s wheel. So many things, the play reminds the audience, happen to a person outside of their control. The world can be a painful and difficult place. It’s also noteworthy that Cressida becomes an object assigned a certain value in terms of prisoner exchange rather than a person in her own right, who might have her own ideas about staying in or abandoning Troy.
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Themes
As the council disbands, Ulysses decides to teach Achilles a lesson. He tells everyone to pass by the formerly revered warrior’s tent as if they neither know nor care who he is. Agamemnon, Nestor, Menelaus, Ajax, and the others do so. As expected, this greatly upsets Achilles, who complains that the goddess Fortune sems to have turned her back on him.
Achilles is, without question, the best and strongest of the Greek warriors. Thus far, his reputation has protected him from more severe consequences for his disobedience. The lords here aim to teach him a lesson, but note how they understand him as more vulnerable to an attack on his ego than to a rational appeal to his responsibilities. Those have already failed because, the play suggests, the only thing he really cares about is himself. Note that Achilles complains about Fortune abandoning him when, in reality, he’s brought this situation on himself. Not every bad thing that happens is random.
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Themes
Ulysses passes by, apparently reading a letter. When Achilles hails him, he explains that he’s struggling to understand the letter, which says that no one can know their own virtue unless the people around them reflect it back to them. Achilles says this makes sense. Likewise, a physical mirror is necessary if a person wants to know what their own face looks like. Yes, Ulysses agrees, the idea is common enough. What’s vexing him is its real-world application. For example, everyone is acting impressed with Ajax, even though he’s a great oaf.
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Themes
Achilles already knows this and is offended, since he has shown much more valor in battle than Ajax ever did. He points this out, and Ulysses replies that Achilles’s deeds are all in the past. Time has a way of diminishing things. Thus, minor accomplishments in the present can outweigh greater accomplishments in the past. If a man wants to be known for virtue or valor, he must behave virtuously or valorously all the time and not rest on his laurels.
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Achilles knows this. But, he tells Ulysses, he has his own private reasons for sitting on the sidelines. Everyone knows his reason, Ulysses retorts: he’s in love with the Trojan princess Polyxena. And it’s not very manly for a warrior to wish to vanquish a princess in bed rather than her warrior brother on the battlefield. What will Achilles’s son think, Ulysses asks, when he learns that someone other than his brave father bested Hector?
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Themes
Ulysses takes his leave. Patroclus turns on Achilles. What Ulysses said is what he’s been trying to say for weeks. It’s past time for Achilles to return to the field. Too late, Achilles perceives how low his reputation has fallen. But he cannot free himself from the thrall of his feelings for the princess. He decides to ask Ajax to invite Hector to a feast after their fight, so that Achilles can meet his beloved’s brother in person.
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Achilles is about to send Patroclus to fetch Thersites when Thersites happens along, complaining about what a pompous fool Ajax has become. Thersites describes how Ajax now strides around self-importantly and no longer deigns to talk to anyone lowlier than Agamemnon. Here, Thersites says, if Patroclus pretends to be fetching Ajax, he’ll act out Ajax’s response. Patroclus agrees. When he pretends to summon Ajax to speak with Achilles, Thersites grunts and says that Achilles must earn the privilege of speaking to such a great hero as himself. Despite this warning, Achilles asks Thersites to bring Ajax a letter anyway, to which Thersites reluctantly agrees.
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