In a broader discussion of men's status and glory (kleos) in The Iliad, Homer describes women's societal roles in their connection to men and the gods. While the male characters are fixated primarily on war and the gods' prophecies, Helen is left to ponder the dreary emotions her circumstances evince. Although Homer initially portrays her as a spoil of war, Helen's relationships with Menelaus, Paris, Aphrodite, and Hektor shed a unique light on her subjugated position, and heighten her humanity to readers. Through more in-depth inquiry into Helen's encounters with these characters and the principles and hierarchies they observe, readers can glean moments that reveal her desires and agency.
Homer introduces Helen in Book II as the wife of Menelaus, King of Sparta. Her beauty is known around the world –– even before she enters the story, Paris and Menelaus organize an international duel to decide her fate in marriage. Paris says to Menelaus:
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to fight together for the sake of Helen and all her possessions. That one of us who wins and is proved stronger, let him take the possessions fairly and the woman, and lead her homeward (III. 70-72)
By placing her as the prize of the duel, Homer imbues no sense of power in Helen; he uses her superficially as a symbol of strength and glory, reinforcing women's secondary role in their society. While her husband and Paris prepare to duel, Helen weaves a 'red folding robe' with the 'numerous struggles of Trojans… struggles that they endured for her sake at the hands of the war god (III. 126-129).' Homer uses Helen symbolically again here; however, in this instance, he describes the patterns she weaves into her tapestry, giving her a unique insight into the destiny of the men objectifying her. Moreover, this moment reveals Helen's capacity for foresight, a quality revered in Homeric times because of its rarity and tactfulness (characters laud Odysseus for his cunning anticipations of the future). But neither Paris nor Menelaus pays any attention to her weavings and the dismal fate they may foreshadow; they only care about beating the other and claiming their prize.
The role of divinity in Helen's deliverance to Paris further complicates our understanding of Helen's desires and her agency. When Paris accepted Aphrodite's bribe –– to help him win the most beautiful woman in the world –– he elected her most beautiful in Zeus' beauty pageant, and in turn, curries favor from her. Aphrodite convinces Helen to escape with her to Paris's quarters by metamorphosing into the figure of a wise old wool dresser. As Menelaus makes his final move to kill Paris in their duel, Aphrodite, 'since she was divine, [and] wrapped him in a thick mist and set him down again in his perfumed bedchamber (III. 380-382).' Helen, recognizing this ploy, asks Aphrodite: 'Why are you still so stubborn to beguile me? Will you carry me further yet somewhere among cities fairly settled (III. 399-401)?' Helen makes it clear that she does not want to go to Paris' bedchamber, and instead wishes to go to a 'fairly settled' city, one where she can find peace. But Aphrodite wishes to help Paris fulfill his lustful desires, and persuades Helen to acknowledge their coalescing beauty. The dissonance between Aphrodite's intentions for Helen and Helen's wishes is particularly fascinating. Although Helen wishes to stay with Menelaus and return with him to Sparta as she sees he is rightfully entitled, Aphrodite, insists she is with Paris instead because of her appreciation for his external features. Helen's coerced decision projects a severe strain on Meneleus's kleos, galvanizing the war between the Trojans and Spartans –– and, eventually, the Greeks. But without Aphrodite's intervention, Helen would return to her nostos with Menelaus according to the fixed ethical codes of Homeric society, and the war would never happen. Moreover, Helen's resignation to go with Aphrodite and Paris illustrates her lack of agency as a mortal woman, reiterating her subordinate position in Homer's world.
Helen attempts to rationalize her sprawling emotions when she confides in Hektor in Book VI. As the son of King Priam and the leader of the Trojan army, he must serve as a symbol of strength in times of war to signal stability to his people. By going to Hektor, Helen is trying both to express her guilt and forestall the impending war between the Trojans and Spartans. She says:
Brother / by marriage to me, who am a nasty bitch evil-intriguing, / how I wish that on that day when my mother first bore me / the foul whirlwind of the storm had caught me away and swept me / to the mountain, or into the wash of the sea deep-thundering / where the waves would have swept me away before all these things had/happened (VI. 343-348).
This moment reveals Helen's desire to restore peace –– as she wished to have with Menelaus –– between the quarreling nations 'before all these things had/happened.' But the guilt she feels is in direct correlation with Menelaus' rage, and she must embrace the 'whirlwind' in which she finds herself caught. She continues:
Yet since the gods had brought it about that these vile things must be, / I wish I had been the wife of a better man than this is, / one who knew modesty and all things of shame that men say. But this man's heart is no steadfast thing, nor yet will it be so / ever hereafter; for that, I think he shall take the consequence. / But come now, come in and rest on this chair, my brother, / since it is on your heart beyond all that the hard work has fallen / for the sake of dishonored me and the blind act of Alexandros (Paris), / us two, on whom Zeus set a vile destiny, so that hereafter / we shall be made into things of the song for the men of the future (VI. 349-358)
As the leader of the Spartan army, Menelaus also must project strength and integrity to maintain harmony for his nation. To allow Paris to cuckold him, even after he cowered away from their duel, would be akin to conceding both his honor and the honor of his nation. Helen, in one of her few speaking roles in the story, asks Hektor to sit with her –– she has come to accept the fate, Zeus and Aphrodite carved, and wants Hektor to marvel with her at their misfortune that one day 'shall be made into things of the song for the men of the future.' Although Helen understands Menaleus' rage and reasons for violence, she also recognizes that this outcome will be 'vile.' She attacks Paris for his lack of honor and 'modesty,' but also understands 'man's heart is no steadfast thing.' Maybe, she hopes, men will write songs of her beauty and the war it inspired so that they can prevent history from repeating itself.
Helen fades into the background during the war, as the speaker develops various other interplaying storylines, but emerges again in Book XXIV, bookending the conflict with a somber message. When Helen addresses King Priam and his company in the third and last 'song of sorrow,' she recalls her fond memory of Hektor as a friend and expresses her guilt again for her role in starting the war. Helen says:
Hektor, of all my lord's brothers dearest by far to my spirit: / My husband is Alexandros, like an immortal, who brought me / here to Troy; and I should have died before I came with him (XXIV 762-763)
At this moment, Helen reminds readers of her lack of agency. She indirectly describes Paris and Meneleus's quarrel over her as a microcosm of the twisted ethical principles people in Homer's world adhere to, wishing she had died instead. Aphrodite's imposition on her homecoming (nostos) with Menelaus furthermore contributes to the discussion of men's glory and reputation in the Iliad. Because Helen was denied the opportunity to return home and live a peaceful life, and forced into a superficially glamorous relationship with Paris, she has to deal with the cascading ramifications of her ex-husband's rage.
In the only shared passage of Homer's epics, Homer describes the patterns on Achilles's shield: '...wrought in all their beauty two cities of mortal men (XVIII 490-491)' –– one of peace (nostos) the other of rage (kleos). Homer's Iliad is often referred to as the book of kleos; his sequel, The Odyssey, is referred to as the book of nostos. Whether they act of their own volition or are circumstantially motivated, characters in The Iliad choose the path of kleos; they rage against opposing characters to establish their status and glory. But Helen, from the beginning of Book II, seems to suggest that she was doomed to follow this path. Because of her remarkable beauty, Helen becomes entangled in the interplaying power struggles between Menelaus, Paris, Aphrodite, and Hektor, and can only express her agency in sole moments of reflection. When other characters such as Achilles come to understand their superficially glorious fate, they too try to forestall their demise –– realizing too late, their instinct for violence is misguided. Helen's role in The Iliad not only illustrates the subordinate, objectified nature of women in Homer's world but also offers unique commentary on the irritable nature of the men and gods' conflicts leading to war. I still wonder, however, if Helen were to challenge the authority of Aphrodite or disguised her beauty in some way like Odysseus does upon his return to Ithaca, could she have extricated herself from her destined path? Homer seems to suggest this outcome would take a universal change of perspective –– a dedication to nostos amongst men and gods alike. But the hierarchical nature of Homer's world inherently breeds discord, and, apart from deceit, the only way to find peace is to remove oneself from these power struggles entirely.
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