Hero's Journey In The Iliad
All hero journeys begin with the departure. Here the hero will encounter a call to adventure and become aware of a certain problem, leaving the world they are used to. The hero will experience feelings of fear and perhaps refuse to find a solution to the problem. They will have to overcome this fear in order to take the next step towards reaching a psychological transformation. Overcoming their fear will sometimes be assisted by some sort of mentor or a supernatural aid. Stories like The Iliad and The Epic of Gilgamesh have examples of heroes that undergo these steps. In The Iliad, Achilles leaves his home in Greece to serve in the Trojan War as his call to adventure. He refuses to go to war because he was afraid
of looking like a coward in front of Agamemnon who took his girl as a replacement for the priest’s daughter,” I’ll send her back in my own ships with my crew. But I, I will be there in person at your tents to take Briseis in all her beauty…” (Iliad 100). Another example can be seen in The Epic of Gilgamesh when Gilgamesh left his home in Uruk to go to the forest and destroy Humbaba the giant. In Gilgamesh’s case, Shamash was the mentor helping him in sending winds as the supernatural aid,” The great winds he appointed..” (Gilgamesh 90). After heroes like these have crossed their known world, where they are comfortable, to the unknown world ,where they are vulnerable, they are on route to the next step in reaching a psychological transformation.
of looking like a coward in front of Agamemnon who took his girl as a replacement for the priest’s daughter,” I’ll send her back in my own ships with my crew. But I, I will be there in person at your tents to take Briseis in all her beauty…” (Iliad 100). Another example can be seen in The Epic of Gilgamesh when Gilgamesh left his home in Uruk to go to the forest and destroy Humbaba the giant. In Gilgamesh’s case, Shamash was the mentor helping him in sending winds as the supernatural aid,” The great winds he appointed..” (Gilgamesh 90). After heroes like these have crossed their known world, where they are comfortable, to the unknown world ,where they are vulnerable, they are on route to the next step in reaching a psychological transformation.