Anger is central to the Homeric epic, but few scholarly interventions have probed Homer’s language beyond the study of the Iliad’s first word: menis. Yet Homer uses over a dozen words for anger. Fighting Words and Feuding Words engages the powerful tools of Homeric poetic analysis and the anthropological study of emotion in an analysis of two anger terms highlighted in the Iliad by the Achaean prophet Calchas. Walsh argues that kotos and kholos locate two focal points for the study of aggression in Homeric poetry, the first presenting Homer’s terms for feud and the second providing the native terms that designates the martial violence highlighted by the Homeric tradition. After focusing on these two terms as used in the Iliad and the Odyssey, Walsh concludes by addressing some post-Homeric and comparative implications of Homeric anger.
Thomas R. Walsh is Associate Professor of English and Comparative Literary Studies at Occidental College.
Chapter 1 ForewordChapter 2 Introduction: Homeric AngerPart 3 Feuding WordsChapter 4 The Prophet DefinesChapter 5 Forms and FormulaeChapter 6 Kotos and Social StatusChapter 7 Anger's History: Kotos and EtymologyChapter 8 Anger's Aggression: The Wrath of FeudPart 9 Fighting WordsChapter 10 Helen's Cure and the End of AngerChapter 11 The Beginning of KholosChapter 12 Fighting WordsChapter 13 Fighting DeedsChapter 14 The Embassy, Kholos, and the Illiad's GenreChapter 15 The Cultural Poetics of Kholos in the IlliadChapter 16 Conclusions and a Comparison
