WEBVTT
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War with Troy: The Story of Achilles
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Told by Daniel Morden and Hugh Lupton.
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Episode 6: Greek on Greek - Wounded Pride
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[Opening music]
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Inside their city, the Trojans waited for the Greeks to give up and sail home.
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In their camp, the Greeks waited for the Trojans to emerge so that they could sack this city.
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Whole years went by without a single battle.
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The Greeks in their camp became restless, impatient.
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Old, stupid rivalries began to rear their heads among the many Greek kings.
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The high king of the whole camp,
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the high king of all of Greece, Agamemnon,
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became worried.
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He could see that soon this camp would become a kind of war.
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The biggest threat of all, of course,
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came from the swift-runner,
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the son of Peleus and Thetis,
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Achilles.
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This was not a man who enjoyed waiting.
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This was a man who loved to hunt, to fight, to kill.
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He prowled around the camp like a caged beast,
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staring, glaring at anyone who dared even to look at him.
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Agamemnon had an idea.
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He ordered the swift-runner Achilles to set off in a ship and sail up and down the coast,
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attacking anywhere known to be sympathetic to the Trojans.
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In this way, Achilles was away for years,
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attacking, sacking, looting, burning anywhere that nurtured men and women.
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When finally he returned to the Greek camp,
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what a hoard he brought with him!
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Gold, jewels, weapons, tools, food, wine and slaves.
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Among the slaves,
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the high King Agamemnon saw a woman –
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a daughter of a priest of Apollo.
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As soon as Agamemnon saw her,
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he wanted her for himself.
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He wanted her for his bed.
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And so he took her.
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Among the slaves,
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the only one who was a match for this daughter of a priest of Apollo,
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was a woman named Briseis.
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Agamemnon, with great ceremony,
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gave this Briseis to Achilles to thank him for all the things that he had done during his voyage,
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as though that voyage had brought glory onto the Greeks instead of shame.
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But, up above,
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Trojan-loving Apollo was watching and listening.
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These Greeks, first they attack and besiege his favourite city,
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then they slaughter its children,
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and now they enslave the daughter of his loyal priest!
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The lord of light, the mighty archer,
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has many awful ways to punish men and women.
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By night, under cover of darkness,
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he sent into the Greek camp tens, hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of silky, grey backs –
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field mice –
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that brought with them a sickness that thrived on the pools of filthy water,
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the heaps of stinking rubbish that had gathered in the Greek camp over the years.
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The first the Greeks knew of it was when the stray dogs of the camp died one by one.
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Then goats, mules, horses began to die.
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And then men.
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It was an awful sight to see a man with whom you’d risked your life wither away,
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age whole years across a single day, and die.
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The plague prowled through the camp for months.
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Eventually Achilles called a meeting in the gathering place.
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He said,
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“Look, wherever I turn I can see rising into the sky the smoke of funeral pyres.
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There is, among our number,
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one who can understand the moods of the gods and goddesses by the patterns the birds make as they fly through the sky.
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We have a prophet, a seer, a wise man:
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far-sighted Calchas should speak.”
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Old Calchas winced.
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He said,
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“Swift-runner Achilles,
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please, promise me your protection before I explain the source of this plague because the bearer of bad news is never welcome and my words will bring upon me the anger of the powerful.”
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Achilles nodded.
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Old Calchas said,
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“This plague has been sent by the lord of light.
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Apollo is furious with us because our high king, Agamemnon,
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has taken to his bed a daughter of Apollo’s loyal priest.
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Until that woman is set free,
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every day will see more dead.”
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“Old man,”
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said Agamemnon,
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“would good news burn your tongue?
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Never a prophecy of victory for me –
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only more bad news,
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heaped upon the one who pays for your food!
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I love this woman,
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this daughter of a priest of Apollo.
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I love her as dearly as I love my own wife,
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Clytemnestra, so far away.
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But, since I value the well-being of my subjects –
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you, my armies –
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more than I do my own peace of mind,
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I will let this woman go.
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I’ll let her go tomorrow, with gold,
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in one of my ships.
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However, this means that I,
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your high king,
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am to go without the treasures of Achilles’ voyage.
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That is unthinkable!
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If I’m to let this woman go,
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I want one in return!”
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“From where?” said Achilles.
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“There are no slaves left to be shared out.
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You, of all of us, know that.
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When Troy falls you’ll be given three or four slaves to make up for the one you let go today.”
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“Why, thank you,”
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said Agamemnon.
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“But I seem to remember that I am the high king of this army and not you.
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You are just another prince under my command.
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Your good opinion of me means nothing to me!
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But since you’re so keen to make up for my loss,
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I will take a slave from you.
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Yes!
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Yes, that Briseis.
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I gave her to you when you returned to this camp.
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I take her now.
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She is mine now!”
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Achilles took a little step forward then.
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He felt a hand on his shoulder.
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He looked behind him.
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There was his best friend Patroclus,
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shaking his head.
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Achilles stepped back.
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Were it not for the hand of his friend,
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Achilles would have jumped,
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beaten the high King Agamemnon to the ground,
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torn off his shiny breastplate and scooped his beating heart out of his chest.
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“Take her!”
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said Achilles,
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“But this means the son of Peleus and Thetis will not fight for you again.
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No oath binds me to the protection of Helen.
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I was not one of those kings who stood on the severed limbs of a stallion and swore to protect her years ago.
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And yet I have fought for you for years.
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I’ve waded through fields of blood.
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And for what?
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So that when finally I find a woman,
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you can take her from me?
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Well, I will not fight for you again,
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not if you beg me!”
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“Good!” said Agamemnon.
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“Go, leave this place.
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By tomorrow you’d be forgotten.
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Just some stupid boy who’s not man enough to take a command.
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You are not a warrior.
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Why the lowliest soldier in the shabbiest squad in this army knows,
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to win this war, he must obey me.
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He must obey his king.
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You are a monster.
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I have never seen such delight in the eyes of one when he took the life of another.
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This army, my camp is better off without you!”
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And he turned and he was gone.
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The crowd was gone in moments,
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leaving only Achilles and Patroclus in their place,
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Achilles shaking with fury.
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And so it was, the next day the daughter of the priest of Apollo was set free.
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She sailed home in one of Agamemnon’s ships with gold.
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As soon as she reached her homeland,
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the plague in the Greek camp ended.
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Apollo turned his glare elsewhere.
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And so it was, two servants were sent across the camp,
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down to where the breakers crash and drag,
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down to Achilles’ hut,
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to demand he give up his slave Briseis.
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They were terrified as they approached his hut but he welcomed them politely.
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He let the woman go readily.
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He embraced her one last time.
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There were tears in their eyes when they parted and then Briseis walked across the camp to Agamemnon’s hut,
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to Agamemnon’s bed.
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That night,
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when the sky was bright with stars,
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the swift-runner Achilles walked to the edge of the ocean,
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waded into the shallows,
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sank to his knees,
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and his face creased into a childish sob.
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Through his tears he saw the shining path made by the moon.
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Down that path walked Thetis.
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“Mother, many’s the time in father’s hall I heard you say that Zeus desired you.
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Go to him now.
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He could make these Greeks taste pain.
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I want blood in the sand!
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I want the ships of this camp burning!
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And then these Greeks will remember that I was out on the battlefield every day,
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cutting off heads with every stroke of my sword,
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while their thorn-hearted,
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dog-faced king cowered behind the palisade.”
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“My dear son,” she said,
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“I can refuse you nothing.
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I will go to Zeus, whose temple is the sky,
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and he will grant your wish.
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Until then, stay by your ships.”
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And she rose up into the heavens.
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She made her way through the clouds,
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high and high and high,
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until she came to the slopes of Mount Olympus,
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and there was Zeus’ palace.
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She ran in through the doors.
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There was Zeus himself, the cloud-compeller,
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sitting on his golden throne.
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Thetis threw herself onto the floor at his feet.
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She curled her left arm over his knees and she said,
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“Great Zeus, if ever I have pleased you in word or in deed,
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listen to me now!
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My son, Achilles,
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has been bitterly insulted by swaggering Agamemnon.
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Agamemnon has taken his woman,
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who he won in warfare.
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He has taken her to his own bed.
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And now my son refuses to fight.
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He will not lift a sword for the Greeks.
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He has retired from the fray.
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Oh great Zeus,
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I beg you,
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teach that swaggering,
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dog-faced Agamemnon how much he needs my son.
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Give the Trojans a tremendous victory.
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May the Greeks wallow in their own gore!
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May they be steeped in their own blood!
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If you grant my wish then bow your head in agreement.
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If you do not bow your head,
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I know that I, of all immortals,
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count for least.”
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And great Zeus listened.
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And he pondered in his heart.
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And then he bowed his head and he said,
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“I grant your wish.”
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And he said,
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“These things I will bring to pass.”
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And he thought
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“In my own way.”
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And Thetis thanked him with all of her heart and then she descended from the heavens.
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And no sooner was she gone than Hera,
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ox-eyed Hera, the queen of heaven, Zeus’ wife,
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and Athene, goddess of war and wisdom,
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came striding into Zeus’ palace.
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And Hera sniffed at the air.
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“I smell fish!
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That sea-nymph Thetis must have been here.
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What did she want?”
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And Zeus said,
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“She asked a favour and I have granted it.”
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And he smiled,
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and he got up to his feet,
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and he made his way out of his palace and he descended from the heavens down and down and down and down to a rocky crag on Mount Ida,
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the great mountain that stretched up behind the city walls of Troy.
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And he sat and he waited until the dawn took her golden throne.
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And he looked down at the city of Troy,
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ringed in stone with its shining diadem of towers.
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And he looked across the plain and the Greek camp and the blue waves of the sea,
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and he lifted his right hand and, in it,
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he was holding a set of golden scales.
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And into one pan of the scales,
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he put the luck of the Greek army;
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and into the other pan of the scales,
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he put the luck of the Trojan army.
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And he held the scales by the centre of the beam and he watched as the Greek luck sank down and down and down,
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towards Hades’ halls.
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And the Trojan luck soared up into the skies.
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[Closing music]