Prompts for paper 2
Please use the same guidelines as for paper one regarding structure and organization. (double-spaced, with separate title page, it’s okay if
you happen to write a little more than 4 pages, however, we will stop reading at 5 pages.
The prompt is a general guide to spur your own thinking on the topic. Please do not feel you have to answer any and every question contained in
the prompt; the questions are only meant to catalyze your own thinking
Please use good essay style, organization is paramount, please have a thesis, please link your paragraphs back to your thesis, please have a
conclusion.
Do not summarize or quote any sources from the internet. Only use primary sources given for the class.)
The only difference is the length, 4-6 pages.
You may also write on a topic of your choice, provided you get it approved.
There will be a turnitin link for the paper. Please turn it in as a hard copy in section and through the turnitin link on BB.
1. Please discuss the relationship between violence and the heroic in any two works we have read, Iliad, Gita, or the Odyssey.
2. What do you think the effect of listening to Homer would have been on citizens in the early polis? What life lessons might a citizen of a
burgeoning democracy have drawn from the Iliad, the Odyssey, or both?
3. Who offers a better conception of the hero – Achilles or Odysseus? Why?
4. How do mortals and immortals interact in the Iliad and Odyssey? Is there a difference in this between the two poems?
5. How significant are mortal women in the Iliad ? What roles do they have? What statuses do they occupy? What kinds of stereotypes apply to
them? Do you see a difference between the way women are depicted in the Iliad and Odyssey?
6. Does the mortal realm of women map onto or correspond with the realm of immortal women, i.e. goddesses in the Iliad and Odyssey? Or, to put
another way, what are the differences and similarities between women and goddesses?
7. What role does food play in the Iliad and Odyssey? What is food, where does it come from, how is obtained? How does food serve to define or
demarcate human beings?