A Review of ‘The Song of Achilles’ by Madeline Miller
Sometimes - just sometimes - a book comes along that changes you. When you close it and step back into everyday life, you’re not quite the same person any more. For me, this was such a book. It’s that good. I’m not surprised that Madeline Miller has won the Orange Prize and I warmly congratulate her on her well-deserved success.
Yet who would have thought that fan-fiction - and slash fan-fiction at that - would win a major award? I daresay some people would think it insulting to call it that, but insult is not intended, only compliment. And I daresay that some people would say it was too well-written to be called that, but such people would only be insulting fan-fiction writers, as if such writing is, by definition, poor, which is far from being the case.
So, is it fan-fiction? Does it tick all the boxes? Based on known characters, originally created by another? Check. Using already-published work and giving it a new twist? Check. Filling out incomplete or unsatisfactory parts of the story to make things happen the way we want them to? Check. And is it slash? Taking a pair whose relationship is only hinted at or implied, and making it real? Giving them real live sex scenes? Taking their relationship to a new level of purity, loyalty and devotion? Check, check, check.
Madeline Miller herself knew that her book would be seen this way. In an article for the Daily Telegraph, she said:
“When I finished the first chapter, I made the mistake of telling my classicist boyfriend. He accused me of writing ‘Homeric fan fiction’. ‘Do you really think that you could ever be as good as Homer?’ he asked. I twisted my hands guiltily. Of course I didn’t. ‘But maybe the piece could still be good, just on its own?’ “
Well, if that boyfriend didn’t think so, I certainly do. Because the quality of the writing is breath-taking. ‘Hidden by the patchwork leaves’; ‘soft and round and giddy with pollen’; ‘Iphigenia. A tripping name, the sound of goat hooves on rock, quick, lively, lovely’; not a page goes by without some original simile, stunning metaphor or beautifully rhythmic phrase. The dialogue, too, is immensely pleasing. She has caught the perfect balance that you need to make a distant age come alive. Too formal, and it sounds silly and archaic. Too casual, and it sounds modern and drags you out of the story. This elegant simplicity is just right, and within it, each character still has his or her own voice.
I would not say, as one reviewer did, that it ‘never jars’, because now and then, to me, it does. But these instances are matters of vocabulary only, and I am certain that much thought was given to their inclusion. Myself, I would not use the words ‘hour’, ‘minute’, ‘lunch’ or ‘dessert’ when writing of any period of ancient Greece, not even Hellenistic and certainly not this early, but you have to say something, and I respect her decisions, feeling sure that they were not taken lightly. The slightly coy ‘servants’ instead of ‘slaves’, is even more understandable.
The use of tenses, changing from past to present and back again, is a real strength, that has something epic about it in itself. The characterisation, too, is astonishing. To interpret the cunning of Odysseus as cruel and manipulative makes the reader take a fresh look at a familiar character, and the treatment of Thetis is even more amazing. She is so cold and frightening, yet entirely believable. The descriptions of her appearance, her voice, and her dwelling are some of the most powerful in the book, and equally strong is the identification of the sea with all that is cold and dark and frightening.
Echoes of Homer’s poetry come through the writing, with deftness of touch, from direct tributes - ‘rosy-fingered dawn’ - to new phrases used in similar ways - ‘rain-swelled clouds’, ‘fat-bellied traders’ and many more, such a pleasing thing on a very deep level, like a familiar bass line with a new melody on top. When imagery and rhythm combine, as they so often do, we are in a place beyond poetry, where all we can do is feel the words:
“Achilles returns to the tent, where my body waits. He is red and red and rust-red, up to his elbows, his knees, his neck, as if he has swum in the vast dark chambers of a heart, and emerged, just now, still dripping.”
I think that three kinds of reader will pick up this book, and the first will be those who are attracted by exquisite writing, and I do not think they will be disappointed at all.
The second kind will be those who are attracted by a historical story, and they too will find huge amounts to enjoy. This book does not merely re-tell the Iliad. Choice pieces from the entire literature of ancient Greece are carefully selected for the light they throw upon the lives of Patroclus and Achilles, and other major characters such as Agamemnon and Odysseus and lesser characters like Iphigenia and Deidameia. Characters with one foot in the realm of myth are placed firmly in the real world, in a real time and real places. Even the gods, when walking on earth, are visible and tangible. All these elements are woven together with a steady hand, so that no joins are visible and the story has a strong integrity of its own. Even better, it is told with vigour and pace, so that it is very hard to put down, and the reader is constantly being drawn on and wishing to see what happens next. This may be the development of a relationship as much as the action of the battles or the unfolding of the drama. Some readers may well see this as a welcome balance; others may, with justification, point out that for a book about Achilles, there are not many battle scenes.
Once we are at Troy, we spend more time on the ‘home front’ with Patroclus and Briseis than we do with Achilles, and that is all very well, but although the story is the story of Patroclus, the book is still called ‘The Song of Achilles’ and Achilles is, supremely, a fighter. Yes, there is his love for Patroclus, of course, and yes, there are his hubris and his honour and his pride, but these things are given their due weight, and his physical prowess is not. When they called him Aristos Achaion they did not mean the most rounded human being among the Greeks, but the best at killing Trojans. These were men who lived weapons, dogs and horses, and we hear so little of these three that we could easily come away with the impression that Achilles only had one kind of spear, which he threw or thrust as occasion demanded. I don’t think even Ajax could have thrown a thrusting spear very far.
The battle descriptions that we do get are very good, vivid and gripping with great imagery, but the mood is usually one of pity, for the folly and waste of bloodshed. It is strange, in a book so deep, that considers with such thoughtfulness and beauty every emotion of the human heart, that the war itself becomes almost a side show, and Achilles’ battle skills glossed over apologetically. We see something of the mixed emotions of the soldier, it is true, but nothing of why men go to war and what they get out of it. In this era, when individual prowess is what counts, and you are up against hostile gods as well as the enemy, every victory and every death you cause is a triumph, because it was them not you, and your reputation has been enhanced. Maybe it is impossible to show such feelings without alienating the modern reader, but approval of fighting for glory as opposed to fighting for greed might have done the trick, instead of leaving the reader with a vague feeling that both are being equally disapproved of.
One thing I was eagerly looking forward to as I read this book was how it would capture a very much earlier world than that of Alexander and Hephaistion. Would it feel more ancient, less developed, or would it just be a generic sort of ancient Greece? I was very much impressed. This was a different world indeed. A world of countries is described, and the reader, knowing just how small those countries really were, gets an immediate sense of how small the world still is. And these countries are ruled by men who call themselves kings, but we quickly see that they are at the top of the heap because they are the strongest. Their position relies on the protection they can afford to those lower down, and any sign of weakness will have the neighbours creeping closer to grab more land and gold for themselves. It is an unspoilt world,
with buildings simple and few, and wild nature all around. There is wealth, and food in plenty, at least for the nobles, but little culture. No reading or writing, no literature; craftsmanship, not art; superstition in plenty, and fear of gods who are terrible and real. The epithet ‘pious’ is earned by a man who simply considers that the gods may care how a man behaves, and the law consists of a set of unwritten rules. One very gripping thing is how little there is to do, so that some dice to play with is a wonderful thing to the child Patroclus. So, although there are of course the sea, the olive groves, goats and so on, that appear in Greece in any era (and still do) there are plenty of elements that set the story firmly in the very ancient past, and then specifics - iron is rare and precious, while gold and bronze, polished wood, oil and wool are very valuable and prized commodities - set us firmly in the late bronze age and approximately 1300 BC.
There are centuries to go before there is an Athens to build democracy in, and the Pella where Aristotle lived and taught lies in an impossibly sophisticated future. Much as I admire the writing, I admire the timeset even more.
The third kind of reader who will pick up this book is the one who is attracted by the loving relationship of Achilles and Patroclus, and some of those will not be disappointed. The relationship is the heart of the story, and the reason why a book called ‘The Song of Achilles’ is told in the first person by Patroclus. Those who expect a normal human relationship with its ups and downs will have no problem at all, for there are very few downs at all, and as happy an ending as the ‘canon’ will allow.
But there are times when the slash fans will want to hurl the book forcefully at the wall, and these times are the reason I said I had never read a book that delighted me and frustrated me so much at the same time. The trouble is that their relationship is built up as perfect for so long, that we are beguiled into seeing them as OTP (one true pair) and there are things that OTPs do and things that they do not. (It is as if Cinderella, having behaved as a perfect fairy-tale heroine for many scenes, suddenly lost her temper with the bluebirds and told the Fairy Godmother not to patronise her. If she had been ‘ordinary’ right from the start, it would not have come as such a shock.)
At first, all is fine. We see Patroclus, so lonely, so self-critical, so unloved, at first admiring Achilles, who is everything he wishes he could be, almost with jealousy. When Achilles holds out friendship, Patroclus blossoms into all that he is meant to be. There is a sensuality in his admiration of Achilles right from the start, and the way this grows, so gradually, so subtly, as the boys themselves grow, is sublime and beautifully written and incomparably good. The growing love and trust between them is intensely satisfying. And then we come to the scene where sharing a bed, as they have done for years, becomes a lot more.
It is curious to think that for many readers, this will have come over as most original and daring, while to slash fans, of course, it is so much a commonplace it is almost a cliché. Myself, I thought it was beautifully done, I loved it. Personally, I am in the ‘use the right words and be done with it’ camp, and try to avoid euphemism. Here, both are avoided, with consummate skill. I think the wings of the tweeness bird are beating in the distance, but the bird does not land.
They are young men, beautiful and in love with each other, and everything is perfect.
The first alarm bells start to ring when Deidameia comes on the scene. Not because Achilles sleeps with her - of course he does, he has a son, there is no getting away from that - but because Patroclus does. What’s that all about? Apparently, he feels sorry for her. And he doesn’t tell Achilles about it. He has deceived him, and it leaves me feeling very uneasy.
And when they get to Troy, things start getting worse. Patroclus does not fight. OK, he has good reason to dislike the idea of killing, but is it really believable that such a man would have been allowed to grow up without learning to fight? He is, in fact, a complete wuss who would have died in his first battle if Achilles had not been guarding him. And we are asked to believe that such a man could convince the enemy that he was Achilles, just by wearing his armour, and that he suddenly managed to kill some of them. I don’t care how inspired by the gods he was, a man like that would not have lasted two minutes against Sarpedon.
He becomes a surgeon, and heals instead of killing. He stays behind, doing the cooking, while Achilles goes off each day to fight, and befriends the women, notably Briseis. Here, I feel, Madeline Miller has fallen into the trap of letting a character have a modern outlook. Perhaps it is necessary, to keep the reader’s sympathy, but to me, such a great writer should have been able to retain sympathy without losing the ancient world mindset.
I am not saying that this spoils the relationship between Achilles and Patroclus - opposites attract, and Achilles (in this book) loves Patroclus because he is different. And it is an observable fact that in many loving male/male relationships, one is gentler than the other. I just don’t think that this is fair to Patroclus or true to Homer, or indeed true to the pre-Christian world.
Briseis falls in love with Patroclus, and he does love her, even though he remains loyal to Achilles. He acknowledges that she would have been the woman he would have chosen, had things been different. In fact, Briseis is so attractive and perfect, and insinuates herself between them so subtly, that the words ‘Mary-Sue’ start ringing in my ears. This is classic slash fudge, written by women who can’t handle the idea that their heroes wouldn’t have looked twice at them, and it disappoints me very much, after all the beauty that has gone before.
But the really infuriating thing is that Patroclus betrays Achilles to save Briseis from being raped by Agamemnon. Many readers may think he did the right thing. From a modern world point of view, he probably did. But Achilles says, “You chose her. Over me.”
And he did. And that is wrong, wrong, wrong. Shout at him, yes, tell him he is making a mistake, yes, but once he has made his decision - which is his to make - you back him up, right or wrong. I won’t say it ruined the whole book for me, but it came close.
Lots of people don’t really like Achilles. They don’t like his pride and stubbornness, the way he will let Greeks die for want of him, just to prove a point, just because he is right. But that is who Achilles is, it is his character, his strength, his glory. His whole reputation - the thing he has accepted an early death for - hangs on this thread. He will not compromise, he is all or nothing, and I love him for it and always have. And Patroclus should have known that and gloried in it, not waltzed in with his twenty-first century sensibilities and spoiled everything.
In conclusion, I will say that the inevitable ending is handled with great power and beauty and leaves nothing to be desired. The voice of Patroclus after his death is comfort and pain together, all that matters now is Achilles’ revenge and his own death, and these too are beautifully written. The fall of Troy, the outrageous Neoptolemus, nothing much matters now except the final question - will they be reunited? And what a lovely twist at the end, that this is finally made real, by of all people, Thetis.
This ending is better than Homer. What do I care about the funeral games of Hector, tamer of horses? Let me see Achilles and Patroclus, reunited in an afterlife, walking together hand in hand into the light.