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“Despite his family’s fears, Priam brings his son home.” Why is he successful?
The novella “Ransom” by David Malouf explores the epic journey of King Priam as a retelling of one day in Homer’s Iliad. Such a journey was deemed impossible and “foolish” by his family, yet Priam still succeeded due to intervention from the gods as well as his own courage, ambition, paternal love and shared grief with Achilles. Furthermore, he was not only successful in bringing his son home, but he brought back a “ransomed and restored self” through his development of character over the journey and succeeded in restoring Achilles’ honour.
Priam’s journey could not have been successful without intervention from the gods. Since Achilles’ defilement of Hector’s body, the gods were offended and intervened in order to protect the order of humans as well as the spiritual world realm. They had protected Hector’s body from mutilation despite it being continually dragged across Troy, in order for it to be in a good condition to be given back to Priam after the ransom had been given. The idea and motivation for Priam to meet with Achilles arose from a visitation by the goddess, Iris, during one of Priam’s dreams. She spoke of a new, unheard of concept of “chance”, convincing Priam that he would be successful if he tried something new. “Not a mockery my friend, but the way things are. Not the way things must be, but the way they have turned out. In a world that is also sublet to chance.” This motivates Priam to change his image and how he could be remembered. Priam had explained to Hecula “The image I mean to leave is a living one. Of something so new and unheard of that when men speak my name it will stand forever as proof of who I was.” Priam did not want to remain naïve, without character, trapped in his “royal sphere”. He was nearing the end of his life and wanted to be remembered as something more than a figurehead or icon to his people. Like Achilles, Priam wanted to be immortalised through his name, and the idea given to him by the goddess Iris had allowed him this opportunity to do so. The god Hermes had also appeared physically, in corporeal form to Priam and Somax, to guide them across the river and into Troy, however, he had introduced himself as “Orchilus”, one of Achilles’ warriors, and was only later found to be the god Hermes. Hermes had also played music to allow Achilles to be in the right mood to meet with Priam and give back Hector’s body, however, the honour of men had to be restored by men alone, so the gods did not intervene during Priam’s encounter with Achilles.
Despite their opposing sides, Priam and Achilles could sympathise with each other because of their mutual feelings of grief; Priam’s grief for his son Hector and Achilles’ grief for his friend Parrochus. Priam had appealed to Achilles’ grief and allowed him to realise the similarities in their situation. Priam had also allowed Achilles to restore his honour and free him from his guilt and grief by doing the honourable action of giving Priam back the body of his son, Hector. They realised that despite being enemies, they both felt love, they both felt grief and they were both humans and mortal. It was this common ground that allowed Achilles to feel empathetic enough to put aside differences and give Hector a proper burial. Besides this encounter, Malouf’s story had been almost entirely based around grief. Grief had fuelled Priam’s motivation to bring back his son’s body throughout the journey, however, it had also made the journey necessary, as it was Achilles’ grief that caused him to defy the gods and drag Hector’s corpse out of rage (“The grief that racked him was not only for his son Hector. It was also for a kingdom ravaged and threatened with extinction”.)
Priam was not only successful in bringing back the body of his son, but also a “ransomed and restored self”. Furthermore, Priam had succeeded in restoring Achilles’ honour. Priam’s character evolved throughout the twenty-four-hour period of the novel through his now experiences with nature and learning about life outside his “royal sphere” with his encounters with Somax, a character incorporated by Malouf to represent the common, working class man. Throughout his experiences, his naivety was reduced and he had learnt what it was to be just a man. “’I have returned’ he wanted to shout, ‘but the “I” is different!’” Priam had also succeeded in his dream to change his image and name and be remembered after his death, as a father and as a heroic figure who had the courage to take a chance and do “what no man has dared do before.”
Priam was successful in bringing his son home, renewing his character, immortalizing his name and restoring Achilles’ honour. This was achievable due to divine intervention, empathy out of “sheer fellow feeling” of grief, ambition from grief and need to gain a reason to be remembered.
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