#philoctetes

[kyleesarthell]

Haven't done any Philoctetes posting in a while...

[spineless-lobster]

Fagamemnon, dykeomedes, men-loverlaus, they/themstor, fagchilles, patransclus, lesbodysseus, I-do-men-eus, bear ajax, lezzy ajax, twinker, neopronouns, philoctop-surgery, mach-ace-on, antilokissmen, podalezzyus, HRTalthybius, calchace, sthemelus, yurialus, transmenesthius, sapphoenix, autofemdom

This is the iliad that the woke left want…

[korrioak]

Neoptolemus, Philoctetes and Odysseus for mythtober day 3

[realtimefanduboutofcontext]

did you manage to clip phil absolutely ripping his voice going DONT YOU WALK AWAY WHEN IM FUCKING TALKING TO YOU because its SUCH a highlight for me and im trying to find it for friends. Please and thank you !

SnapCube's Real-Time Fandub | "Kingdom Hearts (Episode 2)" (2025)

requested by @zingmin via Tumblr

[ochiody]

the madoka magica comic

[didanagy]

HERCULES (1997)

dir. john musker and ron clements

[sporadicallyanenthusiast]

The thing about Philoctetes is that, at some point at least, Neoptolemus was a good kid. Or he tried to be. He outright refused to lie to Philoctetes, even after being threatened by his mentor figure, and after the war he fulfilled his promise to see Philoctetes back home again. So what changed? What made this apparently good, honorable kid become so rotten to kill an old man inside a temple? When even his own father and the other Greeks had shown Priam mercy? How could this child be dragged into war and not suffer a single wound during battle (at least according to Odysseus) but come out with a completely twisted and brutal mind? At what point exactly did he break? Did he ever lie awake at night regretting what he's done, but unable to stop being what he became? If he was such a skilled warrior, was it possible that he let Orestes kill him, because he couldn't take being a monster anymore? Out of all the lives he destroyed, which one haunted him the most, if any at all? Did he ever look at his mother and hated her because she let him go to war, even if he knew she didn't have a choice? Did Deidamia ever look at him and hated him because he killed the most precious one of all, her Pyrrhus?

[ilions-end]

i didn't really notice before it was pointed out to me, but in the iliad, traumatic injury only has two outcomes: immediate (or near-immediate) death, or a short period of recuperation before the injured person can return to battle apparently no worse for wear (see diomedes, odysseus, menelaus, agamemnon, etc etc). there are no slow lingering deaths or infections or persistent disabilities or amputations. and i suppose that works narratively, because "X kills Y during his aristeia" is a definite triumph while "X injures Y who lingers in a bed for two weeks before succumbing to a secondary infection" is a lot murkier honour-wise. so the warriors just don't experience those things in the world of the iliad.

BUT if you take a step back and consider the epic cycle, the soldier philoctetes sits abandoned on the island of lemnos while the events of the iliad takes place, and he experiences nothing BUT infection and disability because of his permanently festering leg wound. (as someone with a medical education i admit i'm fascinated by the vividness of the descriptions of the odour, pus, swelling and pain)

it's like philoctetes is forced to endure the infection and lingering wound the rest of his army is spared. and then, when they finally rescue him and bring him to troy in the final year of the war, the physician podalirius (who was presumably present a decade back when philoctetes first got sick) completely heals him straight away! i know there are various related prophecies, but it also seems like the location is a crucial factor. i'd like to imagine it's the gods who want to keep the plains of troy so straightforward, full of binaries and no middle ground: a thrown spear can either hit or don't hit, an injured warrior can either die or return in a few days.