While the characters of Book II of
Illiad employ a plethora of rhetorical techniques, by far the least intuitive
is the decision of Agamemnon to convince his army to go to war by arguing
against his own position. The obvious
question is: Why would he bother? Recounting the vision he received from the
gods seems like it would be just as persuasive and far less of a risk than
almost disbanding his entire army.
I think that the answer is kairos.
Social psychologists have found that
when people recognize and deal with arguments that are against their own
position, they are less likely to be persuaded to change their minds. Agamemnon knew that his troops were
vulnerable to desertion. In the heat of
the battle many of them would make the same case he was making in advance. They may have said something like, "We've
been here for nine years and nothing has happened? Why don't we just go home and forget about
all of this?"
At a critical moment, thoughts like
this could be disastrous for an army. Rather
than permitting that eventuality, Agamemnon chose to introduce the very
arguments he knew the common soldiers would give themselves during the fight in
a setting in which he had the resources to change their minds. When, as the post "Will you let them die
in vain?" explains, Minerva capitalizes on Ulysses' dissatisfaction to
convince him to change the host's flight, he is in a far better position to do
so than he would have been during the middle of a battle. Having already considered the option of
fleeing and decided against it, the soldiers don't need to think about it
again. Their decision to stay and fight
is firm. Agamemnon's plan had inherent
risks, but it also included powerful rhetorical tools that cemented his control
over the army in a unique way that would not have been possible had he used a
more direct approach.
"Vendel Helmet," by mararie, no changes made. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode
I really like that idea, Gavin. When I first read this book I was thinking "Wow, that plan really backfired." But from your point of view, it was a brilliant plan! I was thinking that he was giving them the option to get them initially fired up. Like, "No Agamemnon! Let's go fight! Hurray!" Should that have been successful, well, his persuasion would have been good enough. But how much more powerful is the resolution to fight after they already chose that and then re-chose to fight? Pretty cool. Great point!
ReplyDeleteI like how you said that rhetorical tools cemented his control over the army, and basically was the tipping point between giving up and still fighting. That sort of persuasion is a skill that every good leader must acquire in order to convince their team/army to move forward in the direction the leader wants.
ReplyDeleteI really appreciate this post! I was trying to figure out, what the heck was was Agamemnon thinking? But that makes sense! Pretty shrewd though, he could have been in trouble had the gods not decided to intervene and tell Odysseus to carry on the fight. As it says, he was truly a master in counsel!
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