Write a diary from the point of view of Achilles' during the Trojan War

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Achilles diary

I am Achilles, the greatest warrior in the Greek army, son of the hero Peleus and the sea nymph Thetis. This is the 10th year of the siege of Troy and I am now onto the 29th book of my diary.

I

An old man came today to try to get his daughter back from us. We captured her in a raid on a Trojan town and she was allocated to Agamemnon (the ‘supreme’ ruler of the Greek army, the biggest fool who ever disgraced the earth and I suspect the reason that a ‘quick raid’ to recover a woman has taken thousands of men 10 years). The poor father would be lucky to get anything back after that pot of lard slept on top of her, even if it weren’t for Agamemnon’s stagger greed. The poor idiot had some idea that his status as priest of Apollo will help him regain his daughter. Ha! He obviously doesn’t know our Agamemnon. It probably gave him even more pleasure in the refusal. A decision he made despite the ransom the old man brought and the cheers of the warriors for him to be respected. Poor beggar: but life goes on.

X

Well the Old priest is obviously favoured by his god. No sooner had he left than the first of our animals and men became sick. They died within hours but not before they had managed to spread the disease round the camp; it’s as if the lord Apollo himself was raining arrows on our heads in vengeance for the disrespect of his priest. If that is so however, the archer lord can’t be a very good shot, as Agamemnon has not even felt the disease, nor has anyone close to him, though that may be because the arrows have bounced of his many layers of fat. By today even my wonderful Myrmidons were succumbing to the epidemic though I myself am too strong to be overpowered. Regardless, for their sakes I called an assembly of all our remaining warriors to demand the release of the slave girl at the centre of all of this from the clutching grasp of our ‘great’ overlord.

        It could have gone better.

        It started well: Chalchas (our resident mad old man who believes he can see into the future) told the whole army that the plague was a punishment from Apollo for the maltreatment of his priest and that it would end if Agamemnon gave his daughter back. Agamemnon didn’t take this to well and though he agreed that this would be the best course of action, the idea that he could take someone else’s prize somehow wound its way into his piggy little head. Of course I opened my mouth and protested and what does that fat oaf do? He goes and decides that he should take my prize, my beloved Briseis! And he said he was doing it just to let me know “how far superior” he is to me! The humiliation! And in front of the entire army! I feel it more keenly than the loss. I would have taken his head of there and then from the fury I felt towards him but Athena appeared to me and stayed my blade. It would appear that the gods still have some fondness for the blundering buffoon; or at least for the great war which only Agamemnon’s skill as a warrior prevents us from winning. Either way it’s always a good idea to do what a god tells you to do. Actually perhaps not; we all know what happened to Paris.

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        Well if I couldn’t kill Agamemnon, what could I do? Only one thing was possible. I have pulled out of the fighting. Along with my fellow Myrmidons I will sit in the Greek camp, consuming their resources and watching them being slaughtered without me and my battlefield prowess. That should kill Agamemnon as surely as my blade, or at least many of his men. To make sure my plan will work, I tried one more thing: I called Mother to me and begged that she may get almighty Zeus to make the Greeks suffer in my absence.

XI

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