Assignment cover sheet

Note:  The attention of students is drawn to the Academic Regulations (accessible via http://my.acu.edu.au/40147), the Academic Honesty Policy (accessible via http://my.acu.edu.au/42703.and) the Assessment Policy and Procedures (accessible via http://my.acu.edu.au/37875).

Student ID Number/s:	Student Surname/s:		Given names:
S00070285	Bowditch		Shayne Andrew
Course:  Bachelor of Arts
School: FACULTY OF ARTS AND SCIENCES School of Arts and Sciences Strathfield Campus (Mt Saint Mary)
Unit code: ENGL102		Unit title: Australian Literature: An Introduction
Due date: Tuesday, 5/02/2018				Date submitted: 5/02/2018
Lecturer-in-Charge: Associate Professor Michael Griffith				Tutorial Group/Tutor: 01
Assignment Title and/or number: A King’s Ransom

DECLARATION OF ORIGINALITY

1. This assignment is submitted in accordance with the Academic Regulations and the Academic Honesty Policy.
2. No part of this assignment has been copied from any other source without acknowledgement of the source.
3. No part of this assignment has been written by any other person, except to the extent of collaboration and/or group work as defined in the unit outline.
4. This assignment has not been recycled, using work substantially the same as work I have completed previously and which has been counted towards satisfactory completion of another unit of study credited towards another qualification, unless the Lecturer-in-Charge has granted prior written consent to do so.
5. I have made and retained a copy of this original assignment.

Signature of student(s):  Shayne Andrew Bowditch       5/02/2018

Q: What are the meanings of the word “Ransom” as they are used in this novel and how are these meanings relevant to the themes of the novel as a whole?  [With this statement in mind what are the values that are conveyed in David Malouf’s Ransom and how are they communicated?]

In this essay, I will explore the meanings of the word “Ransom” as it is used by author David Malouf in his novel of the same name and how these meanings are relevant to the themes of the novel as a whole.  To do this I will look at thematic ideas such as love, relationships, and honour.

Rather than a just another interpretation of Homer’s classic “The Iliad”, Ransom is a story of individual characters; woven a round the themes of loss, the brutality of war and ultimately redemption.  The story of Ransom is essentially one of pride and humility.

There are several meanings of the word “Ransom” as used in Malouf’s epic novel of the same name.  The novel first speaks of Ransom in the conventional sense as a payment. 

Early in the story, we learn of the two Trojan slave girls Briseis and Chryseis.  Both girls are a prize of war, for Agamemnon and Achilles, when Chryseis is ransomed (set free) and sent back to Troy, Agamemnon becomes enraged and demands from Achilles Briseis as a substitute. 

This one action sets of a chain of events culminating in the death of Achilles’ “soulmate” [1]and brother in arms Patroclus at the hands of the great Trojan warrior Hector.  Patroclus had gone in to battle clad in Achilles armour due to the wounded and stubborn pride of his childhood friend.  Driven by equal amounts of rage, bereavement, and guilt, Achilles rides in to battle slaying the Trojan subsequently committing a series of inexpressible horrors upon the corpse of the warrior Hector. 

Later in the novel, we learn that the child Podarces is ransomed when king Priam recounts to his wife queen Hecuba the disturbing story of a six-year-old boy.  One day a prince and heir to his father’s (king Laomedon) throne, the next snatched up as a prize of war, only later to be restored by the hands of Heracles (Hercules) at the bequest of his sister Hesione. 

Restored but forever changed by his ordeal, rechristened by the son of Zeus, “Priam, The price paid.” [2]

Ransom, takes on a yet another meaning altogether.  When we learn that after having a vision in witch the Goddess Iris speak to him; King Priam comes to a decision, a decision so bold so unheard-of that it will forever change his life, and the life’s of those he cares for, indeed men will speak of this bold and noble act throughout the agers.

Stripped of all majesty and the symbols of office which accompany his birthright, Priam decides to go before the great Achilles, not as a king but “humbly, as a father and as a man.” [3]  

This is the heart and soul of the story, Ransom in essence a story of “individual sufferings, the intimate moments of sorrow and betrayed hope, and the secret redemption.”  [4]

Priam now sees himself as a feeble old man, who just happens to be a king, he also knows that his best days are behind him, and is painfully aware of what is to become of him and his beloved Troy.

As Priam sees it, he has one of two options; he can either wait helplessly for the inevitable; as a passive onlooker to be consumed by the dogs of war.  Alternatively, Priam can attempt something so bold, so noble, something so completely human that those closest to him will think that this once great king and father, this leader of men has in his old age given himself over to lunacy.

However, what King Priam hopes to achieve is not the desperate act of a mad man, instead it is an act of love for his fallen son Prince Hector. 

Thus, in keeping with the vision given to him by the Goddess Iris, Priam orders two of his sons Hippothous and Dius to supervise the getting ready of the cart that he has requested.  Much to there fathers disgust the two Princes return with a fine new cart. 

This however is not the cart that Priam has asked them to bring him.  Outraged that his idiot sons should disobey such a simple request, the king jumps to his feet, “are you deaf… did not one of you hear me when I spoke?”  “I asked for a cart an ordinary mule cart not this…carnival wagon” [5]

King Priam once again orders his two sons to go out in to the market place and instructions them to return with a common work cart.  The type of cart is of great significance to the story, as is the driver of the cart.  Priam’s revelation was specific; he would go before Achilles, dressed in a simple white robe riding in a common work cart driven by a common day labourer and pulled by mules.  Priam would ride on the cross bench next to the driver and in the back of the cart would be a large amount of treasure.  This is the key element of the story; Priam goes as humble man, with a humble cart, and carter to exchange the treasure for the body of his son Hector.  Of course we discover that the treasure is really just a symbolic ransom. The real ransom, is the act of Priam sacrificing his nobility and god like status with his people and humbling himself before Achilles, and his men.

It is on his journey to meet with Achilles that King Priam, truly begins to discover not just himself but life as others experience it.  Priam has always been kept, at kingly distance form the rest of his subjects.  Indeed the king has lived his life to this point as part of a dream, a kind of pantomime for the Gods.  Yet it is, through the eyes of this most ordinary of men Somax, that the king discovers the true beauty of the natural world, a world that he has never fully noticed until now.  In fact, king Priam is child like; even the simple art of a casual conversation is foreign to him.  The king finds himself somewhat bewildered by the ordinary day labourer whom he has christened Idaeus.

This odd yet pleasant man seems so at ease with his surroundings and himself; and the stories that he tells intrigue Priam.  The description of his daughter-in-law lovingly mixing the batter to make the little pound cakes that Priam so likes, the way this man Somax speaks of his ailing grandchild and the death of his son; these are simple stories of a simple man and his family.  Under any other circumstances, the king would not waste his time with such a trivial conversation.  However, out here in this garden of the Gods, where the water is clear and cool, and the little fishes are nibbling at his feet, Priam is awakened from his long slumber.  What started out as a journey of redemption to ransom himself before the great Achilles in exchange for the body of his son Prince Hector, has become a journey of self-discovery. 

In the end, there is a price to pay for love, and in turn, each of us must pay his or her share.  King Priam knows this and is prepared to humble himself before Gods and men, and in doing so, he

manages to live out the fullness of his name “Priam the price paid” [6] not only by securing the body of his son Hector but by also allowing Achilles to redeem himself.

Ransom is a parable for our times, there is, as Robert Tulip of BookTalk.org writes, a “silent unspoken lens of the expiating sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross.  Hector is a type of Christ, and Priam a type of God, making Achilles a type of Satan, to whose satisfaction the ransom is due.

The Christian ransom, by contrast, points to a victory of God in the world, whereas Priam is tragically doomed by fate.  By mixing the myths in this way, Malouf implies the uncomfortable

Question of whether the sacrifice of Christ can possibly provide atonement, or if we live in a Greek universe where honour is the prelude to destruction” ^[7]

Bibliography

Malouf, David.  Ransom.  Sydney: Random House Australia Pty Ltd. 2009.

Manguel, Alberto. “Malouf the master of imaginary lives”  The Australian:  April 01, 2009 News Limited. 4 October. 2009 http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25238205-25132,00.html

Tulip, Robert.  “Review of Ransom by David Malouf” BookTalk.org:  Jun 09, 2009 BookTalk.org Forum 4 October. 2009 http://www.booktalk.org/post49374.html

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[1] Malouf 10

[2] Malouf  74

[3] Malouf 90

[4] Manguel The Australian

[5] Malouf  91–92

[6] Malouf  74

[7] Tulip Book Talk.org