John Doe
Professor Martin
World Lit. 1
19 September 2005
Scholarly Article Evaluation: “The Humor of Homer”

Turn-of-the-century satirist Samuel Butler was no stranger to Homer’s works when he wrote the article, “The Humour of Homer.”  Butler had not only translated The Iliad, but also penned the novel The Authoress of the Odyssey, where he theorized that a woman, and not Homer, wrote that epic tale (Wikipedia).  In “The Humour of Homer,” Butler attempts to use comicality to bring his perspectives into light.  Notably, Butler mentions that, “We are told in one place of a fine bronze cauldron for heating water which was worth twenty oxen, whereas a few lines lower down a good serviceable maid-for-all-work is valued at four oxen.”  This line provides the reader with false hope of some powerful satire to follow, but the rest of the article mainly has Butler trying to convince readers that in order to understand how Homer felt, “[...] if we would read his lines intelligently we must also read between them: ”  Thanks for the great insight, Mr. Butler, and to think I was just staring blankly at the words on the pages until this point.
Butler wants us to believe that Homer wrote The Iliad based on his own beliefs, no matter how fantastic the tale became.  In trying to prove this, Butler states, “We may be sure, then, that Homer had his full share of troubles, and that traces of these abound up and down his work [...].”  Whether this is true or not, that vague statement reflects any text, article or journal ever written.  What makes Homer so special in this case, the fact that Butler says so?  This fact just gives Butler a general theory that anyone could use, any time.  Butler also says of Homer, “No poet ever made gods in his own image more defiantly that the author of the Iliad.  In the likeness of man created he them, and the only excuse for him is that he obviously desired his readers not to take them seriously.”  I assume that Butler has never read another mythical work outside of Homer, because many other tales, including Gilgamesh, show the gods with strong, human qualities.  Even though Butler translated The Iliad at one point in his career, and most likely very felt very intimate with it’s concepts, Homer died almost two thousand years before Butler was born, so most likely the two had never met, making both of Butler’s statements interpretative at best.
Butler’s writing style is over one hundred years old and from across the Atlantic Ocean.  In writing a novel, this fact would not be overly relevant, but in this particular article, when read today, it seems his thoughts are scattered across the pages and his words are not flowing smoothly.  He switches the article’s tempo from which side of the Trojan War Homer sided with (the Trojans), to whether or not he appreciated music, to his “keen sense of the beauties of nature” (Butler).  It seems as if he used all of his “humorous” ammunition in his first two paragraphs, and then went on to discuss random thoughts as they entered his head, as long as they showed his point of view.  Butler goes as far as to suggest that Homer has some allegorical meanings that are sarcastic toward a possible “Mrs. Homer.”  I rest my case. Maybe Butler should have stuck with discussions on oxen exchange rates and snappy banter between Hera and Zeus in order to live up to his article’s title.

Works Cited
Butler, Samuel. “The Humour of Homer.” The Humour of Homer and Other Essays, edited by R. A. Streatfeild, Mitchell Kennerly, 1914, pp. 59-98. Reprinted in Classical and Medieval Literature Criticism, Vol. 1. Gale Research. 1997. Literature Resource Center. Collin County Community College District, Plano, TX. 12 September 2005 <http://galenet.galegroup.com/servlet/LitRC?locID=txshracd2497&srchtp=ttl&c=5&stab=512&ai=149783&docNum=H1420014742&bConts=12589759&vrsn=3&TI=iliad&OP=starts&TQ=TO&ca=1&ste=57&tab=2&tbst=trp&n=10&wi=1095551>
“Samuel Butler.” Wikipedia. 9 Sept. 2005. 12 Sept. 2005  <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Butler_%281835-1902%29>