The Illiad From the initial callousness and stubborn temper of Achilles in the first books of the Iliad to the eventual ‘humanization' of Achilles in his interaction with the grieving father of Hector, whom Achilles himself slew, the Iliad can be seen to chronicle the maturation of the Greek hero during the terrible battles of the Trojan War. Achilles is a hero in the epic sense, complete with flaws and bad qualities that round out the character, but with passions and convictions that any reader can relate to. Throughout the course of the Iliad, Homer creates the character of Achilles to be that kind of hero in every sense of the word. As the novel begins, we firs