Mary Renault, did you lie to me?

[selenak]

Not being an Alexander the Great fangirl, I had never read the primary sources (which were written centuries later, because all the contemporary sources on AtG were lost) on everyone's favourite Macedon, but now I got around to reading at least Plutarch. And you know, if there is ONE thing not just the late Ms Renault and her trilogy but the entire internet led me to believe, it's that Hephaistion was Alexander's One True Love And Soulmate; even absolute homophobes concede him as the friend of friends, the Patroclos to Alexander's Achilles, etc. So imagine my suprrise when I stumbled upon these few paragraphs by good old Plutarch:

Moreover, when he saw that among his chiefest friends Hephaestion approved his course and joined him in changing his mode of life, while Craterus clung fast to his native ways, he employed the former in his business with the Barbarians, the latter in that with the Greeks and Macedonians. And in general he showed most affection for Hephaestion, but most esteem for Craterus, thinking, and constantly saying, that Hephaestion was a friend of Alexander, but Craterus a friend of the king.

For this reason, too, the men cherished a secret grudge against one another and often came into open collision. And once, on the Indian expedition, they actually drew their swords and closed with one another, and as the friends of each were coming to his aid, Alexander rode up and abused Hephaestion publicly, calling him a fool and a madman for not knowing that without Alexander's favour he was nothing; and in private he also sharply reproved Craterus.

Then he brought them together and reconciled them, taking an oath by Ammon and the rest of the gods that he loved them most of all men; but that if he heard of their quarrelling again, he would kill them both, or at least the one who began the quarrel. Wherefore after this they neither did nor said anything to harm one another, not even in jest.


Craterus? CRATERUS? And he "abused Hephaistion publicly?" Hephaistion - who in fiction shows up eternally chill and calming emo Alex down - was jealous of some guy who wasn't at least Bagoas? Truly, this is not what I expected.

To be fair: Plutarch also later describes the complete breakdown and momentous grief for Hephaistion when Heph dies. (Oh, and he does mention Bagoas as well, to wit: We are told, too, that he was once viewing some contests in singing and dancing, being well heated with wine, and that his favourite, Bagoas, won the prize for song and dance, and then, all in his festal array, passed through the theatre and took his seat by Alexander's side; at sight of which the Macedonians clapped their hands and loudly bade the king kiss the victor, until at last he threw his arms about him and kissed him tenderly. ) Still. I feel let down by the OTPlers.

Not really surprised, though. This kind of thing happens constantly in Frederician fandom.

To celebrate the latest example of research making everyone more complicated, I'm linking this gem, which includes both Alex and Fritz:

Watch on YouTube

Comments

[redfiona99]

I got Greek Lives for Alexander, I stayed for Alcibaldes.

[mildred_of_midgard]

I mean, who wouldn't stay for Alcibiades? The one thing the man wasn't was boring!

I remember chatting with some Classics grad students back in my grad student days some 20 years ago, and I suddenly realized I couldn't remember:

Me: "Who killed Alcibiades?"
Other grad student: "Who DIDN'T kill Alcibiades?"

:'D

[selenak]

Me, to my Latin teacher when we were reading Sallust: "So basically Catilina is the Roman Alcibiades?"

Teacher: "Catilina wishes."

[mildred_of_midgard]

Ha! Alcibiades is definitely an example that's difficult to live up to (fortunately).

[redfiona99]

They definitely all tried :)

[aurumcalendula]

tbh I remember getting the impression that Renault's OTP was Alexander/Bagoas rather than Alexander/Hephaestion, but yeah general pop culture osmosis definitely has Alexander and Hephaestion as soulmates on the level of Achilles and Patroclus.

[selenak]

"The Persian Boy" isn't a standalone novel, and even without taking "Fire from Heaven" into account, Bagoas is so massively jealous of Hephaestion - who is presented as basically chill and "Whatever makes Alexander happy" minded - that I would doubt that. (And the very fact that Bagoas'jealousy is so one sided contributed to my surprise re: Hephaestion's depiction in Plutarch.) I mean, she may have preferred Alexander topping, and identified with Bagoas more, but she did present Alexander/Hephaistion as Achilles/Patroclos.

[aurumcalendula]

Good point!

[mildred_of_midgard]

Hahaha, yes, indeed. Truly, the sources are complicated!

They are so complicated that I have the outline of a scholarly journal article I'd like to write about Fritz vs. Alexander sources, only I need to brush up on my Alexander first. Which I started doing yesterday and, which, uh, would be a lot easier if a certain three of us were doing a Classics salon.

Given how quiet things have been on the Fritzian front, has the time come at last? I'm now hanging out with classicists at a university with a good library! I'm going to a Mycenaean-Minoan museum exhibit on Saturday, and I'm trying to brush up on my archaeology this week! We could make this happen!

[selenak]

We could. And speaking on the Fritz vs Alexander topic, reading Plutarch and then Arrian unfortunately rather feeds our opinion that Heinrich would get the Kleitus treatment if they ever switched. I briefly wondered whether AW isn't Fritz' Kleitus anyway but decided no, what with all the emphasis, in Plutarch and Arrian both, that Alexander was sorry immediately after and that it wasn't a pre-considered move but the result of their argument. (BTW, all the "it was really Kleitus' fault for harping on the "your Dad was great! Also you owe me your life!" subject" on the part of the ancient historians did remind me of the Hohenzollern historians and their "Heinrich and Ferdinand were totally irrational for blaming Fritz for AW".) The lynchpin of the AW story being that it was so drawn out and included a year of "you suck! You have no honor! You suck!" on Fritz' part (i.e. exactly what he subsequently rewrote in his mind when AW died). So Kleitus would definitely be Heinrich in argumentative mode, plus Heinrich would be the one Alexander!Fritz would actually owe something to.

[cahn]

I am up for this! After Yuletide you might even be able to get me to read stuff. (Heck, maybe before Yuletide opens too, my assignment is pretty consuming and there's some stuff I have to read for it but it's not as text-heavy as it sometimes is. unless I write that treat Though my time is limited for the next couple of weeks, see also Yuletide and music)

Should I make a post? (Or should we make a community or is one of you dying to take a turn? I am super super happy to make a post, I love being the salonniere, but wanted to make sure I wasn't stepping on any toes)

Should I be reading Plutarch? Or something else?
(also I know very little about Alexander; I know more about him than I knew about Fritz than we started but that's saying... very little)

[mildred_of_midgard]

No worries about bruising my toes; I prefer you or Selena host!

[selenak]

I prefer Cahn, because of Darth Real Life, but I'm all for it.

[mildred_of_midgard]

Yeah, that makes sense. Kind of the reverse of "Yet We Grind", where I borrowed your idea that in a fit of rage, when reading the "condolence" letter, Heinrich might give into the urge to do away with Fritz. (The fact that geographical considerations meant that he had to do it via letter, with time to reconsider, was one of those things I was never quite comfortable with and probably would have changed if I'd spent more time revising.)

Kleitus!Heinrich would have to have less of a survival instinct* than Prussian!Heinrich, just as my AU Heinrich had to be a lot less loyal to Fritz and the state than actual Heinrich.

* Or maybe just be a lot more intoxicated? Those Macedonians and their unwatered wine.

Cahn is on board with Classics salon, let's do it! I have no time, but let's do it! I'm never going to write a paper on Alexander and Fritz otherwise.

[selenak]

Definitely less of a survival instinct! Prussian!Heinrich, in retrospect, did have a good sense of how far to go with his Fritz provocations.Then again, he had Fritz himself and Dad as a example, whereas Original Kleitus was of Philip's generation, wasn't he? Or at least closer in age to Philip than to Alexander? Meaning, Philip was the type to joke about people raping you if you were his bodyguard, but not apparantly the type to throw a spear at you?

Given Fritz in real life after the Hubertusday incident stayed the hell away from too much wine, it's hard to say whether he'd have killed Heinrich with alcohol-induced lowered inhibitions upon being compared to Dad to his disadvantage, but with Alexander's temper, he definitely would have.

Speaking of Hubertus, burning of Persepolis = razing of Hubertusburg (et al, i.e. the other Saxon castles)? No Thais necessary?

[moon_custafer]

Well, but this opens the door to all kinds of dramatic Alexander/Hephaestion/Craterus love-triangle fics!

[selenak]

True! How come Craterus has been completely overlooked by shippers so far!

(p.S. Sorry for first posting the reply to another comment here.)

[mildred_of_midgard]

Hephaistion - who in fiction shows up eternally chill and calming emo Alex down

Also, yeah, no. We clearly need to have a Classics salon so I can tell you (and Cahn!) all about the picture of "Hephaistion the eternally quarrelsome" as painted by historians. Complete with Alexander having to calm him down!

[selenak]

Now I understand why he, too, is Alexander.

[mildred_of_midgard]

LOL! Truly, they were soul mates.

[cahn]

Heeeee, I had managed to osmose that as well!

I think it's hilarious that he abused Hephaistion publicly, but only reproved Craterus in private.

[selenak]

That does make Craterus look as either the more valued one or the one Alexander thought he should not diminish in public for political reasons.

[kore]

Oh yeah sadly, I think Renault's Chill Hephaistion has a lot more to do with her own character preferences, because absolutely nobody was chill in Alexander's circle, including (most especially) Alexander.

[selenak]

Well, I knew Alexander was the anti chill! But both Renault and the internet and even Oliver Stone have always presented Hephaistion as basically the calm guy soothing their fiery hero!

Re: nobody being chill - what about Ptolemy? He gives the impression that while he wants power and success as much as the rest, he's good at keeping his cool and a bland facade. Hence also the ability to outmaneouvre Perdiccas by the body heist which apparantly Perdiccas did not see coming.

[duskpeterson]

One of the more amusing moments of my life was when I was doing research on eunuchs of the classical era at the Library of Congress in the early 00s, desperately trying to track down info on what turned out to be a seriously under-researched topic. All that I knew at the start was what Mary Renault said in the historical note of The Persian Boy.

Every single historian I consulted drew their findings from that historical note.