Res Agens: Towards an Ontology of the Homeric Self

What is the nature of the self as presented to us in Homeric epic? Having recognized that in Homer death is conceived as the total negation of the self, this paper employs Homeric depictions of the corpse and psuchê to arrive at a full ontological theory of Homeric selfhood. Against Cartesian, quasi-Hegelian, and crudely "physical" interpretations, it is shown that Homeric poetry conceives of the self in terms of interactive force relations, as a certain capability of effecting changes in the usual procession of things in the world. Neither merely "body" nor res cogitans, the Homeric self is conceived in terms of pointed, relational activity, as a "driving, herding thing"—a a res agens. The paper then concludes with some reflections on how this particular understanding of the self might shape interpretation of the Iliad and the Odyssey.