Dr. Jonathan Shay’s opening message wasn’t what one might expect to hear at a lecture given by an award-winning author.

‘Not a blessed thing I have to say in this regard is new,’ he said. ‘Nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing.’

Shay went on to explain this statement to the crowd of nearly 100 students and faculty who gathered to hear him speak Wednesday in Maxwell Auditorium.

‘I’ve had the great privilege of stating the obvious,’ Shay said. ‘The Iliad is about war and what matters to soldiers in war. As long as human beings engage in the social practice of war and coming home from war, the Homeric experiments will offer substantial insights to today.’

The lecture, titled ‘Homer on Military Leadership,’ was part of the Moses Finley Memorial Lecture series celebrating ancient historians.

Shay is the author of two books: ‘Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma’ and ‘The Undoing of Character and Odysseus in America: Combat Trauma and the Trials of Homecoming.’ Both offer insight into psychological injuries sustained by ancient Greek and modern American soldiers.

‘Dr. Shay has taught us to listen to the words of veterans and attend to what they have to say about their experiences in warfare,’ said Donald Mills, professor of classical languages and literatures.

Shay refers to himself a missionary for psychologically injured combat veterans.

‘I’ve worked with (them) for 20 years,’ he said. ‘Those veterans don’t want other kids to be wrecked in the same way they were.’

Much of Shay’s research focuses on the ecology of power within allied forces. While the enemy matters in times of war, Shay said the most detrimental thing to a veteran’s life and peace of mind is a failure or malpractice within his or her own force.

‘It’s almost as though the enemy does not have the power to truly wreck the spirit of the fighting man or woman in a healthy military organization,’ he said.

An unhealthy military organization is another story and one first told by Homer more than 1,000 years ago.

Shay recalled an incident in which the character Odysseus’ careless leadership leads to tragedy. ‘The question is, is the leader the shepherd of the people, or is the leader the destroyer of the people?’ Shay asked.

Shay posed this question to the audience: ‘How many of the 600 or so of the youth of Ithaca that Odysseus took off to fight at Troy did Odysseus come home with?’

Tom Schmitz, an older man wearing a U.S. Army hat shook his head. ‘None,’ he said.

Schmitz, a veteran lieutenant of the Vietnam War who now lives in Oneida N.Y., read both of Shay’s books and then reread the Iliad and the Odyssey

‘I think he’s really onto something,’ Schmitz said. ‘Post-traumatic stress disorder isn’t an injury; it’s a wound of the soul. It’s presented as being an anxiety disorder, but it’s not. It’s a wound, and I find it somehow reassuring to think that whoever Homer really was, there were people who knew or understood that for thousands of years.’

Schmitz said as a veteran, he’s glad to see PTSD as a commonly accepted formal diagnosis.

While societies undoubtedly change and evolve, there are certain truths in the works of Homer still relevant today, Shay said.

These epics don’t teach strategy, training or technology, but Shay said they teach lessons on how to protect soldiers during wartime.

‘I say there are three things that can protect the mind and spirit of the person that we send into horrible danger for our sake,’ he said.

Shay listed troop cohesion as the first of the three. ‘Don’t send people to work with strangers,’ he said.

His other two forms of protection were expert, ethical leadership and prolonged, highly realistic training for possible wartime situations.

Tom Dilella, a sophomore dual political science and history major, said he enjoyed Shay’s lecture.

‘I thought it was brilliant,’ he said. ‘I’m going to have to reread ‘The Iliad’ and ‘The Odyssey’ in a new light now.’

Mills thoroughly enjoyed the lecture. ‘I was mesmerized. I teach ‘The Iliad’ and ‘The Odyssey,’ so it was very relevant for my students because they’ve been reading it.’

Mills also saw the lecture as relevant to today’s military situation.

‘With the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, we’re going to have vets coming back, and they’re going to be psychologically injured,’ he said.

jmterrus@syr.edu

Published on April 2, 2008 at 12:00 pm