Using Homer’s Iliad to better understand the actions of Stephen Garcia
Nineteen-year-old USC quarterback recruit and current media falling star Stephen Garcia is the definition of a hero. Struggling against difficult and powerful forces, the young USC athlete, built like a Greek god with long brown flowing hair, has indeed manifested himself into a modern day Achilles. But in literature, without obvious flaws a hero can never truly be one.
In Homer’s The Iliad, Achilles is the mightiest soldier in the Achaean army with all the markings of a magnificent warrior. But he is young and stupid and his will is far stronger than his common sense. With long wild hair and an impressive disposition, a true star in his field, Achilles could single-handedly lead his army to victory if only he could overcome his childish behavior— his brief and fleeting moments of weakness that compromise the integrity of the entire army.
In Stephen Garcia we can draw similarities. Had you called him on his cell phone before now you would have heard on his voicemail a quote from the movie Troy. Growing his hair out over the past two years, he reportedly did so paying homage to the film’s hero, Achilles— a hero he would later come to resemble in more ways than looks and stature.
In The Iliad, Achilles inherits his strength from his mortal father and his emotion from his immortal mother. Throughout the compressed narrative he proves himself as a more than worthy fighter time and again, known to slaughter 12 men at a time. As the son of an immortal, Achilles has a close relationship with the gods and knows his fate is to die in battle. But there is a part of Achilles we see that illustrates an impulsive and destructive streak that counteracts his greatness. It is this part of Achilles, his rage against his fate, that makes us feel for him as a contemporary American audience indoctrinated with a fascination for the rebellious hero, the same part of our cultural DNA that draws us obsessively to the TV screen to find out if Anna Nicole died from a drug overdose or if Michael Jackson actually did touch those kids. Because to us, you cannot be a hero unless you have flaws.
In real life, Stephen Garcia inherits his strength from his own father who has been quoted saying he believes “bouncing off the edges” makes for a more enjoyable life than going “straight down the line.” While in high school, the young athlete had become the top college recruiters’ most sought-after quarterback and proved his prowess on the football field without exception. Choosing the Gamecocks as his team, Stephen Garcia’s fate was sealed by the God of football, Steve Spurrier himself. Like Achilles, Stephen Garcia was going to lead his army in battle, destroying his enemies with each snapped ball, each cock ‘n’ fire play.
“We build up our athletes to the point where they can only let us down,” writes Ron Morris of The State newspaper in a profile on Stephen Garcia. And like his hero Achilles, Stephen Garcia recently did just that.
The question becomes not “why did he do it?” (drunkenness, failing to stop for police command and most recently vandalism) but of something more telling, “Can we blame him?” In The Iliad we read of an incredible warrior, a top competitor and someone on the battlefield to be admired— and in Stephen Garcia we see the same. As Americans we respect and admire the hero who never gives up, the “fall off the horse, get back up on it” mentality that lets us overlook past transgressions, misdemeanors and spots on the permanent record. It’s why Robert Downy, Jr. still has a job. It’s why Courtney Love isn’t in jail and before O.J. Simpson’s If I Did It book was axed the advance copy sales were through the roof. It’s why Stephen Garcia keyed that car.
As Morris puts it, the football star “grew up too fast,” but to put all the blame on him for it is too harsh a conviction. Maybe we should blame the institution he exists in. Had City Paper not reported the vandalism there is talk that Stephen Garcia would have actually gotten away with it. Or maybe instead we should blame the culture we live in that puts such incredible pressure on our athletes to be 100 percent great 100 percent of the time so when they do anything less it is considered a failure. Or, we can accept failure as a part of heroism and not act so surprised when it happens.
Either way what Stephen Garcia did is illegal in our society. He drank when he was underage. He ignored a police officer’s request for him to stop. He vandalized someone’s automobile. And like Achilles, he suffered not only guilt, which is personal, but also shame, which is public. Now suspended from the football program for which he was destined to be great, destined to lead his team into battle next fall to earn all the glory and respect any hero deserves, Stephen Garcia has— like Achilles— let his own personal faults compromise the entire army. For him it was not enough for him just to be great; if he wanted to encompass the true definition of a hero he also had to show us his shortcomings.
Now it is up to us, the audience, to decide how we’ll judge him before the end of the movie. In an online poll at TheState.com, the majority of 2,110 voters said he should be suspended from all team activities, including spring practice, until the start of preseason camp. What that essentially means is that we will take him out of a battle or two but still let him win the war.
There is however, one deviation of Stephen Garcia from the stubborn, spiteful Achilles. The football star seems genuinely sorry for what he did and has accepted the responsibility and consequences of his immature actions, even issuing a public apology. And, on the same month that disgraced pop icon and once top-of-the-charts celebrity, Britney Spears, shaved her head before entering rehab, Stephen Garcia has cut his own hair. It may mean nothing; the weather is getting warmer. But it may mean something else. That Stephen Garcia has forsaken his hero Achilles and maybe, though as Morris says, it may have been too fast, Stephen Garcia has grown up.
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