Plato's Socrates Argued Homer's Achilles Needed Censoring — For Greed and Arrogance
In Book 3 of Plato's Republic, the character Socrates explains to Glaucon and Adeimantus why the depictions of Achilles and the other Homeric heroes need to be heavily censored.
The objection is not a lack of pedigree: Achilles is the son of a goddess and of Peleus, a man of the utmost self-control and a grandson of Zeus, and he was guided by Chiron, the wisest of schoolmasters. The problem is that he is shown in such inner disorder that he combined two contrary diseases — illiberal love of money and overweening arrogance toward gods and men.
The proposed remedy is blunt: stop tales of this kind before they breed in young men an indulgent tolerance of wickedness.
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What makes the charge memorable is the pedigree it cuts through: a goddess for a mother, a famously self-controlled father, the wisest of schoolmasters — and still two contradictory diseases diagnosed in one hero. Bad character, on this account, survives excellent breeding.
Fine diagnosis, crude prescription. Stop the stories before they breed in young men a tolerance of wickedness, and you have said something bleak about young men and something grandiose about whoever gets to edit their reading.