Book VI: While Odysseus sleeps in a forest, Athene visits the house of King Alcinous in Scheria, the city of the Phaeacians. She appears to the king’s daughter, Nausicaa, in a dream, disguised as the girl’s best friend. She tells Nausicaa to wash her clothes in the washing cisterns in preparation for her wedding. Nausicaa is being courted by many men and will likely not be unmarried for very long. When Nausicaa wakes up, she obtains a wagon and mules from her father. She and her maidservants drive down to the washing cisterns, which are some distance from town. The cisterns are close to where Odysseus sleeps, but the girls wash their clothes and begin a game of ball without noticing him. Athene, trying to wake Odysseus up so he can receive help from Nausicaa, causes one of the balls to fall into …show more content…
When Odysseus is exploring the island alone, notices that there is a house on a hill. Odysseus divides his men in half, and it is Eurylochus’ group that goes to the house. All of Eurylochus’ company except Eurylochus himself enters the house, where they are given food and wine by Circe. The meal, however, is drugged, and the sailors are turned into pigs. Eurylochus hurries back to the ship, telling Odysseus that the other men have disappeared. Odysseus, against Eurylochus’ advice, goes to Circe’s house. There, he meets Hermes, who has taken the form of a young man. Hermes tells Odysseus what will happen inside Circe’s house. He gives Odysseus instructions and an herb called moly, a talisman that will protect him from Circe’s drugs. Odysseus follows Hermes’ instructions. He dines with Circe, and when she touches him with her wand, he draws his sword and lunges at her. Circe asks him to become her lover, but Odysseus demands that she first swear an oath to free his friends and to not try to harm him again. Circe agrees. Circe changes Odysseus’ crew back into humans, and all of his men stay with her for a
Athena disguises him as an old beggar and he meets up with his son, Telemachus. They form a plan to beat the suitors and then Odysseus goes to meet them. Finally, it is decided that whoever can use Odysseus’s bow to shoot an arrow through twelve axes. Odysseus, unsurprisingly, wins and starts fighting the suitors. He kills them all and reveals himself to Penelope. To make sure it’s him, she asks him to move their bed. Knowing it can’t be moved, he tells her that part of the headboard is a tree. Penelope and Odysseus are reunited and they live the rest of their lives together.
Odysseus tries to gain the pity of Nausicaa by suggesting that he thinks she resembles a goddess and says that her ‘beauty, grace and stature’ remind him of Artemis, he does this to gain Nausicaa’s trust by making her think he genuinely admires her and by mentioning Artemis specifically he shows that he is familiar with the gods therefore making her more likely to listen to him as being close the gods was a heroic trait. Odysseus also states that the person who gets to marry Nausicaa is ‘most blessed’ which implies that Odysseus himself wants to marry Nausicaa, which is a possibility if Nausicaa helps Odysseus get to her father’s castle which she will do if she wants to marry him, which in turn will give Odysseus an opportunity to return to
...s, a prophet, and Circe, a Nymph, that he would be the only one to survive the voyage home. First, Scylla takes and eats six of Odysseus’ men and after they stop on Helios’ Island, the men eat Helios’ cattle. He tries in every way he knows to keep his men alive, but they did not abstain themselves from eating the cattle, so they perish.
Their next destined endeavor takes them to the land of the Lotos Eaters. The Lotos flower possesses powers which cause men to forget any thought they have of leaving the island. Odysseus, knowing of the Lotus’ special powers, orders his men to avoid the flowers. Three men took it upon themselves to taste the flower and were subsequently drug back to the ships kicking and screaming. Again, Odysseus’ intelli...
A female character always aids an epic hero, and Odysseus is no exception. Near the end of his travels, Athena feels sorry for him and decides to assist him and let him go home, and once he arrives, she helps him kill the suitors that plague his house. “That left the great Odysseus waiting in his hall as Athena helped him plot the slaughter of the suitors” (Fagles 390). Not only is this assistance by a woman, and a sure sign of an epic hero, but also a goddess assists him, and only those worthy enough can be helped by the Immortal. Odysseus is also aided and told how to get home by the Goddess Circe. “You must travel down to the House Of The Dead and the awesome one, Persephone, there to consult the ghost of Tiresias, seer of Thebes” (Fagles 245). This is the same person who tried to tempt him, but she realizes he wont stay and decides to help him instead.
These two female characters are especially enticing to Odysseus because they are goddesses. Though it is evident that Odysseus longs to return to Penelope in Ithaca, it sometimes appears that he has lost vision of what life was like with a wife, a son, and with thousands of people who regard him as King. Although his experiences on the islands of these goddesses were similar in that he was retained from Ithaca for the longest periods of his adventure, these goddesses and the ways that Odysseus reacts to his experiences with them represent two very different aspects of Odysseus' life and disposition in life. When Odysseus and his men arrive on Circe's island, they are still in fairly good shape. In Book X, lines 194-196, Odysseus says: "I climbed to a rocky place of observation and looked at the island, and the endless sea lies all in a circle around it." I believe this illuminates a very important aspect in Circe's tendencies. She doesn't seem to want to cause any real harm to the men, but wishes to encircle these men with her food, wine, and lust. She seems to be obsessed with lust and material possessions, and it is my belief th...
The. " In disguise as an old friend of Odysseus', Athena travels to his manor in Ithaka, now overrun with noisy, lustful suitor's intent on marrying Odysseus' wife, Penelope. Odysseus' son, Telemakhos, unhappy among the suitors, greets Athena warmly as a stranger and invites her to their feast. As the suitors devour Odysseus' oxen, Telemakhos says he believes his father - whom he does not know at all - is dead. "(gradesaver.com/
Like Jacob, Odysseus connived, manipulated, and deceived. On his journey home from the Trojan War, Odysseus uses his trickster ways to get himself out of trouble. One famous tail was his encounter with the one-eyed Cyclopes Polyphemous. Odysseus and his crew landed on the land of they Cyclopes. They made themselves at home, eating the cheese and goats of the Cyclopes, fully expecting him to be hospitable. Instead, Cyclops began eating then men as though they were animals themselves. Odysseus and his men were trapped in the cave and Polyphemous rolled a stone over the entrance so no one could exit. Odysseus connived a plan and gave the Cyclopes some wine. When he got drunk and passed out, Odysseus poked out the eye of Polyphemous and completely blinds him. Odysseus and his men escape the cave by clinging to the bellies of sheep (Odyssey, Ch. 9). He also disguised himself as a veteran of a Trojan war to Eumaios, a loyal servant, and as a beggar to his wife and son.
However, his journey isn’t over yet. This last leg of Odysseus’s journey is perhaps the most important and crucial. Odysseus’s nurse and maidservant, Eurycleia is the first woman in Ithaca to know that Odysseus is back after she recognizes the scar on his leg while she is washing him. Eurycleia vows to keep his identity a secret. Odysseus’s wife, Penelope has stayed faithful to Odysseus for all the years that he was gone. Penelope was consistently unweaving her web to the delay the suitors. The reader even grows sympathetic for Penelope as “we see her struggle to make the virtuous choice about her marriage, despite pressures from her suitors, her son’s endangered situation, and her own uncertainty about Odysseus’s survival” (Foley ). Finally, Odysseus reveals his identity and Penelope is bewildered, but quickly embraces her husband after he tells her the secret of their immovable bed. It is the faithfulness of Penelope and nurse Eurycleia that insures Odysseus’s survival to the very end.
Zeus’ revenge on Odysseus and his men on their journey home from Troy is one of the reasons Odysseus is setback in returning home. While on the journey home, Circe warns Odysseus of revenge if they eat the cat...
The power and influence of women is symbolized in Odysseus’ encounter with the dead in Hades. In the Underworld, Odysseus meets more women than men. He meets his mother and then a “grand array of women” (334). They all were “wives and daughters once of princes” (334). All of them are the legendary women who were the mothers of the greatest Greek lineages. This symbolizes how Greek civilization was founded by women; they were the ones who gave birth to the heroes. Similarly, The Odyssey is a story created by women. The plot revolves around the actions of women. Athena orchestrates all the events. The seductresses, such as Circe, the sirens, and Calypso, attempt to stop Odysseus from reaching home. The helpmeets, such as Nausicaa, Arete, and Athena, aid Odysseus in his homecoming. The wise and virtuous Penelope is the object of Odysseus’ quest. Unlike Helen who forsakes her husband, Penelope remains faithful. Unlike Clytemnestra who assassinates her husband, Penelope patiently waits for Odysseus. She becomes a model of female patience and of female intelligence. Her craftiness is the only one which can match up to Odysseus’. The Odyssey presents a wide array of women and demonstrates the influence that women have in the life of a
Again Odysseus shows a lack of self discipline while with the witch Circe. Odysseus chooses to stay with Circe instead of trying to make it back to his wife, Penelope, and his kingdom of Ithaca. In the Odyssey it says "he enjoyed the many pleasures of Circe." (Page 913). This proves that Odysseus, once again has no control over himself when he is tempted. He choose the beautiful witch over his very own wife who has been waiting for years for him to return.
Learning the Greek rituals and after practicing them for many years, Odysseus, Odysseus' shipmates, and Telemachus became very reliant Greek tradition, especially that of treating all guests with great hospitality. At many times Odysseus would not have made it back to his wife and kingdom if it was not for the Greek tradition, that he relied on. After being at sea for seventeen days on a raft he had constructed, Odysseus spotted land. Poseidon then brought about a terrible storm, which wrecked his raft. After two days of battling waves that brought him near death, Odysseus was finally helped by a sea nymph onto the shore of Scheria. Once reaching the shore he kissed the earth, crawled under some olive trees, and fell asleep. Later, Princess Nausicca and her young friends went to the shore of Scheria to wash their clothes. Playin...
Upon the isle of Circe, the crew had been tasked under Eurylochos to discover the circumstances of the witch at the center of the island. But only Eurylochos returned to tell the tale of their capture, how Circe, “asked them to come in; they all followed her, in their innocence … but she put deadly drugs in the mess, to make them wholly forget their native land” (117). The rest of the crew gave into the temptation of the beautiful Circe, drawn into her house despite warned caution in their scouting. It also stands as a bit of irony that the man who would lead the crew into their eventual demise was the only one to stand strong and suspect that not everything was as they appeared with Circe. Among the lotus eaters, the crew was tasked with learning more about the island’s native people. But upon finding them the men, “tasted that honey-sweet fruit, they thought no more of coming back to us with news, but chose rather to stay … and chew their lotus, and [say] good-bye to home” (102). The lack of caution among Odysseus’s sailors leads to their loss of individualism as they attain a death of a sorts, unable to live as men and incapable of attaining kleos. These reckless and unwise actions taken by each of the sailors was done in their greed for an immortality through remembrance but ultimately provided nothing but their
Odysseus orders his men to tie him up to the mast of the ship, so he can be the only one getting tortured by the Sirens’ song. Circe foretells that Odysseus and his men will die, in an effort to sacrifice himself for the crew, he tells his crew to tie him up. This daring moves is another reason why he is parted from the other characters, as a hero.