Download Characters of the Odyssey

About the Odyssey
Most likely written between 750 and 650 B.C., The Odyssey is an epic poem about the
wanderings of the Greek hero Odysseus following his victory in the Trojan War (which, if it
did indeed take place, occurred in the 12th-century B.C. in Mycenaean Greece). Originally
composed in the Ionic Greek dialect in dactylic hexameter (most English translations use
iambic pentameter), The Odyssey, alongside the slightly earlier Iliad (a violent retelling of
the Trojan War), ushered in a new age of Western literature. The Odyssey has been so
influential that its primary theme‹ the desire for home‹ may be the most important one in
modern narratives, used for stories as diverse as The Wizard of Oz and James Joyce's
directly allusive Ulysses. The Odyssey is also notable for its exploration of its hero's
sensitive interior life, a stark contrast to the nonstop action of The Iliad.
There has been fervent debate, especially since the 19th century, over the authorship of
both poems. Some scholars maintain that they are the work of multiple writers, while others
believe that both are the product of a blind bard named Homer. It is now generally agreed
that a singer-poet named Homer from the city of Smyrna on the western coast of Asia Minor
did exist around the time of the composition of both poems, though the rest is still
disputable. One likely theory is that the illiterate Homer had memorized heroic stories that
had been passed down through the ages and altered them slightly when he sang them to
audiences and strummed a simple stringed instrument for musical accompaniment.
Someone else then cobbled together Homer's various narratives and wrote down first The
Iliad, then The Odyssey, most likely on a papyrus scroll. The stories were then copied, and
undoubtedly evolved, over time, helping explain particularly the uneven final third of The
Odyssey.
To buy them time between improvisations, the singer-poets repeated stories (such as that
of Agamemnon's murder in The Odyssey) and used recurring epithets‹ pithy tags attached
to characters ("grey-eyed Athena," "swift-footed Achilles")‹ and epic (or Homeric) similes,
or repetitive poetic comparisons ("rosy-fingered Dawn," "the wine-dark sea"). It is
important to remember that The Iliad and The Odyssey were originally oral entertainment,
and that much of the pleasure for the ancient Greeks came not from the narratives‹ with
which they were familiar‹ but from the sound of the poetry, which is still unmatched in the
epic poetic tradition for its beauty and grandeur.
Characters of the Odyssey
Odysseus:
The epic hero of The Odyssey, Odysseus is a fascinating character full of contradictions.
While he is intent on returning home to his faithful wife, Penelope, and his adult son he has
barely seen, Telemakhos, Odysseus also willingly beds down with not one but two beautiful
goddesses during his travels and expresses little remorse for his infidelities - though he rails
against the suitors who are trying to capture his wife.
The contradictions extend to Odysseus' intellect. Blessed with great physical strength (which
he amply demonstrates, despite his years, at several moments), he has an equally keen
mind that bails him out of many dire straits. There is no better "improviser" or "strategist"
in Greek mythology, though the label attached is often "cunning" or "deceiver"; indeed,
many Greeks saw Odysseus' habit of lying as a vice and a weakness. His penchant for
disguise complements his ability to make up plausible stories about his background.
Although Odysseus' ingenuity comes across as his chief weapon, his Achilles' heel of sorts is
the frequency with which he falls victim to temptation and makes grave tactical errors, none
more so than when adding insult to injury to Polyphemos and revealing his true name. Still,
Odysseus is aware of this flaw, and bids his men to tie him up when they pass by the
Seirenes, the paragons of temptation. By the end of his journey, he has learned to resist
temptation, willingly suffering abuse by the suitors to meet his eventual goal of destroying
them.
Despite his occasional gaffe, Odysseus is a courageous and just leader who inspires
admiration and respect from his shipmates and servants; the faithfulness of his dog and
swineherd after so many years says as much. The near-constant protection he enjoys from
the goddess Athena seems justifiable for a man who has endured so many hardships, and
cast away so many luxuries, to reunite with his beloved family.
Telemakhos:
Odysseus' son, Telemakhos, undergoes a miniature odyssey of his own. A callow 20-yearold afraid to challenge the suitors at the start of the poem, by the end, thanks in part to
Athena's grooming, he is an assured, mature young man ready to take on the suitors.
During his short journey to learn about the father he does not know, Telemakhos is the
beneficiary of "xenia," the Greek term for hospitality. He repays the favor to others who
need help and is a respectful traveler. The respect extends to his father; Telemakhos most
likely can string his father's bow during the contest, but he holds back under Odysseus'
watchful gaze. Though he has not inherited his father's gift for cunning, The Odyssey ends
with the promise that Telemakhos will one day make a fine ruler of Ithaka.
Penelope:
The beautiful wife of Odysseus, Penelope has always given critics difficulty. Does she refrain
from expelling the suitors only because she fears their retribution, as she claims, or does
she in some ways enjoy the attention? Though she weeps for Odysseus nightly, she does
not even force the suitors to act with proper decorum.
However, her faithfulness to her husband does remain steadfast, and she even shares his
proclivity for trickery, promising to remarry once she has finished weaving a shroud for
Laertes, but unraveling it each night (the suitors catch on after a few years). Penelope is
also fiercely protective of Telemakhos, and speaks out against the suitors when she hears of
their plans to murder him. After Odysseus' disguised arrival, Penelope's loyalty to her
husband is more evident, as is her sadness over his presumed death.
Athena: Daughter of Zeus and goddess of wisdom and battle (and of the womanly arts,
though this is barely touched upon), Athena is Odysseus' most powerful ally. Frequently
appearing throughout The Odyssey in disguise, she offers instructions, encouragement, and
magical protection to Odysseus and Telemakhos, whom she grooms in the ways of a prince.
Yet she also tests Odysseus at times; when he is disguised as a beggar, she provokes the
suitors to abuse him to see, ostensibly, if Odysseus will give in to temptation and fight back.
She also does not intervene in the climactic battle until the end, once Odysseus has proven
his mettle.
The suitors: Led by the manipulative Antinoos, the hotheaded Eurymakhos, and the
rational, somewhat decent Amphinomos, the suitors, numbering over one hundred,
ungratefully live off Odysseus' estate in their pursuit of the beautiful and wealthy Penelope.
They revel nightly with Odysseus' food and his willing female servants and bully around
Telemakhos, defying the sacred Greek value of "xenia" (hospitality). Homer's unsympathetic
portrait of them ensures that the audience enjoys the suitors' extremely violent end.
Poseidon: God of the sea, Poseidon is Odysseus' central antagonist for the middle section
of The Odyssey. Enraged over Odysseus' blinding of his Kyklops son Polyphemos, Poseidon
is directly responsible for most of Odysseus' troubles at sea.
Servants of Odysseus: Odysseus' servants are split into two camps according to loyalty.
His swineherd Eumaios and old nurse Eurkyleia epitomize the loyal servants while the
siblings Melanthius and Melantho lead the backstabbing group that sides with the suitors.
Major Themes
Home, wandering, and fidelity:
The title of The Odyssey has given us a word to describe a journey of epic proportions.
Throughout his travels, Odysseus' central emotion is loneliness. We first encounter him as
he pines away for home, alone on Kalypso's beach, and he is not above weeping when
thinking of home at other points. He also endures great loss through the deaths of his
brothers-in-arms from the Trojan War and his shipmates afterward. Loneliness pervades the
emotions of other characters; Penelope is nearly in constant tears over her absent husband,
Telemakhos has never known his legendary father, and Odysseus' mother explains that
loneliness caused her death.
Yet tempering Odysseus' desire to return home is the temptation to enjoy the luxurious
surroundings he sometimes finds himself in‹ particularly when he is in the company of
beautiful goddesses. He happily spends a year on Kirke's island as her lover and does not
seem to complain too much about his eight years of imprisonment on Kalypso's island. In
both cases, Odysseus expresses little remorse about being unfaithful to his wife‹ although
infidelity is what he fears Penelope may be succumbing to at home.
That Homer never reproaches Odysseus for his extracurricular romances but condemns the
unfaithful women in the poem recalls Kalypso's angry statement about the double standard
for immortals: male gods are allowed to take mortal lovers, while female goddesses are not.
Likewise, men such as Odysseus have some freedom to "wander" sexually during their
geographical wanderings‹ so long as they are ultimately faithful to their home‹ while
Penelope and the other women in The Odyssey are chastised for their lack of chastity.
Indeed, Odysseus does remain true to Penelope in his heart, and his desire to reunite with
her drives his faithful journey. Fidelity is also central at the end of the poem, when
Odysseus tests the loyalties of his servants and punishes those who have betrayed him.
Cunning and disguise:
Odysseus' most prominent characteristic is his cunning; Homer's Greek audience generally
admired the trait but occasionally disdained it for its dishonest connotations. Odysseus' skill
at improvising false stories or devising plans is nearly incomparable in Western literature.
His Trojan horse scheme (recounted here and written about in The Iliad) and his multiple
tricks against Polyphemos are shining examples of his ingenuity, especially when getting out
of jams.
Both examples indirectly relate to another dominant motif in The Odyssey: disguise. (The
soldiers "disguise" themselves in the body of the Trojan horse, while Odysseus and his men
"disguise" themselves as rams to escape from Polyphemos.) Odysseus spends the last third
of the poem disguised as a beggar, both to escape from harm until he can overthrow the
suitors and to test others for loyalty. In addition, Athena appears frequently throughout the
poem, often as the character Mentor, to provide aid to Odysseus or Telemakhos.
Women as predatory: It is little wonder Odysseus fears Penelope's lapse into
infidelity‹ women are usually depicted, if anything, as sexual aggressors in The Odyssey.
Kirke exemplifies this characteristic among the goddesses, turning the foolish men she so
easily seduces into the pigs she believes them to be, while Kalypso imprisons Odysseus as
her virtual sex-slave. The Seirenes, too, try to destroy passing sailors with their beautiful
voices. The suitors even accuse Penelope of teasing them, a debatable point. But no woman
receives as negative a portrait as Agamemnon's wife Kyltaimnestra; the story of her
cuckoldry and murder of her husband frequently recurs as a parallel to Odysseus' anxieties
about Penelope.
Odysseus' character flaws: Though he is usually a smart, decisive leader, Odysseus is
prone to errors, and his deepest flaw is falling prey to temptation. His biggest mistakes
come in the episode with Polyphemos as he first foolishly investigates the Kyklops' lair (and
ends up getting trapped there), and then cannot resist shouting his name to Polyphemos
after escaping (thus incurring Poseidon's wrath). If Odysseus' character changes over the
course of The Odyssey, though, it pivots around temptation. After his errors with
Polyphemos, Odysseus has his crew tie him up so he can hear‹ but not follow‹ the
dangerously seductive song of the Seirenes. Disguised as a beggar in Ithaka, he is even
more active in resisting temptation, allowing the suitors to abuse him as he bides his time.
Temptation hurts his crew, as well, in their encounters with Kirke, the bag of winds from
Aiolos, and the oxen of Helios.
The power of the gods:
The gods exercise absolute power over mortal actions in The Odyssey. To curry the gods'
favor, mortals are constantly making sacrifices to them. Conversely, offending the gods
creates immense problems, as demonstrated by the oxen of Helios episode and Poseidon's
grudge against Odysseus for blinding his son Polyphemos.
Athena is the most visible god in the poem; only under her aegis can Odysseus survive his
dangerous adventures, and she lobbies Zeus for his freedom and safety at other points. Her
favoritism for him seems justified as a reward for his sacrifices and nobility of character; her
distaste for the suitors is similarly understandable.
The power of the gods, who usually care more about their internal disputes than about
mortal behavior, is cemented at the end of the poem as Zeus orders a cease-fire between
Odysseus and the suitors. Ultimately, the gods decide what happens in the mortal world;
lack of free will receives more depth in The Iliad, but is a prominent theme in nearly any
ancient Greek text, particularly ones that concern themselves with the omnipotent gods.
Hospitality:
The Odyssey nearly serves as a Greek guide to hospitality, or "xenia," which was such a
dominant concept in Greece that Zeus was the god of hospitality. Telemakhos and Odysseus
receive warm hospitality throughout their journeys from others, usually without even having
to give their names. The flip side of the equation, of course, is the suitors, who abuse
Telemakhos' hospitality in running through Odysseus' reserves. The other blight on
hospitality comes at the end when the Phaiakians, after Poseidon turns into stone their ship
that carried Odysseus to Ithaka, decide not to give strangers conveyance anymore.
Telemakhos' miniature odyssey: Paralleling Odysseus' greater journey, Telemakhos' journey
at the beginning of the poem is as much a search for maturity as it is one for his father.
Athena, who sparks his travels, also grooms him in the ways of a prince. Telemakhos
matures from his initial weakness in the face of the suitors into the authoritative man of the
house, and his place by his father's side in the climactic battle is well earned and
represented.
Source: gradesaver.com