The Symbolism of Homer's Odyssey
Throughout Homer's The Odyssey, many tangible symbols are used to represent abstract ideas. Each symbol that Homer uses has two meanings. The double meanings of these symbols are used to represent Odysseus and Telemachus as they strive to meet each other. While each symbol has a meaning that represents the growth of Telemachus, each one also represents, by another meaning, the growth and development of Odysseus. When they meet for the first time, the symbols, and the character traits that they represent confluence, and the resemblance between Odysseus and Telemachus becomes complete.
One of the main ideas running throughout
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Water can be considered a paradox in and of itself. While it is good and usually life giving, it also demonstrates how too much of a good thing can bring harm. It brings much harm to Odysseus as he is traveling to Phaeacia, "At Zeus' command the whole sky is heavy with clouds, the sea is seething, squalls from every corner hurtle together. There is nothing now for me but certain death." Everything needs water to live, however Odysseus speaks of water as an agent of death. Water that brings death by excess represents Odysseus, for he is the one that has to suffer all these years, and he is the one that nearly drowns. Odysseus also learns how too much of a good thing, such as wealth or gold, can seriously harm a man. He especially experiences this when he sacks Troy, and gets carried away, angering the gods. Henceforth, it is fitting that the excessive side of water represent …show more content…
The expression, "tomb or womb" has been used to explain the double meaning of the cave. In other words, the cave is either a place of shelter, or a place of mystery, even death. One of the most obvious places where the symbol of the tomb cave is used is when Odysseus and his group find their way into Polyphemus' dwelling. Many of Odysseus' good men die there. "Instead, he jumped up, and reaching out toward my men, seized a couple and dashed their heads against the floor as if they were puppies...while we, weeping, lifted our hands to Zeus at the ghastly site." The tomb meaning can be interpreted as the real world, sink or swim. Odysseus is faced with this throughout his twenty years of travel. Odysseus is the character that should be associated with the unpleasant side of the caves. The other idea the cave symbolizes, the womb, or the sheltered life of a man never being able to face the real world is represented by a different cave, "...while Odysseus set about bringing in all his belongings...Pallas Athene, Daughter of Zeus, closed the entrance with a stone." The cave in this part, the cave that Odysseus stows all his expensive belongings, is definitely symbolizing a womb. Telemachus is unmistakably represented by this type of meaning of the cave. He is sheltered all his life, until he comes closer and closer to meeting
Over their travels in the epic The Odyssey, both Odysseus’ and his son Telemachus’ adventures were parallel but at the same time different. These travels led them both to grow and change drastically, and both learned some very important life lessons over the course of this epic.
McQuade, Donald, ed. The Harper American Literature. Harper & Row Publishers: New York, 1987, pp. 1308-1311. This paper is the property of NetEssays.Net Copyright © 1999-2002
The Hero’s Journey is never an easy one. This particular journey, as detailed in Homer’s The Odyssey, is one of struggle, loss, heartache, pain, growth and triumph. It is comprised of many steps that Odysseus has to overcome and battle through in order to achieve his final goal of reaching his home and his loved ones. From the Call to Adventure to the Freedom or Gift of living, Odysseus conquered them all. The story begins in the middle of the story, as many of the oral Greek traditions did, with the Journey of Telemachus to find his father. Although Telemachus has not yet met his father, it is almost as if they are journeying together, where the end of both of their journeys results in being reunited. Telemachus journeys from being a boy to becoming a man, while out in the sea Odysseus is battling Poseidon to return to the home that wife that he loves and the home he has left behind.
In the movie Gattaca the main character Anton was discriminated against because of his gene makeup. Anton never even had a chance in the society in Gattaca because the potential employees of companies were not tested on their skills or knowledge but on their physical and mental possibilities. The same society also used derogatory terms for people like Anton. Just because his parents decided that he would come into the world naturally instead of through gene therapy or alteration. Terms like “faith birth'; and “invalid'; were used against Anton. I think gene therapy has it promises, but when used in the fashion as it was used in the Gattaca I think its progress should be carefully monitored. Right now sheep and other animals are being cloned. Soon primates and Humans could be cloned. I think we should further investigate human cloning for research on the parenting process and other physiological experiments that can only be used now on identical twins separated at birth. These experiments when used could be used to gain insight on what our genes determine in our personalities. I also think that the achievement of us humans cloning ourselves would be a great achievement for the entire human race such as it was when we landed on the moon in 1969.
Within the epic poem "The Odyssey", Homer presents the story of Odysseus's quest to find his home and his identity. According to Homer's account, with its origin in oral tradition, the two quests are interchangeable, as a mortal defines himself with his home, his geographic origin, his ancestors, his offspring, etc. But in addition to this Homer illustrates the other aspect of human identity, shaped by the individual and his actions so that he may be recognized in the outside world. Through this Homer presents Odysseus in two ways: the first his internally given identity as ruler and native of Ithaca, son of Laertes, father of Telemachos; the second the definition of the external world which sees the "god-like" mortal famous for his clever actions and the god's almost unanimous favor.
Throughout the Odyssey there are many themes that Homer uses to portray different people and events. To name a few, there are the themes of Betrayal and Revenge,Greed and Glutony, Hospitality, Role of the Gods and Wealth (the amount of money one had determined the status he held in the greek society, and this explains Odysseus's love for plunder).
In the Odyssey, Telemachus, son of great hero Odysseus, who grows up in the world of greed and disrespect where the suitors take over his palace and court his mother, is one of the most significant character throughout the whole epic. His father, Odysseus, leaving the land Ithaca for 20 years, is the only warrior alive in Trojan war who hasn’t make his return home. During Telemachus’ expedition to search for the news of his father, he is under a process of maturation from the beginning in which he is mere a shadow of his father to the end in which he becomes more and more like him in terms of initiative, sensitivity and socialization.
Does your mother or father ever give you more than enough money when you go on trips with friends or out of town with a school event? They always give you way more than you need in a lifetime, you ask for twenty and they give you double of what you need. Parents always have a way of making sure you have more than enough of what you need to get by with. Well in the story Parable of the Prodigal Son the father gives his second son a bunch of money for him to go live off on his own and he ends up blowing all the money and coming back home. There are many questions we can ask about this story, but the three that I want to focus on is do you think it’s a good idea to give your kid a lot of money or make them work for what they want in life, do you think it’s good parenting that he throw a party after he blew all the money and last question we will focus on is do you think parents chose favorites.
Throughout the Odyssey, there are many relationships that represent love between two people. These relationships show loyalty, compassion, and the wanting to be near one another. Two of these kinds of relationships are between Odysseus and Telemakhos, and Odysseus and Penelope.
Homer compares the crying Odysseus to a woman who weeps for her husband who died in battle. The weeping woman is described in a very dramatic scene in order to reflect the intensity of the sorrow that Odysseus is experiencing. The “woman weeps, flinging herself across the fallen body of her dear husband.” As she is “clinging to him, [she] wails,” and then “the enemies behind her strike her back and shoulders, then they carry her away to slavery and trials and misery.” The woman goes through a great deal of hardship, which explains why “her cheeks are wasted with pain.” Not only does her husband die, but the enemies strike her with their spears and take her away to suffer more. By comparing Odysseus’s crying to the woman weeping in this intense scene of misery, Homer is able to show the reader the degree of sorrow that Odysseus is feeling.
...journey is less cyclical than Achilles' but similarly ends with his regret for the ravages of war. Odysseus is a flawed character, much like man himself, and his actions can only be fully accounted for by attributing them to the gradual progression of his soul. He is gifted, yet possesses shortcomings; insightful, yet blind; driven, yet lost. Achilles is divine, yet mortal; rational, yet contradictory; kind, yet vicious. Still, together they represent the ideals of Greek mythology and the weaknesses of mankind. They are in control of their own actions, but subject to fate. Through both heroes, Homer manages to convey some of the most fundamental features of human existence.
middle of paper ... ... In Homer’s Odyssey, both Odysseus and his son Telemachus embark on long, difficult journeys; Odysseus trying to return from Troy to his home in Ithaca, escaping Calypso and the island of Ogygia, and Telemachus from Ithaca to Pylos and Sparta in search of his lost father. While The Odyssey tells of the courage both men demonstrate during their respective travels, their quests are the results of the intentions and desires of gods. Odysseus is trapped in exile on Ogygia by the will of Poseidon, whose anger Odysseus attracts when he blinds the Cyclops Polyphemus, son of Poseidon, and by the love of Calypso, who wishes to make Odysseus her husband.
Would you say that it’s ever moral to kill an innocent person? What do you consider a living person? When their heart has a beat, when they’re breathing? After a lady is pregnant for five weeks their baby 's heart has started to tick, though you can’t
In the first four books of Homer’s The Odyssey, the character of Telemachus undergoes a dramatic evolution. When Homer first introduces him, he appears to be an unsophisticated youth, wallowing in self-pity. After the goddess Athena intervenes, he becomes, seemingly, a man of courage, strength, and resolve. On closer analysis, however, one remains to wonder if this transformation is genuine. The rapidity of his change in personality and the assistance he requires from the goddess at every stage in his journey suggests that he is not yet a hero in the mold of his father, the great Odysseus.
“The Odyssey” is an epic poem that tells the story of Odysseus and the story of his many travels and adventures. The Odyssey tells the main character’s tale of his journey home to the island of Ithaca after spending ten years fighting in the Trojan War, and his adventures when he returns home and he is reunited with his family and close friends. This literary analysis will examine the story and its characters, relationships, major events, symbols and motifs, and literary devices.