Homer's The Odyssey

The Odyssey is an epic poem that was written by a man called Homer who is believed to have lived hundreds of years ago. In his 12,000 line story, he captures the adventure of a man named Odyssey who is trying to return home from war to his wife and son. He faces several forms of trouble and deterrents that encompass everything from monsters to gods to people. The reader can look at these events, the symbols, the motifs, and the relationships in the story between different characters in the story to determine the theme of the story. Each part plays a role in forming the themes, though it can sometimes be hard for the reader to analyze each part of the story effectively.
One of the most important parts, though also one of the hardest to grasp, are the events. They can all have a different morale and a different lesson while they all come together to form a completely different central idea. One of the first events, and one of the most influential on the theme of the story, is when Odysseus meets the Cyclops named Polyphemus. This is an important event because this is the first event in which Odysseus losses several of his men and his life is also at risk of being lost. His cunning and intelligence is revealed through his trickery of the Cyclops, though the reader is also exposed to his pride. Odysseus is a great warrior because of his ability to plan and think things out, which the reader saw when he devised the plan that let them injure the giant and then escape from his detrimental rule and return to their ship. Once they are a safe distance from the enraged and aggravated brute though, Odysseus makes a grave mistake. He leans overboard and yells back to the island his name and where he is from because up to that point Polyphe...

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...ide was when he faced off against the Cyclops. He was so wrapped up in the moment that he threw caution to the wind and yelled his name out to Polyphemus. Other than this situation, there were not many other times that it was Odysseus was the one who let pride sweep them away; normally it was his crew.
These two themes are fairly good representations of the poem, though they would be nothing without the events, motifs, and events that back them up. They all combine to tell an epic story of large proportion that was withstood the tests of time and is still an amazing and astonishing tale of good and evil. It is amazing to think that someone from hundreds of years ago could be able to sum up almost all of the pitfalls and high points of human life in one poem. It was done though, and all in one piece of literary work that is 12,000 lines long and was written in 8 BC.