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Essay on the characteristics of odysseus
The character of odysseus
Character of odysseus
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Odysseus Reacts
(A discussion of how Odysseus reacts to the three souls he meets) Odysseus seems to react to everything and sometimes not in a positive way. When Odysseus escapes from Polyphemus, he gets on the boat and starts shouting at him and screaming his name which was a complete over reaction. Also, when Odysseus is trapped in the cave with the cyclopes he gets mad and demands that they be let go or Zeus will punish Polyphemus. Odysseus’ reacts to the three souls, Elpenor, Anticlea, and Tiresias different and the somewhat the same and he displays that he is compassionate. When Odysseus meets Elpenor, he weeps for him and shows compassion. After Elpenor first shows up, Odysseus weeps for pity. “Now when is saw him there I wept for
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Anticlea is Odysseus’ mother and before he left on his journey, she was alive. It was somewhat horrifying to Odysseus to see his mother dead. “Now came the soul of anticlea, dead, my mother, daughter of Autolycus, dead now, though living still when I took ship to Troy.” Textbook 2 pg. 1067. When Anticlea spoke to Odysseus he just wept and never replied. Unlike Elpenor, Odysseus doesn’t speak too his mother. Although, He does feel sorrowful with both spirits. Again, Odysseus shows his compassion to the spirit by weeping for them. Going to the underworld was easier for him then leaving it because the things the spirits tell him and the things he feels. To a degree, it can be claimed that Odysseus is bitter towards Anticlea because he puts his head down at the sight of her and refuses to speak even a word. Odysseus’ reaction to Tiresias is quite different from the other two. Tiresias makes Odysseas feel hopeful and that everything will turn out fine in the end. A special out of the ordinary sacrifice was made to Tiresias from Odysseus. “. . .as for Tiresias, I swore to sacrifice a black lamb, handsomest of all our flock.” Textbook 2 pg. 1065. Not only does Odysseus offer that sacrifice, but he listens and believes what Tiresias foretells. Tiresias brings out good qualities in Odysseus. Odysseus shows that he is caring, hopeful, intelligent, and a couple other things that he only
After escaping Polyphemos’s cave, Odysseus’s crew remains loyal. As a result, the focus changes to Odysseus being the epic hero. Odysseus takes control of the situation and allows most of his crew to escape safely. The crew is helpless and directs the attention to how Odysseus rescues his crew by blinding Polyphemos with a spear. He has escapes by having his men hang on the underside of rams. Odysseus laughs and keeps calm during the entire tense situation. “They lumbered off, but laughter filled my heart…” (9.461). Odysseus’s ability to keep his cool is what separates him from an ordinary man. Odysseus rises up when his crew is in predicaments. His lea...
Odysseus relates to the public with his character flaws that is what makes him get the impression that he is to a greater extent alive and not fabricated. In the Odyssey, Odysseus has ongoing dilemmas with his pride. An example of his intolerable selfishness with himself being his undoing is when he and his crew were on Cyclops’ Island. The protagonist had escaped Polyphemus and he had already taunted the Cyclops and almost was captured, but here is his ego taking control. This is Odysseus’s response to Polyphemus stating that a prophecy told him that a
What are the key points you will want to emphasize in your online profile for Character 1 (3-4 sentences)?
Humbly, he is “on the ground, in the ashes by the fire”(VII,190). He does not intrude into to their home and forcibly take gifts as he did on the Cyclops island. He accepts the care given to him from the Phaeacians and does not ask for more than he is given. Odysseus takes accountability of his actions when King Alcinous blames his daughter for bringing stranger into their home, Odysseus tells King Alcinous to not take “fault with a flawless daughter now, not for my sake, please”(VII,342-343). He is grateful for her help in giving him hospitality. After King Alcinous assures Odysseus he will get home, Odysseus prays,“May the king fulfill his promise one and all! Then his fame would ring through the fertile earth and never die”(VII,380-382). He is appreciative of the help so Odysseus calls to Zeus for good things for Alcinous. Not thinking of himself and wishing positive impacts on others is a sign of maturity.
This shows the value of showing respect for the gods. When Odysseus faces death at the hands of Scylla, he turns toward Zeus. Odysseus sees Zeus as a benevolent yet just ruler who will help heroes who deserve it.
In the “Land of the Dead”, Odysseus has to make a complicated potion to bring out the profit Teiresias. While waiting for Teiresias to come, he has to hold back the ghosts of the dead. While holding them back, he sees his dead mother. Odysseus did not know she was dead, and grieved, but still held her off to accomplish his obligations. While in the land of the dead, he sees his fallen shipmate, Elpenor. Elpenor tells him that he must backtrack back to Aeaea Island to bury his body and give him an honorable funeral. Odysseus promises to do this and he later does. The strength that he has to hold back ...
When people think of Odysseus, they think of a great, cunning, warrior. Who wouldn’t see him that way, he fought his way through Troy and embarked on a journey back home to see his son and wife again. On the surface Odysseus seems like a genius but in Homer’s, The Odyssey, Odysseus shows many instances where he outwits his foes but his foolishness heavily outweighs his smarts; he becomes boastful after a victory which leads to more hardships, he leaves precious cargo in the open for his brutish crew to mess with, and refuses help from the gods which nearly leads to his demise.
Odysseus approaches his homeland differently; thus coming to a different fate. When Odysseus lands on Ithaca, he is aware of the possibility of danger, which makes him skeptical and cautious. His attitude is a result of the things he had encountered on his journey, like monsters and Agamemnon’s ghost. The monsters, such as Polyphemus and the Laestrygonians, surprise Odysseus when they eat his men instead of being good hosts. Agamemnon’s ghost influences Odysseus’s mindset by informing him of his own unfortunate end....
Odysseus’ character is challenged in many ways throughout books 5 through 12. In some instances he holds strong, and in others he fails. His sense of adventure sometimes overwhelms him. The length of time Odysseus spends away from Ithaka also dilutes his desire to return, and possibly dilutes his desire to live. Under certain circumstances, any man can succumb to the evils to which he despises. A perfect example is Akhilleus in the Iliad. He started out an honorable man. With the death of his friend, he turns into a maniac who wants nothing but death for the enemy. Odysseus starts out wanting nothing but to return to his family and his homeland. Over the course of the many years away, this feeling dwindles and he is left with nothing but adventure to prolong his reason for living.
With the Odyssey, Odysseus learned a big lesson in humility. The greatest example of this is in the last five books or so within the story. He has to dress, act, and live like a beggar in order to regain everything he had lost. While he was a beggar, the suitors treated him horribly. Antinous, leader of the suitors, was the worst of them all. He was the first to mistreat Odysseus and planned to kill Telemachus. He was also the one that would abuse him physically and verbally for some time to come. Also, if that weren’t enough, he planned a boxing match for Odysseus to be in to watch him get beat up. All this was happening and the other suitors were most likely following their leader in whatever he was doing. Odysseus had to control himself the whole time this was happening. If he had lost his temper, the suitors would have killed him, his son, and most likely taken over the kingdom. That didn’t happen though. Odysseus learned self-control and humility. He may not be perfect at it, but going through all the humility made him a better man. Along the same topic, he was a king going through this humility. It would be one thing for a peasant to go through it, but a king? This made it even harder for Odysseus. He had rank above all the suitors and could rightly kick them out of his kingdom. Instead he waits for the right time and kills them all. The “pre-journey” Odysseus would of thought of himself invincible and probably would have died trying to get his kingdom back.
This tale coincides with the times in Greece. This was a time that art and Philosophy were extremely important and respected by the people. Odysseus was a new type of hero that didn’t win by overpowering his opponents, but by using his mind to outwit them. Manners also seemed to play an important role to Odysseus, as he was learned to be polite and generous to strangers and in the end punished those who weren’t.
When challenged during his excursion, Odysseus was prepared to give up any of his men if it meant saving himself. While he was absent for twenty years, Penelope did everything that she could to remain faithful to her husband. Penelope was unsure if her husband was even alive, but felt that moving on to a different man would not be just. While Penelope was at the palace awaiting Odysseus’ return, Odysseus was at Aeaea with Kirke. Odysseus was off living his life without thinking of how his actions could affect his wife. In book eleven, Odysseus is instructed by Kirke to go to the underworld to talk to Tiresias. When he arrives, one of the first people he spoke with was his mother, Anticlea. She goes on to inform her son that she died of grief waiting for him to return home. Odysseus only ever thought about how he would be affected by this prolonged journey and never about the lives of those who cared about him, such as his wife and his
Odysseus is a wise and strategic man who becomes a better person because of the lessons he learns on his journey. Odysseus learns to have hope and he learns not to have so much pride in himself. He also learns that people cannot change their fate, and that years of grieving can create a hard heart.It is hard for people to enjoy their goals in life if they do not think about the journey they took to get to where they are in life. After all, people learn a lot on the journeys they venture through and become stronger people from them.
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.
When Odysseus first gets to the Underworld he sees “…the souls of brides and youth and worn-out old men and soft young girls with hearts new to sarrow, and many men wounded with bronze spears...” (159). He sees his friend Elpenor next. Elpenor tells Odysseus that he fell off of Circe’s roof and begs Odysseus to bury him (161-162). Odysseus then sees his mothers spirit and that is how he found out she had passed away. He then sees Theban Tiresias who tells him not to harm any of the cattle or sheep on Thrinacia or they will be harmed. He also says that if any of his men touch the cattle but somehow Odysseus escapes he will find trouble at home. Odysseus will have to kill suitors that took over his home. Tiresias also tells Odysseus to offer a sacrifice to Poseidon, a ram, a bull, and a boar in their prime, when he gets to the land where men know nothing about the sea (161). Next, Odysseus talks his mother who tells him his wife is still in his halls, Telemachus holds his lands, and his father is still alive mourning for him (163). Three times Odysseus tries to embrace his mother and all three times she drifted out of his hands (164). He saw a lot of people he knew, but the next one of his friends he spoke to was Agamemnon. Odysseus asks him what fate he met and Agamemnon responds