Theme Of Failure In The Odyssey

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When Failure Leads to Success

Focusing on at least three or as many as four characters in the Theogony and the Odyssey (and, in addition, if you wish, the movie Iphigenia), discuss how experiences of apparent failure, defeat, and great challenge lead to success, victory, and/or transformation.

The Odyssey and the Theogony both describe several instances in which characters experience some sort of failure, defeat, and or challenge. Sometimes these negative experiences have led to success, victory and or transformation. As a result of Kronos’ failure, Zeus defeats and overthrows his father, in the Theogony. Chosen by Gaia, Typhoeus would be responsible for the annihilation of Zeus and ruling the heavens. Although it seemed like Zeus would …show more content…

This is not public place / this is Odysseus’ house- / my father won it for me, so it’s mine / you suitors control yourself. No insults now, / no brawling, no, it’s war between us all.” (Homer 20.291-296). Here you can see Telemachus showing courage and confidence both things he wanted to do as soon as the suitor got to his home but couldn’t do. But what changed? As the reader, what really showed me that Telemachus found his voice was when he said “don’t let me see more offenses in my house, / not from anyone! I’m alive to it all, now, / the good and the bad- the boy you knew is gone.” (Homer 20.345-347). When Telemachus uses the word now in this sentence it shows that the Telemachus in the beginning of the book is totally different from the one in book 20. He now has more experience and the guidance of his father, both crucial things that he didn’t have in book one. This is why I believe the challenge of not having his father around combined with the infestation of the suitors is what really lead Telemachus to transform into the man he always wanted to …show more content…

This was a challenge for Odysseus as well, because he went from being a might king and warrior to a beggar with nothing to call his own. This will lead him to become a better king because he now knows what it is like to be a beggar, being humiliated, and treated like nothing. Once he knows how the highest and lowest people are treated in Ithaca he could rule accordingly. Once he got into his house and he saw the suitors and came up with a plan to kill them all. First, he needed to kept his identity secret then, he needed to hide all the weapons so he would have the upper hand. Once the contest was in play he was finally able to do something about the suitors who “bled [his] house to death, / ravished [his] serving-women – wooded [his] wife / behind my back while [he] was still alive.” (Homer, 20. 37-40). After, the contest Odysseus started killing the suitors one by one leaving a pond of blood throughout the house. Just when he thought he had the upper hand (suitors didn’t have any weapons) little did he know that Melanthius the goatherd, “climbed up through smoke-ducts / …into Odysseus’ storeroom / bundled a dozen shields, as many spears and helmets / … rushed back down to the suitors, quickly issued arms.” (Homer 22.151-155). At this point Odysseus knew that he no longer had the upper-hand and now the suitors were armed and ready for an equal fight. When he saw the armed

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