...Poseidon In the Odyssey Poseidon, the Olympic god of the sea, earthquakes and storms is considered a villain in The Odyssey because he is vengeful and unforgiving. He uses his powers to harm those who wronged him or those close to him. Odysseus, the main character, blinds Poseidon's son, the Cyclops named Polyphemus. Odysseus landed his ship on the Cyclops’ island and Polyphemus begins to show him hospitality at first, but he begins to eat Odysseus’ men. Odysseus cleverly gets the Cyclops drunk with wine to impair him enough to fall when his men pick up a hot olive stake and drove it into the Cyclops’ eye ultimately blinding Poseidon’s son. Poseidon could have had some underlying hate for Odysseus beforehand because they were on opposite sides of the Trojan War. Poseidon’s anger could have been influenced even greater once he realized that a mortal man had outsmarted Polyphemus. Poseidon uses his power to delay Odysseus return home by causing powerful storms and strong winds to push Odysseus further from Ithaca. Polyphemus prays to his father to make Odysseus come home late as a broken man, his shipmates lost, alone on a stranger’s ship, and to let him find a world of pain at his home. Poseidon’s greatest...
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...The Odyssey is a Homeric Poem written by Homer, a blind poet, that is one of the greatest poems ever written. The Odyssey is filled with heros, monsters, creatures, and gods. This poem is about a journey taken by Odysseus. On his way home he faces many obstacles making his journey home much more complicated. While he is facing obstacles he is faced by 4 gods Athena, Zeus, Helios, and Poseidon. These gods help him throughout his journey home. Athena, the most powerful god, helps Odysseus make his journey home by providing him with guidance and beauty. Athena is the goddess of wisdom, warfare, crafts, and is one of the most powerful of the 12 olympian gods. Athena created the potter's wheel, vase, horse bridle, the chariot and the ship....
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...In Homer’s The Odyssey, Homer presents a perplexing and complex dilemma revolving around the ambiguity and problematic language used to describe the ideology of justice and vengeance. Moreover, it is the returning of equivalent harm for harm that seems to run through the heart of the archaic Greek culture that allows for crimes to merge with and become their own punishment. The relationship between crime and punishment is a tight linkage that seems to be arranged by Homer in an attempt to justify the moral positions as well as the actions of many major characters throughout The Odyssey. Distinctively, the role of justice and vengeance can be exhibited in the interactions between Polyphemus, Odysseus, Poseidon and the suitors. The conflict...
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...Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Literature: An Analysis of The Odyssey The Odyssey is one of the most well known stories about war and its effects on the survivors. Homer goes out of his way to share the names and families of fallen soldiers for many reasons. The deaths in The Odyssey are exceptionally bloody and gore-filled, which allows the reader to vividly see the scenes depicted and understand the true horror that violence holds. The war scenes are particularly gruesome and filled with death. The only part of The Odyssey that Homer has left to the reader to venture in to is what Odysseus has going on inside his head. How did the Trojan War affect Odysseus mentally? Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a mental health condition that is triggered by a terrifying event. Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares severe anxiety, and uncontrollable thoughts about the event. PTSD affects most war veterans and has for as long as wars have raged on. Until 1980, when PTSD was first recognized as a mental disorder, people suffering from PTSD were deemed psychologically insane if they were deeply affected. When the Odyssey was written, there was no possible way to diagnose Odysseus with PTSD, though many signs in The Odyssey point to the fact that he would have. Odysseus struggled through many hard times and witnessed many terrifying things during his strife. He witnessed the gory death of at least six of his crew, seeing their skulls bashed open on rocks and their brains...
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...the blame upon us gods, for they say evils come from us, but it is they, rather, who by their own recklessness win sorrow beyond what is given.”(Odyssey 1. 32-34) These words are spoken by Zeus at the beginning of Homer’s The Odyssey as he explains that it is not the gods who are responsible for the suffering of mankind, but that these hardships come from one’s own choices and character flaws. Homer begins The Odyssey with this dialog to inform the reader that the fate of Odysseus, his ten year long journey home, is the result of his own choices and flaws rather than portraying him as a victim of the gods. Although Odysseus is certainly a great hero, Homer makes it clear from the beginning, through that quote from Zeus, that...
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...God, play a key role in the development of the literature. In Homer’s epic poem The Odyssey, the gods are key in Odysseus’ return to Ithaca after twenty years. Whether it is helping Odysseus or delaying him, they play a major role in the development of the story. In Psalm 139, the scripture passage taken from the Bible, God is a very obvious factor. Even in the poem by William Owen “Dulce et Decorum Est” God again plays a major role once we dive deeper than the words are saying. The role of the gods, or singular God in Catholicism, plays a key role, sometimes unspoken, part. In The Odyssey we see in the first book three major gods that make an immediate impact on Odysseus’ journey home. Zeus, Athena, and Poseidon all are important in their own way in either helping Odysseus or trying to stop him. Zeus, king of the gods, is characterized as a mediator between Athena and Poseidon, the former helping Odysseus and the latter trying to stop him from reaching home. Athena does all she can to help out the mortal Odysseus, even appearing to him and his son Telemachus in disguise to point them in the right direction. Poseidon, however, hates Odysseus for blinding his son and tries his hardest on multiple occasions to kill Odysseus and his men. Zeus, for being king of the gods, does not have the most important religious role in this epic poem. He is mostly seen as a babysitter between Athena and Poseidon, allowing Athena to help Odysseus but...
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...THE ODYSSEY Is a good leader classified as one who personally gains a lot or one who benefits his or her community at large? After fighting in the brutal Trojan War, Odysseus travels the sea in hopes of returning to Ithaca, his homeland, and his wife and son, Penelope and Telemachus. Homer’s The Odyssey reveals the struggles and obstacles Odysseus and his men face traveling home. As prophesized, twenty years later, Odysseus returns to a devastated Ithaca, alone, penniless and unrecognizable. Odysseus has hubris, a flaw that costs him, as well his men, excessive troubles. Odysseus does not learn from his and others’ past mistakes, again leading him into traps that could have easily been avoided. Odysseus constantly puts his men in harm’s way for selfish purposes. For these reasons, Odysseus is an incompetent leader, and therefore should be criticized. Odysseus has hubris. This excessive pride and arrogance leads Odysseus and his men into difficult situations that would not have otherwise arisen. Towards the beginning of Homer’s epic, Odysseus narrowly escapes from a Cyclops’ cave. In triumphant victory, Odysseus taunts the Cyclops, Polyphemus. His men advise him against further agitating Polyphemus after the Cyclops starts throwing massive boulders at their ship; however, Odysseus displays hubris and does not listen. ‘Godsake, Captain! Why bait the beast again? Let him alone!’ ‘Aye He’ll smash our timbers and our heads together!’ / I would not heed them...
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...Odysseus from Homer's The Odyssey is not a good role model. At times, Odysseus' curiosity can lead to some extreme situations and endanger the lives of his crew. Odysseus can also be very prideful of his clever work or achievements, causing unnecessary trouble later on. Furthermore, although Odysseus says that he misses his kingdom, wife, and son, and wishes to return to them dearly, he doesn't stay faithful to his wife. Book IX of The Odyssey provides an example of Odysseus' bad curiosity as it trapped him and his crew in the cyclops' cave. When Odysseus and his crew reach the island of the cyclops, they discover the cyclops, Polyphemus' cave. Odysseus, curious to see what the beast looks like, waits with his crew in the cave. When...
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...makes an effort to return home and leave Calypso’s island. His journey has been a long one, leaving wife Penelope and son Telemachus at home fending off suitors. However, it seems the time has come for him to take another long journey home, but not without the guidance of the gods. Of all the ideals and customs that the Greeks share in this story, particularly Odysseus, their religious beliefs and ideals are the most important and defining of their culture. The religious beliefs and ideals that the Greeks hold of the Greek gods are what guide the individuals in this story over any other ideal or custom of their culture. As seen from early on in the book, The Odyssey, the gods play a heavy role in the lives of the Greeks. Athena, goddess of wisdom and battle, is the main goddess who is master of disguises. In The Odyssey, Athena comes to Telemachus as “Mentes” and explains that the “great Odysseus is not dead” (Fagles, pg. 85). Athena disguises herself as this lord of the Taphian men as to convince Telemachus that she is friend of his father’s not just a stranger. Unaware that “Mentes” is in fact Athena, Telemachus prepares to leave for Pylos and Sparta to not only set a name for himself but to seek information of his father. Telemachus was given a lot of motivation in his conversation with Athena and I believe a huge part of that is because she told him his father will be on his journey home through a “prophecy, one the immortal gods have planted in [her] mind” (Fagles, pg. 84)...
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...Heroes are defined as people who help and save people. It could also be defined as someone who goes on a dangerous adventure with many obstacles that the person has to surmount. Heroes are everywhere. Odysseus is the hero of the “Odyssey” by a blind poet, Homer. Odysseus fights in Trojan War for 10 years and it took him another decade for him to get home. He had to pass many hardships to get to his homeland Ithaca. The three main stages in Campbell’s “The Hero’s Journey” that exemplified in Homer’s The Odyssey are the crossing of the first threshold,the road of trials, and freedom to live. For example, Joseph Campbell describes that the crossing of the first threshold is the hero which is Odysseus who is accompanied by the guide which is Athena, the goddess of wisdom goes beyond the boundaries of his or his everyday, enter the wilderness, and has the first encounter with...
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...influences are reflected in today’s modern society, and many similarities can be found between Greek mythology and modern religions, such as Christianity. The twelve Olympian Gods and their Myths To begin with, many of the beliefs that the Ancient Greeks believed in were based on the Olympians. The Olympians were a group of twelve gods who ruled after they overthrew the Titans. All of the Olympians are related in some way and they were named after their dwelling, Mount Olympus. The three major gods are Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades. Their father, Kronos, was the leader of the Titans, he was cruel and was so determined not to lose his throne that he ate his children alive. But one child, Zeus was spared because his mother, Rhea, fed Krono’s a rock disguised as a baby instead of Zeus himself. Zeus defeated his father by chopping him up into little pieces and scattering his remains across the world. Then Zeus released all of Krono’s children that his father had eaten. These gods were Poseidon, Hades, Hestia, Demeter, and Hera. Zeus became the god of the sky and it is said that he was the one who created Mankind. His brother Poseidon became the god of the Sea. But Hades, tricked by Zeus, became the god of the underworld and was left there in darkness and despair to ferry the dead to their fates. Each of the twelve gods represented things in our world. For instance, the Athena or Αθηνa, as it is spelled in...
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...The Odyssey has been a major part of English Literature. Therefore, there have been several adaptations made to it, including multiple movies. There are two major movies that represent the Odyssey luminously. Ulysses (1954) and The Odyssey (1997) are two of the most major adaptation to the remarkable Odyssey by Homer. Ulysses (1954) was directed by Mario Camerini, and the Odyssey (1997) was directed by Andrey Konchalovskiy. INCLUDE THESIS The Odyssey )1997) starts off with Odysseus running to the birth of Telemachus, while Agamemnon and Menelaus visit him. They visit him to tell him about the kidnapping of Helen, which leads to the Trojan War. When Odysseus is leaving there are two major things that happen first, of all his mother makes him...
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...woman, but she actually never gives in to any of the men. The purpose of women was mainly to lament the losses for their men and also persuading for their safety. Criticism- Homer had written the Odyssey with a bit of over-the-top reiteration, along with the missing component of a sense of unity. However, even when Odysseus wasn’t on a scene, the lines of the story still indicate that he is...
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...Tom Rath says, “You cannot be anything you want to be - but you can be a whole lot more of who you already are.” Rath is the creator of Strengthsfinder, a program helps people find and understand their strengths. For example, my strengths include: Competition, Significance, Achiever, Futuristic, and Focus. Throughout our study of Greek culture, especially in The Odyssey, these are very common traits. These are traits commonly seen in athletes, warriors, and leaders such as Odysseus. My vase includes images such as those, along with images that connect to The Odyssey and my own life. Focus: Lens & Penelope While creating my vase, I incorporated both Greek culture and some modern-day styles. For example, I chose to incorporate a camera lens...
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...all literature works read thus far, the Odyssey full fills the hero’s journey in all aspects of the story. Throughout this story there are vivid examples of how the hero’s journey is outlined. From the beginning of “the hero’s journey”, which is the call to adventure Odysseus will begin his journey when he makes the choice of going into battle in the Trojan War. There will also be specific events in this epic story to display “the hero’s journey” even further. Eventually the end of the journey will be revealed when Odysseus regains his family, friends, and home. This part of hero’s journey is called the return. As stated earlier, the hero’s journey starts out in the Odyssey with the call to adventure. This is shown when Odysseus goes to Troy. He had the right to refuse but he goes anyway. He didn’t want to leave his wife and son, but he felt it to be his duty to show his son what a true man and soldier he was. There were plenty supernatural aids within this story. One would be Athena. Athena is a goddess who always helped Odysseus along his journey. One example of how she helps him is that she convinces Zeus to send Hermes to Calypso. Hermes gives instructions to Calypso to release Odysseus from her prison. If Athena never would have convinced Zeus Odysseus might not have ever left Calypso’s island which would have prevented him from returning home. Circe is also a supernatural aid in the Odyssey. She was a sorceress who turned Odysseus men into Swine. She also...
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