![]() ![]() Seen in this light, Homer’s Odyssey emerges as much more than simply an epic journey home. By the end of the poem, the disorder of the house of Odysseus leads to incredible violence, and almost ends in war. Furthermore, since Odysseus reigns as king over the island of Ithaka, the failure of his house will also have serious repercussions for his people as well. If the hero dies or gets stranded on his way home, his house will fall. It will take all of the hero’s wits and brawn to make it back alive, but Homer sets the stakes even higher than life and limb: with Odysseus’s son not quite yet of age, and his beautiful wife surrounded by violent suitors, the great tactician’s wealthy household teeters on the brink of disaster. But we find our hero weeping for his home on Ithaka, “sitting on the seashore, and his eyes were never / wiped dry of tears, and the sweet lifetime was draining out of him.” Even for epic heroes, it seems, there’s no place like home.īut although we tend to think of Homer’s Odyssey as a story of homecoming, it has just as much to say about the terrible cost of homewrecking. We first meet Homer’s Odysseus stranded on the island paradise of Ogygia, a prisoner of the amorous and beautiful goddess Kalypso. Our first glimpse of an epic hero always tells us something about his character. ![]()
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