1. Key themes of the Odyssey
3.Respect
for the
Gods
2. Coming home &
wife
1. Journey
4. Revenge/ Vengeance
Key themes of the Odyssey
8.Temptation
7. Hospitality
&
The Homeric code
5. Cunning &
Disguise
6. Fidelity/
Honour

2. 1. Journey

3. 1. Journey Physical Odysseus Telemachus Right of passage/coming of age
Telemachus Books 1-4
Leaving the security of his home and mother, alone, to discover the truth about his father.
Physical
Odysseus
Hero’s decent to the underworld
10 year voyage home to his kingdom, wife and son following the Trojan war
Telemachus
A sons quest to find his father who has been absent for 20 years
Note: The further the travels from home, the greater the perils and obstacles. Journey from the known to the unknown world.
Spiritual
Odysseus
Overcoming temptation, reuniting with his family and making peace.
NOTE: During the course of the text Odysseus is constantly placed outside of his physical, social, emotional and gender context. His journey reflects this.

4. 2. Coming home & wife

5. Odysseus
Ithaca is represented as his home, and the source, goal and scene of his heroism.
Intense desire to be reunited with his wife.
The whole epic is about this journey, it is centred purely on Odysseus with other myths, with lessons of morals and societal values interwoven in the text.

6. 3. Respect for the Gods

7. Respect for the Gods Respect Lack of respect
Athena's care and guidance for Odysseus and Telemachus.
Book 23: The gods validate Odysseus’s right to kill 108 suitors, all conceived as villains, in defence of his wife and property. After all it is his moral right
Book 23: Odysseus carries and oar inland and makes sacrifices to Poseidon.
Odysseus blinding Polyphemus (Cyclops) Book 9 and therefore angering Poseidon, incurring his wrath.
Zeus strikes down Odysseus' crew after they disobediently eat the Cattle of the Sun
Suitors devour the livestock of Odysseus risk being punished:
“perishing themselves without payment, if Zeus grants there be acts of requital.” (2.162)

8. 4. Revenge / Vengeance

9. The Cyclops Book 9: In the One-Eyed Giant’s Cave
Explain in your won words what happened.
2. Where was this located in the text (given the book and line number Eg: (1.12)
Another example:
Helios forces Zeus to destroy Odysseus' crew in retaliation for the slaughter of his cattle.

10. The Suitors
Book 22 (35-42): Odysseus’s right to kill 108 suitors, all conceived as villains, in defence of his wife and property. After all, it is his moral right.
“ You dogs! you never imagined I’d return from Troy…..
Page 440.

12. How much do you really know about the Odyssey?

13. Questions
How long has Odysseus been absent at the beginning of the text?
How many axe heads must the suitors shoot Odysseus bow through in Penelope's challenge?
Who is “…wise beyond all mortal men”?
Who is the son of Poseidon & Thoosa?

14. Questions
How long has Odysseus been absent at the beginning of the text? 10 Years.
How many axe heads must the suitors shoot Odysseus bow through in Penelope's challenge? 12
Who is “…wise beyond all mortal men”? Odysseus
Who is the son of Poseidon & Thoosa? Polyphemus

16. 5. Cunning & Disguise

17. Odysseus He is ruthless and cunning Calculating beggar
Reference to the wooden horse at Troy
“I am Odysseus the son of Laertes, known to the world
for every kind of craft – my fame has reached the skies.” ( )
Conversations with Athena
“Any man –any god who met you-would have to be
some champion lying and cheating to get past you
….foxy, ingenious, never tired of twists and tricks. (except from )
Ate all of Polyphemus (Cyclops) and created a plan to blind him Book 9
AND THEN…. Attempted to deceiving by saying his name was ‘Nobody’ (9.410)
Plots to kill the suitors with his so Telemachus Book 22
Calculating beggar
speaking about himself but still disguised as beggar not only to his wife but to others that he knows
Initially he doesn’t trust his wife or nurse and tests them (
Odysseus’s fate is directly related to that of his wife.
He must return home, get his wife to recognise him, conquer the suitors and reclaim his position.

18. Penelope
Cunning
Remains at Ithaca, surrounded by the suitors to ensure the kingdom remains in the families control. REMEMBER she can’t strike or run away and must remain passive, therefore she prays for divine intervention.
Tests the suitors and ‘the beggar’ to ensure the true identity of her husband Book 21. She knows all along how she can create a challenge that her husband would win.

19. 6. Fidelity / Honour

20. Fidelity / Honour Fidelity:
faithfulness to a person, cause, or belief, demonstrated by continuing loyalty and support.
feminine
Honour:
the quality of knowing and doing what is morally right
masculine
Give examples of characters which exemplify these values and explain what events in the text reinforce these interepretations.

21. 7. Hospitality & Homeric code

22. Hospitality Homeric code
Write down examples of this that you remember from the text.
Book
“Don’t murder the man…don’t court his wife…”
Hospitality
“I’d find fault with another host, I’m sure,
too warm to his guests, too pressing or cold,
Balance is best in all things.”
Examples:
Book 1. (138-46)
Book 4. (688-93)
Book 15. (76-77)
Book 24. (315-18)
“But if you’d found him alive, here in Ithaca,
he would have replied in kind, with gift for gift,
had entertained you warmly before he sent you off.”

23. Calypso
Nausicaa
The Sirens
8. Temptation

24. The Sirens Book 12: The Cattle of the Sun
The Sirens Book 12: The Cattle of the Sun

25. Definition: Enchantresses of the sea, whose song can tempt a sailor to his ruin. Often depicted as birds with either the heads, or the entire upper bodies, of women.
The Sirens
Odysseus sailed by the sirens island bound tightly to the mast of his boat with his men blocking their ears with wax to stop them hearing the sirens bewitching song. However, Odysseus did succumb to the temptation of their song.
The lead up (12: )

26. The Sirens ‘First you will raise the island of the Sirens,
those creatures who spellbind any man alive,
whoever comes their way. Whoever, draws too close,
off guard, and catches the Sirens’ voices in the air –
no sailing home for him, not wife rising to meet him,
no happy children beaming up at their father’s face.
The high, thrilling song of the Sirens will transfix him,
lolling there in their meadow, round them heaps of corpses
rotting away, rags of skin shrivelling on their bones…
Race straight past that coast! Soften some beeswax
and stop your shipmates’ ears so none of them can hear,
have them tie you hand and foot in the swift ship,
erect at the mast-block, lashed by ropes to the mast
so you can hear the Sirens’ song to your heart’s content.
But if you plead, commanding your men to set you free,
then they must lash you faster, rope on rope…” ( )

27. The Sirens
The sirens are a powerful temptation for Odysseus. Their song:
‘Come closer, famous Odysseus – Achaea’s pride and glory –
moor your ship on our coast so you can hear our song!
Never has any sailor passed our shores in his black craft
until he has heard the honeyed voices pouring from our lips,
and once he hears to his heart’s content sails on, a wiser man.
We know all the pains that the Greeks and Trojans once endured
on the spreading plain of Troy when the gods willed it so –
all that comes to pass on the fertile earth, we know it all!’ ( )
is an invitation to live in the past,
The lead up (12: )

28. Refences
Text
Schein, S. L. (1996). Reading the Odyssey: Selected Interpretive Essays. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press
Sternberg, M. (1978). Expositional Modes of Temporal Ordering in Fiction. Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press.
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