1. Honors English 9 Jenkins Focus: The Odyssey
Today’s Target:
I can distinguish between an epic & other literary genres.
I can do this by recognizing & analyzing the epic hero,
the epic journey, epithets, & epic similes.
Agenda:
Hero Journal Entry
Epic PowerPoint Notes
The Odyssey
Homework: Essay Exams Due Friday!!

2. Hero Journal Entry In your opinion, what makes someone a hero?
List 5 heroes in your journal-both fictional and real.
Discuss
Now, create a definition for a hero.

3. Watch the following trailer
Is this man a hero?
Why?
Why not?
What qualities does he possess that seem essential to the definition of a hero?
Also, is he not one? Why? Be specific.

4. Today’s focus- the epic & the epic hero
Can’t have one without the other…….

5. The Epic An epic is a long poem that tells a story.
2. Has to have a hero!!

6. 1. The epic pattern ….. long, narrative poem presents adventures
adventures are united through
central character of heroic
proportions

7. The classical or literary epic
Is work of single author
Hero is figure of heroic stature
Setting is vast in scope
Supernatural forces at work
Poet begins in media res (in the middle of action)
Includes epic similes

8. 2. An Epic Hero must be…. a. identified with native, Greek tradition.
-embodies values of society.
b. nobly born (often with divine parent).
c. surrounded by a sense of doom or magnificent
destiny.
d. intensely proud and masculine
e. glories in hand to-hand combat.
f. motivated by a desire to be more than other men.
g. Greatest hero must die.

9. How Were Epics Told ? Out loud By people who could not read or write
Everyone would gather to hear the stories told
Told over a couple of days
They were passed on orally

10. Author is…Homer (not the guy from the Simpsons)
A blind minstrel (story teller)
Rhapsodes: singers of tales, historian, entertainer, and myth maker.

11. Homer’s Epics: Homer’s war stories: The Iliad and The Odyssey
Stories set in Greece
His 1st epic: The Iliad-tells the story of a war fought outside of Troy.
His 2nd epic: The Odyssey (our story) tells of journey coming home from war.

12. The Iliad The Odyssey Is the model for the epic of war.
Is the model for the epic of the long journey.

13. Theme of the Journey in Books and Movies Today:
Incredible Journey
Moby Dick
The Hobbit
Wizard of Oz
Star Wars
Lion King
Forrest Gump

14. Odysseus Protagonist and HERO of The Odyssey
He fought in the Trojan War
Now this story, The Odyssey, is about him coming home.
He has a wife, Penelope.
He loves her and wants to return to her and his son, Telemachus (baby when war started).
There are several traps and snares to impede his journey home

15. The traps and snares that impede his journey home:
Angry Gods (Poseidon)
Mythical Monsters –
Cyclops, Scylla, Charybdis
Women
(goddesses, temptresses,
the Harpies)
and his own personal demons
(his desire for war and the kill/hunt-hard to give
up and hard to return from=
post war disillusionment or PTSD

16. Where is Odysseus?
When The Odyssey starts, he is stranded on an island with a beautiful woman!!

17. Homeric / Heroic Similes
You will see these in The Odyssey
Similes that compare heroic events to everyday things.

18. As you read….what you are looking for today:
Instructions:
Read by yourself (10 mins).
Discuss above questions with partner, as you jot notes in your journal. (10).
Be ready to discuss
Is it a poem? How do you know?
Does it tell a story? What is the story?
Does it have a hero? Who is it? How does the author set it up for us that this IS the HERO?
Does it include epic similes where? Give line numbers for these.

19. Final Clip /Exit Pass
View Clip
1. How does Clint Eastwood clearly use the epic form/pattern to tell this tale?
2. What did you learn today about the epic form that you see used here in this ad for movie?
3. What about the epic hero? What did Eastwood and this actor do to ensure we would see Sniper as epic hero?