I can not express myself enough how much I love this book. I want to steal Homers mind and study it but sadly the man was way before our time back in BCE sooo….
What I love about the Odyssey so much is that there are lessons from every encounter Odysseus, the main protagonist of this story, learns and how much he’s willing to sacrifice and go to get back home to his wife Penelope and his son, Telemakus or in todays translation; Telemachus.
Most of you may be familiar with he Musical adaptation by Jorge Rivera-Herrans and his commission of casts for all the amazing characters that in the Greek times were considered their gods that they worshipped and some of the men that Odysseus sailed with and who he was commissioned by.
How many of you who are currently Reading this are familiar with the Trojan War?
Do you remember the giant Horse? The Trojan Horse?
Odysseus was the one who composed this idea and arranged for a sequence of events and if you’re a fan of the musical, you’ll recognize the horse on the cover of the album named: The Troy Saga.
The main story follows with Telemachus wanting to know the whereabouts of Odysseus who hasn’t return after the war for some time. Suitors have come from the kingdom of Ithaka(Ithaca) for Penelope’s hand and the old kings spoils.
The Odyssey is a cautionary tale of pride but many things about the Odyssey and more specifically Odysseus and most of them are towards his misfortunes with the witch goddess Circe and goddess Kalypso (Calypso)
In order of events, Odysseus is trying to get home and takes pride in himself and disregards his mentors judgement, Athena, the goddess of wisdom. Bestowing upon himself that he didn’t need her and went against her judgment when confronting Polyphemus, the Cyclops and told the Cyclops his true name. (he had blinded the cyclops and told him his name was Nobody,) This caused Athena to leave and Odysseus was then alone without a guide and had only his own wits to guide him and his crew. He meets another god after a storm on the sea. The wind god Aeolus, who gives Odysseus the wind bag with the storm inside to sail home with clear skies, but he only ever told Odysseus. This outcome drives his crew to wonder what was inside the wind bag and greed overcame them, but it was Odysseus who didn’t tell them. If he had, maybe they wouldn’t have opened the wind bag. The wind sails them to the isle of Aeaea, where Circe is. This is where a lot of the hate comes from towards Odysseus. Circe upon their arrival turned his men into pigs, in order to get them back Hermes helps Odysseus with a magic root (moly) to overpower Circe. IN FEAR AND SUGGESTION Circe attempts to SEDUCE Odysseus who refuses to be corecorced. This infatuated her and drove her to have love for him. So to save his men, Odysseus committed to sleeping with her.
Keep in mind, he’s trying to get home and has no feelings for this woman what so ever and in comfort of what Circe provides his crew afterwards for a year making them stay but not as prisoners, When Odysseus finally asked her to leave she directs him to the Underworld to see the dead prophet Tiresias.
This is where I will stop for now, but let me explain Circes and Odysseus situation.
Circle has a love for a man who can suddenly resist her magic, and he is a man trying to save his men and get home to his wife. WIFE. Odysseus is many things but it’s throughout the story of the Odyssey you will see he really only, truy, harbours love for his wife Penelope and son Telemachus.
Since Odysseus had to engage in a night with Circe to save his men, he didn’t really have a choice to willingly sleep with her and she made them stay for a year to be comforted from war.
Some key details that INDICATE what happens in the book are in the musical, hidden within lyrics but wont go overboard in full force telling what has happened. Think of Epic more as a pg-13 film where the Odyssey in a WHOLE with all little details included would be rated R.
I’m going to end it here, but what do you think? Was Odysseus right for wanting to stay and save his men?
Also, again, please not that Epic the musical is not entirely accurate in action but subtle hints to those who have read the book (And hopefully this blog) will understand in the lyrics.
I will make a new blog about similar Lyrics and the out comes of the book and how they link.
I had left this out because I really wanted to get to the debate with Circe, but how this whole thing really ended up was what followed AFTER he had revealed his true name. Polyphemus with a now set-in-stone named TOLD his father Poseidon who now cursed Odysseus to forever have storms in his journey home, that’s how they found Aeolus and from there the wind bag then Circe. Sorry, I was in a rush to publish this.