Analysis Of Odysseus

Analysis Of Odysseus

Kyle Hoffmann

CPLT 2010

Paper 3

Odysseus from Hero to Villain One of the more famous characters of the ancient Greeks, Odysseus, has been written about for millennia. Homer composed an epic poem entirely about him. Dante wrote about Odysseus while describing his journey through the afterlife in Inferno. These two writers, though describing the same man, portray him in different lights – Homer lauding him as a valiant hero and Dante condemning him to burn for eternity. Each portrayal is a product of the different times in which the two authors lived. Through how the two authors abbreviate, augment, and tell the story of Odysseus, their personal values on acts such as lying, sacrifice, and the capabilities of mankind against the gods ... Show more content on Helpwriting.net ...Whereas Homer's Odysseus receives a seat of honor at the table of a foreign king, Dante's spends eternity burning in cramped quarters.

In each portrayal of Odysseus, the two differ not only in how he is viewed, but what the reader gets to view about him. Curiously absent from the Odyssey is the account of how the Trojan War really ends. Homer had already dedicated one epic to the War, and then tells the return from it in this epic, but does not give the reader the closure of explaining how it ended. An obvious reason is how the deed of capturing the city with the Trojan Horse was less than heroic. Homer valued the in–your–face toughness of the andres of the ancient world, and in his epics spares no detail in describing many Greeks and Trojans to paint them as he–men. His failure to include the fall of Troy in the Odyssey is no accident, and stems from the fact that the strategy by which it occurred runs counter to the values of classical heroism. In Homer's Greece, a real man would not have to trick his enemies to defeat them. The omission is a concession by Homer to admit that Odysseus was not nearly heroic as Achilles and that there is no virtue in dishonesty.

While Homer brushes the fall of Troy under the rug, Dante harps on it to the extent that the Horse becomes the reason Odysseus burns in one of the deepest parts of Hell.

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