A Reputation Contradicted Essay, Research Paper

A Reputation Contradicted

To many, a? hero? is person who saves something or person else. Although Odysseus seems to be the hero in Homer? s The Odyssey, his name problematizes the nature of his gallantry, and finally, of his individuality. In Greek, the proper noun? Odysseus? besides functions as a verb significance? to be against or to oppose. ? Paradoxically, so, the supporter of The Odyssey is besides an adversary ; the hero is besides the character responsible for doing the greatest injury.

When Odysseus leaves Ithaka to contend in the Battle of Troy, he does more intimate harm than he will of all time recognize until he returns to happen his place in a province of pandemonium and subsequent devastation. When Odysseus leaves, he leaves behind a boy that will ne’er hold a secure apprehension of who he truly is until he himself takes a journey to happen his true individuality. For the twenty old ages that Odysseus is off, Telemekhos has no confidence of who his male parent truly is or if he truly is Odysseus? s boy. All that Telemekhos wants is a male parent that will turn old in his house, will move as a male parent acts, and be at that place as a male parent is:

? Friend, allow me set it in the apparent manner.

My female parent says I am his boy ; I know non

certainly. I wish at least I had some happy adult male

as male parent, turning old in his ain house & # 8212 ;

but unknown decease and silence are the destiny

of him that, since you ask, they call my father. ? ( Book I, 258 & # 8211 ; 264 ) .

Odysseus has caused emotional harm to Telemekhos by non being there like a male parent should be. Odysseus besides left his married woman Penelope with Telemekhos as a babe when he went to contend. He left Penelope with the purpose of returning but there was no guarantee. After so many old ages a married woman can merely conceive of the atrocious fates her hubby may hold encountered. Penelope? s emotional position is in a province of agony and depression due to the fact that her lover has left and doesn? T seem to be returning. Penelope, stays in her room and weaves and unweaves a shroud in hope that he may return before she has to take a new hubby. She sits in her room all twenty-four hours and she weeps and weeps for Odysseus? s return: ? Sill with her kid so she is, hapless bosom, / still in your castle hall. Forlorn her nights/ and yearss travel by, her life used up in weeping. ? ( Book XI, 204-206 ) . Although Odysseus is out playing hero for many, within his internal environment, he is doing sever harm.

The hurting and harm that he has caused nevertheless, is non limited to merely his married woman and his kid. Odysseus besides has harmed his female parent and his male parent. The emotional harm that Odysseus has done to his female parent, is so extended that she dies non of an unwellness but of solitariness:

? & # 8230 ; non that unwellness overtook me & # 8212 ; no true unwellness

blowing the organic structure to undo the spirit ;

merely my solitariness for you, Odysseus,

for your sort bosom and advocate, soft Odysseus,

took my ain life away. ? ( Book XI, 123 & # 8211 ; 127 ) .

Odysseus besides damaged his male parent emotionally. After Odysseus left, he no longer held his temperament of a male monarch and began to fall into a province of depression. When Odysseus goes to the underworld, his female parent Tell him:

? But your male parent

is state edge and comes to town no more.

He owns no bedclothes, carpets, or brushed mantles,

but lies down, winter darks, among the slaves,

rolled in old cloaks for screen, near the coals.

Or when the heat comes at the terminal of summer,

the fallen leaves, all around his vinery secret plan,

heaped into windrows, do his lowly bed.

He lies now even so, with hurting bosom,

and longs for your return, while age comes on him. ? ( Book XI, 210-219 ) .

The intimate harm Thursday

at Odysseus has done is so extended that he has caused depression, and even decease.

When Odysseus reaches Troy, he becomes hero to one section of the population, but will ever stay a destroyer to another section of the population. To his fellow warriors, he is a hero for his scheme in get the better ofing the Trojans: ? And as to stratagems, no adult male would claim/ Odysseus? gift for those. He had no challengers, / your male parent, at the fast ones of war. ? ( Book III, 129 & # 8211 ; 131 ) . Although he is a hero to these people, to the people of Troy, he will stay a destroyer. Odysseus, killed many people and rupture down a metropolis that took so long to construct. No individual from that metropolis could of all time name him a hero.

On Odysseus? journey place, he stops in many different lands and causes devastation in one manner or another to either the people of the land or to his sailors. When he and his sailor go to the island of the Kyklops, Odysseus has an thought to travel into the Kyklops? cave and delay for him with a few of his sailors. The first harm that is done, is that the Kyklops eats the sailors. Although Odysseus did non mean for this injury to be done, it happened irrespective. Then, after Kyklops ate the sailors, Odysseus and the sailors that were left, stabbed the kyklops in the oculus with a stick. This is the 2nd episode of harm that was caused by Odysseus accidentally. Another illustration of the harm that Odysseus has caused, is when he stops on Aiaia, island of Kirke. Odysseus? program was to merely remain two darks, nevertheless their stay ended up to be one month. Odysseus could hold left whenever he wanted, but Kirke? s beauty and the copiousness of vino kept them at that place longer than planned. Finally after one month when the determination is made to travel in front with their travels, the youngest sailor falls off of the roof and dies because he has had to much to imbibe. This incident may non needfully be straight Odysseus? mistake, but had Odysseus and his sailor, left when they had foremost decided to go forth, this ne’er would hold happened. The physical harm that Odysseus has either indirectly or straight caused, is beliing his heroic stature.

In add-on to doing physical devastation, he besides accidentally produces emotional desolation. When Odysseus and his crew arrive on Aiolia Island place of Aiolos Hippotades, the harm that is done is non a physical harm, but an emotional desolation. Aiolos Hippotades, the air current male monarch, gives Odysseus a bag of air currents to assist him on his manner. He state Odysseus non to open it so that all of the air currents don & # 8217 ; t acquire out at the same clip. Odysseus does non state his crew what is in the bag so they think that Odysseus is concealing things from them and non sharing with them. While Odysseus takes one of his rare sleeps, they open the bag and allow all of the air currents out. Odysseus wholly loses Aiolos? trust and regard:

? Take yourself out of this island, crawling thing & # 8211 ;

no jurisprudence, no wisdom, lays it on me now

to assist a adult male the blessed Gods detest & # 8211 ;

out! your ocean trip here was cursed by Eden! ? ( Book X, 82 & # 8211 ; 85 ) .

Although Odysseus is non the 1 that loses the air current, the fact is that he indirectly was a portion of it:

? He drove me from the topographic point, moan as I would,

and comfortless we went once more to sea,

yearss of it, till the work forces flagged at the oars & # 8211 ;

no zephyr no aid in sight, by our ain folly & # 8211 ; ? ( Book X, 86 & # 8211 ; 89 ) .

Not merely did this destroy the trust between Aiolos and Odysseus, but it caused Odysseus and his crew to be stuck at sea longer than they would hold had to be. Not all of the harm done is physical, it can be in many different signifiers.

Within Odysseus? travels, everyplace he stops harm is done, whether it be physical, emotional, straight, or indirectly. Odysseus? character portrays the supporter and the hero, but his self-contradictory name contradicts his epic repute.