Summary
Thursday's lecture began with a discussion of several familiar concepts from previous classes, including irony, epic conventions, and Ancient Greek culture as observed through xenia. The epic conventions employed by Homer include the use of similes, repetition, digression, magic, speeches, and epithets. During our discussion of irony we focused more on situational irony than in the previous lectures. The class also had a more in-depth discussion looking at Odysseus as a hero, coming up with several characteristics such as being brave, strong, crafty, respectful, wise, and persistent. These characteristics are also consistent with the concept of metis, of which Athena, the goddess of craft and wisdom is closely associated. Metis, interpreted in English as "craftiness," seems to be a recurring act throughout the poem. Odysseus is continuously using metis as a means to escape the gravest situations including saving himself from the Cyclops and not telling his men about sailing past Scylla. One way in which we observed the Ancient Greek culture in books 17-20 was through xenia, the respect between host and guest regardless either party's stature. We also discussed how Odysseus plays the role of the guest in his own home and is treated poorly by the suitors. Another topic discussed in the lecture was that of fate. It seems that many prophecies are coming true, including Odysseus returning a broken man to his swift, raptor-like annihilation of the suitors. We discussed how Athena seems to keep urging on the insolent suitors, which angers Odysseus even more, and helps seal their unfortunate fates by encouraging Odysseus to pursue his plans to kill the suitors. Several reasons were brought up for this spurning on including the suitors' violation of xenia, allowing their deaths to become just in the reader's eyes. (291 words)
Key Terms
Quotations/Passages on Metis
Page 430, Odysseus doesn't want to be recognized:
"Ithaca...Heart racing, Odysseus that great exile
filled with joy to hear Athena, daughter of storming Zeus,
pronounce that name. He stood on native ground at last
and he replied with a winging word to Pallas,
not with a word of truth-he chocked it back,
always invoking the cunning in his heart:"
"As his story ended,
goddess Athena, gray eyes gleaming, broke into a smile
and stroked him with her hand, and now she appeared a woman,"
Athena is continually using the skill of metis by disguising people or places and is extremely happy to discover Odysseus's use of her tactic when he is telling her of the Phoenicians dropping him in a land he did not recognize.
Penelope also shows her metis in Book XIX, lines 152-176:
"A god form the blue it was inspired me first
to set up a great loom in our royal halls
and I began to weave, and the weaving finespun,
the yarns endless, and I would lead them on: 'Young men,
my suitors, now that King Odysseus is no more,
go slowly , keen as you are to marry me, until
I can finish off this web..."
"so by day I'd weave at my great and growing web-
by night, by the light of torches set beside me,
I would unravel all I'd done."
Penelope tells how she stalled the suitors attempts to sweep her off in marriage by saying she would not marry until she had finished Laertes death shroud. Craftily, she wove the shroud by day, and at night unraveled everything she had done. Penelope's craftiness aids in showing that she truely is a deserving wife of Odysseus, and remains true and loyal to him.
Quotations/Passages on Irony
On page 504 there is an example of dramatic irony when Penelope is speaking to the beggar who is actually Odysseus.
"'If only, my friend,' reserved Penelope exclaimed,
'everything you say would come to pass!
You'd soon know my affection, know my gifts.
Any man you meet would call you blest.
But my heart can sense the way it all will go.
Odysseus, I tell you, is never coming back,
nor will you ever gain your passage home,
for we have no masters in our house like him
at welcoming in or sending off an honored guest."
Much of the dramatic irony in this section of reading follows this format. There is a person talking to Odysseus without knowing it is him. Often, the unbeknownest people say that Odysseus is never coming back, when in-fact, he is sitting right in front of them. There is also an example of situational irony in this passage, in that Penelope states that "we have no masters in our house like him," when in fact Odysseus is right in front of her.