The Odyssey, Part VII: Overview

     The book The Odyssey is a classic from ancient Greece, that has been translated many times over by many different people (Homer, 1997). The Odyssey follows the book The Iliad, but they can be mutually exclusive books(Homer, 1997). What makes The Odyssey a classic? Well if you’ve been following along with my publications, you’ll know that a classic is something that is important and interesting, via being important to your life, even if you choose to view it in that aspect, or simply for the story's enjoyability and entertainment factor, because whether you are contentious of it or not, that is why it is entertaining, you’re learning from the story in an enjoyable way

     Some people like to refer to this as the moral of the story. So what is the moral of the story The Odyssey? Well, that is determined by the viewer as well as the writer, as both worldviews are infused into the story, and something different can be found meaningful with each read. 

     However, the overarching moral throughout the whole story that is commonly found is that of life’s journey. Everyone goes through their own journey, and you might have heard the term maps of meaning. Everyone has one, it is your map, you try to get to your life’s ambition, and the route takes you steadily and with some occasional hardships to achieve that ultimate goal, but you only notice the obstacles, and the goal, the rest of the world you don’t pay any mind to because it’s not important to you.

     Although, you can pick up any chapter from the book The Odyssey, and you can find a different “moral” to pull out of the story, and it’s your worldview that allowed you to come up with that moral, so it’s probably applicable to your own life (Homer, 1997). And The Odyssey is only one example, you can do this with any book, a good example would be when  Jordan B. Peterson, picks apart Disney movies such as Pinochio, and even the Bible to deliver you valuable life lessons that are interesting to listen to (2017).

     Going back to The Odyssey, let’s look at some great examples, and interesting stories within The Odyssey. In book four of The Odyssey, Odysseus’ son Telemachus is being told a story of king Menelaus’ journey (Homer, 1997).

    During king Menelaus’ story, he tells of his interactions with The Old Man of the Sea, an all-knowing shapeshifter who will not give you information unless you capture him (Homer, 1997). In simplified terms, I like to ask, what could this part of the story symbolize? Well, The Old Man of the Sea is a shapeshifter. By altering your entire form, are you not lying about what you are, perhaps this man is symbolizing a liar, or a trickster. But he is also honest, once you catch him, he will never tell you a lie, so how can both things coincide? The Old Man of the Sea is basically breaking all the right rules. Everyone learns the rules of society, and good morals, as a child. Once you learn them, you have to break them before knowing which rules are okay to break in what circumstances. The Old Man of the Sea knows how to break all the right rules. He just wants peace and quiet, but he is intelligent and a good honest man, even though he is also seemingly cunning. 

     Another great example for the morals in the story; during the last three chapters of The Odyssey Odysseus gets home, and decides to disguise himself for many reasons, one of which being to see who out of his workers are still loyal to him. After losing the disguise Odysseus does what he has to and quickly kills the suitors who have taken over his home, however he leaves a lengthy painful death for the goat hurd and many women in his house (Homer, 1997). Why is this, and what is the significance of it? Odysseus hurts those who had betrayed him and his wife and son above all; because, as explained in the work Dante's Inferno (Alighieri 2013) betrayal is one of the most vial acts people are capable of, so why is this? As Peterson explains, betrayal is world shattering to the betrayer because one must now question their own reality, a person one has trusted must question the entire relationship (2017). Analysis makes you question what was real in that reality throughout many years.

     So those are some examples of morals I’ve found throughout a few select chapters in the book The Odyssey. Anyone can practice this with any literary work if so chosen. I encourage you to see how this practice can enrich your life.

Works Cited:

Alighieri, Dante. The Divine Comedy: Inferno. Translated by Henry F. Cary, Henry W. Longfellow, and Charles E. Norton, e-artnow, 2013.

Homer. The Odyssey. Translated by Robert Fagles, Deluxe ed., Penguin Classics, 1997.

Peterson, Jordan B. "Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Bel." University of Toronto, 2017, Toronto, www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8Xc2_FtpHI&list=PLsvFdgT3ETgAVZWj0faD0sDJhJh2NeZwe. Accessed 17 Nov. 2023.