The Odyssey(Penguin Classics Deluxe Edition)

by Robert Fagles

  “My royal king Menelaus —welcome guests here,

  sons of the great as well! Zeus can present us

  times of joy and times of grief in turn:

  all lies within his power.

  So come, let’s sit back in the palace now,

  dine and warm our hearts with the old stories.

  I will tell something perfect for the occasion.

  270 Surely I can’t describe or even list them all,

  the exploits crowding fearless Odysseus’ record,

  but what a feat that hero dared and carried off

  in the land of Troy where you Achaeans suffered!

  Scarring his own body with mortifying strokes,

  throwing filthy rags on his back like any slave,

  he slipped into the enemy’s city, roamed its streets —

  all disguised, a totally different man, a beggar,

  hardly the figure he cut among Achaea’s ships.

  That’s how Odysseus infiltrated Troy,

  280 and no one knew him at all . . .

  I alone, I spotted him for the man he was,

  kept questioning him —the crafty one kept dodging.

  But after I’d bathed him, rubbed him down with oil,

  given him clothes to wear and sworn a binding oath

  not to reveal him as Odysseus to the Trojans, not

  till he was back at his swift ships and shelters,

  then at last he revealed to me, step by step,

  the whole Achaean strategy. And once he’d cut

  a troop of Trojans down with his long bronze sword,

  290 back he went to his comrades, filled with information.

  The rest of the Trojan women shrilled their grief. Not I:

  292 my heart leapt up —

  my heart had changed by now —

  I yearned

  to sail back home again! I grieved too late for the madness

  Aphrodite sent me, luring me there, far from my dear land,

  forsaking my own child, my bridal bed, my husband too,

  a man who lacked for neither brains nor beauty.”

  And the red-haired Menelaus answered Helen:

  “There was a tale, my lady. So well told.

  Now then, I have studied, in my time,

  300 the plans and minds of great ones by the score.

  And I have traveled over a good part of the world

  but never once have I laid eyes on a man like him —

  what a heart that fearless Odysseus had inside him!

  304 What a piece of work the hero dared and carried off

  in the wooden horse where all our best encamped,

  our champions armed with bloody death for Troy . . .

  when along you came, Helen —roused, no doubt,

  by a dark power bent on giving Troy some glory,

  309 and dashing Prince Deiphobus squired your every step.

  310 Three times you sauntered round our hollow ambush,

  feeling, stroking its flanks,

  challenging all our fighters, calling each by name —

  yours was the voice of all our long-lost wives!

  And Diomedes and I, crouched tight in the midst

  with great Odysseus, hearing you singing out,

  were both keen to spring up and sally forth

  or give you a sudden answer from inside,

  but Odysseus damped our ardor, reined us back.

  Then all the rest of the troops kept stock-still,

  320 all but Anticlus. He was hot to salute you now

  but Odysseus clamped his great hands on the man’s mouth

  and shut it, brutally —yes, he saved us all,

  holding on grim-set till Pallas Athena

  lured you off at last.”

  But clear-sighted Telemachus ventured,

  “Son of Atreus, King Menelaus, captain of armies,

  so much the worse, for not one bit of that

  saved him from grisly death . . .

  not even a heart of iron could have helped.

  330 But come, send us off to bed. It’s time to rest,

  time to enjoy the sweet relief of sleep.”

  And Helen briskly told her serving-women

  to make beds in the porch’s shelter, lay down

  some heavy purple throws for the beds themselves,

  and over them spread some blankets, thick woolly robes,

  a warm covering laid on top. Torches in hand,

  they left the hall and made up beds at once.

  The herald led the two guests on and so they slept

  outside the palace under the forecourt’s colonnade,

  340 young Prince Telemachus and Nestor’s shining son.

  Menelaus retired to chambers deep in his lofty house

  with Helen the pearl of women loosely gowned beside him.

  When young Dawn with her rose-red fingers shone once more

  the lord of the warcry climbed from bed and dressed,

  over his shoulder he slung his well-honed sword,

  fastened rawhide sandals under his smooth feet,

  stepped from his bedroom, handsome as a god,

  and sat beside Telemachus, asking, kindly,

  “Now, my young prince, tell me what brings you here

  350 to sunny Lacedaemon, sailing over the sea’s broad back.

  A public matter or private? Tell me the truth now.”

  And with all the poise he had, Telemachus replied,

  “Son of Atreus, King Menelaus, captain of armies,

  I came in the hope that you can tell me now

  some news about my father.

  My house is being devoured, my rich farms destroyed,

  my palace crammed with enemies, slaughtering on and on

  my droves of sheep and shambling longhorn cattle.

  Suitors plague my mother —the insolent, overweening . . .

  360 That’s why I’ve come to plead before you now,

  if you can tell me about his cruel death:

  perhaps you saw him die with your own eyes

  or heard the wanderer’s end from someone else.

  364 More than all other men, that man was born for pain.

  Don’t soften a thing, from pity, respect for me —

  tell me, clearly, all your eyes have witnessed.

  I beg you —if ever my father, lord Odysseus,

  pledged you his word and made it good in action

  once on the fields of Troy where you Achaeans suffered,

  remember his story now, tell me the truth.”

  370 “How shameful!”

  the red-haired king burst out in anger. “That’s the bed

  of a brave man of war they’d like to crawl inside,

  those spineless, craven cowards!

  Weak as the doe that beds down her fawns

  in a mighty lion’s den —her newborn sucklings —

  then trails off to the mountain spurs and grassy bends

  to graze her fill, but back the lion comes to his own lair

  and the master deals both fawns a ghastly bloody death,

  just what Odysseus will deal that mob —ghastly death.

  380 Ah if only —Father Zeus, Athena and lord Apollo —

  that man who years ago in the games at Lesbos

  382 rose to Philomelides’ challenge, wrestled him,

  pinned him down with one tremendous throw

  and the Argives roared with joy . . .

  if only that Odysseus sported with those suitors,

  a blood wedding, a quick death would take the lot!

  But about the things you’ve asked me, so intently,

  I’ll skew and sidestep nothing, not deceive you, ever.

  Of all he told me —the Old Man of the Sea who never lies —

  390 I’ll hide or hold back nothing, not a single word.

  It was in Egypt, where the gods still marooned me,

  eager as I was to voyage home . . . I’d failed,

 
; you see, to render them full, flawless victims,

  and gods are always keen to see their rules obeyed.

  Now, there’s an island out in the ocean’s heavy surge,

  396 well off the Egyptian coast —they call it Pharos —

  far as a deep-sea ship can go in one day’s sail

  with a whistling wind astern to drive her on.

  There’s a snug harbor there, good landing beach

  400 where crews pull in, draw water up from the dark wells

  then push their vessels off for passage out.

  But here the gods becalmed me twenty days . . .

  not a breath of the breezes ruffling out to sea

  that speed a ship across the ocean’s broad back.

  Now our rations would all have been consumed,

  our crews’ stamina too, if one of the gods

  had not felt sorry for me, shown me mercy,

  408 Eidothea, a daughter of Proteus,

  that great power, the Old Man of the Sea.

  410 My troubles must have moved her to the heart

  when she met me trudging by myself without my men.

  They kept roaming around the beach, day in, day out,

  fishing with twisted hooks, their bellies racked by hunger.

  Well, she came right up to me, filled with questions:

  ‘Are you a fool, stranger —soft in the head and lazy too?

  Or do you let things slide because you like your pain?

  Here you are, cooped up on an island far too long,

  with no way out of it, none that you can find,

  while all your shipmates’ spirit ebbs away.’

  420 So she prodded and I replied at once,

  ‘Let me tell you, goddess —whoever you are —

  I’m hardly landlocked here of my own free will.

  So I must have angered one of the deathless gods

  who rule the skies up there. But you tell me —

  you immortals know it all —which one of you

  blocks my way here, keeps me from my voyage?

  How can I cross the swarming sea and reach home at last?’

  And the glistening goddess reassured me warmly,

  ‘Of course, my friend, I’ll answer all your questions.

  430 Who haunts these parts? Proteus of Egypt does,

  the immortal Old Man of the Sea who never lies,

  who sounds the deep in all its depths, Poseidon’s servant.

  He’s my father, they say, he gave me life. And he,

  if only you ambush him somehow and pin him down,

  will tell you the way to go, the stages of your voyage,

  how you can cross the swarming sea and reach home at last.

  And he can tell you too, if you want to press him —

  you are a king, it seems —

  all that’s occurred within your palace, good and bad,

  440 while you’ve been gone your long and painful way.’

  ‘Then you are the one’ —I quickly took her up.

  ‘Show me the trick to trap this ancient power,

  or he’ll see or sense me first and slip away.

  It’s hard for a mortal man to force a god.’

  ‘True, my friend,’ the glistening one agreed,

  ‘and again I’ll tell you all you need to know.

  When the sun stands striding at high noon,

  then up from the waves he comes —

  the Old Man of the Sea who never lies —

  450 under a West Wind’s gust that shrouds him round

  in shuddering dark swells, and once he’s out on land

  he heads for his bed of rest in deep hollow caves

  and around him droves of seals —sleek pups bred

  454 by his lovely ocean-lady —bed down too

  in a huddle, flopping up from the gray surf,

  giving off the sour reek of the salty ocean depths.

  I’ll lead you there myself at the break of day

  and couch you all for attack, side-by-side.

  Choose three men from your crew, choose well,

  460 the best you’ve got aboard the good decked hulls.

  Now I will tell you all the old wizard’s tricks . . .

  First he will make his rounds and count the seals

  and once he’s checked their number, reviewed them all,

  down in their midst he’ll lie, like a shepherd with his flock.

  That’s your moment. Soon as you see him bedded down,

  muster your heart and strength and hold him fast,

  wildly as he writhes and fights you to escape.

  He’ll try all kinds of escape —twist and turn

  into every beast that moves across the earth,

  470 transforming himself into water, superhuman fire,

  but you hold on for dear life, hug him all the harder!

  And when, at last, he begins to ask you questions —

  back in the shape you saw him sleep at first —

  relax your grip and set the old god free

  and ask him outright, hero,

  which of the gods is up in arms against you?

  How can you cross the swarming sea and reach home at last?’

  So she urged and under the breaking surf she dove

  as I went back to our squadron beached in sand,

  480 my heart a heaving storm at every step . . .

  Once I reached my ship hauled up on shore

  we made our meal and the godsent night came down

  and then we slept at the sea’s smooth shelving edge.

  When young Dawn with her rose-red fingers shone once more

  I set out down the coast of the wide-ranging sea,

  praying hard to the gods for all their help,

  taking with me the three men I trusted most

  on every kind of mission.

  Eidothea, now,

  had slipped beneath the sea’s engulfing folds

  490 but back from the waves she came with four sealskins,

  all freshly stripped, to deceive her father blind.

  She scooped out lurking-places deep in the sand

  and sat there waiting as we approached her post,

  then couching us side-by-side she flung a sealskin

  over each man’s back. Now there was an ambush

  that would have overpowered us all —overpowering,

  true, the awful reek of all those sea-fed brutes!

  Who’d dream of bedding down with a monster of the deep?

  But the goddess sped to our rescue, found the cure

  500 with ambrosia, daubing it under each man’s nose —

  that lovely scent, it drowned the creatures’ stench.

  So all morning we lay there waiting, spirits steeled,

  while seals came crowding, jostling out of the sea

  and flopped down in rows, basking along the surf.

  At high noon the old man emerged from the waves

  and found his fat-fed seals and made his rounds,

  counting them off, counting us the first four,

  but he had no inkling of all the fraud afoot.

  Then down he lay and slept, but we with a battle-cry,

  510 we rushed him, flung our arms around him —he’d lost nothing,

  the old rascal, none of his cunning quick techniques!

  First he shifted into a great bearded lion

  and then a serpent —

  a panther —

  a ramping wild boar —

  a torrent of water —

  a tree with soaring branchtops —

  but we held on for dear life, braving it out

  until, at last, that quick-change artist,

  the old wizard, began to weary of all this

  and burst out into rapid-fire questions:

  ‘Which god, Menelaus, conspired with you

  520 to trap me in ambush? seize me against my will?

  What on earth do you want?’

  ‘You know, old man
,’

  I countered now. ‘Why put me off with questions?

  Here I am, cooped up on an island far too long,

  with no way out of it, none that I can find,

  while my spirit ebbs away. But you tell me —

  you immortals know it all —which one of you

  blocks my way here, keeps me from my voyage?

  How can I cross the swarming sea and reach home at last?’

  ‘How wrong you were!’ the seer shot back at once.

  530 ‘You should have offered Zeus and the other gods

  a handsome sacrifice, then embarked, if you ever hoped

  for a rapid journey home across the wine-dark sea.

  It’s not your destiny yet to see your loved ones,

  reach your own grand house, your native land at last,

  not till you sail back through Egyptian waters —

  536 the great Nile swelled by the rains of Zeus —

  and make a splendid rite to the deathless gods

  who rule the vaulting skies. Then, only then

  will the gods grant you the voyage you desire.’

  540 So he urged, and broke the heart inside me,

  having to double back on the mist-bound seas,

  back to Egypt, that, that long and painful way . . .

  Nevertheless I caught my breath and answered,

  ‘That I will do, old man, as you command.

  But tell me this as well, and leave out nothing:

  Did all the Achaeans reach home in the ships unharmed,

  all we left behind, Nestor and I, en route from Troy?

  Or did any die some cruel death by shipwreck

  or die in the arms of loved ones,

  550 once they’d wound down the long coil of war?’

  And he lost no time in saying, ‘Son of Atreus,

  why do you ask me that? Why do you need to know?

  Why probe my mind? You won’t stay dry-eyed long,

  I warn you, once you have heard the whole story.

  Many of them were killed, many survived as well,

  but only two who captained your bronze-armored units

  died on the way home —you know who died in the fighting,

  you were there yourself.

  And one is still alive,

  held captive, somewhere, off in the endless seas . . .

  560 Ajax, now, went down with his long-oared fleet.

  561 First Poseidon drove him onto the cliffs of Gyrae,

  looming cliffs, then saved him from the breakers —

  he’d have escaped his doom, too, despite Athena’s hate,