by Homer
21.406 as a man skilled with a lyre. Among the Phaiakians, it was the bard’s last song, about the fall of Troy, that finally led Odysseus to reveal his own identity. When he returns home to Ithaka soon thereafter, it is once again a marked association with song and music that spotlights Odysseus. When Odysseus tries his hand at stringing the great bow, in the poet’s resonant simile system the master bowman becomes a musician; the sound of the bowstring itself is described in terms of bird-song. Through the power of condensed metaphors, the double abilities of Odysseus—master performer and unerring marksman—become united. The picture makes sense within the Homeric worldview, where words themselves are “winged” or “feathered” like arrows. Rhetoric, song, and bowmanship—all spring from Odysseus’s cunning intelligence.
22.8 Antinoos first. The moment of revelation has arrived. Odysseus begins his revenge by shooting down the loudest, meanest suitor. As the others scatter in panic, Odysseus pronounces their death sentence. But why must all the suitors be slain? Odysseus mentions three offenses: theft of his goods, forced sex with his housemaids, and the courting of Penelopeia while he was alive. Eurumakhos, the most reasonable suitor, fails to propitiate Odysseus with a promise of restitution (lines 55–59), because these offenses have so deeply threatened the hero’s home and honor. The scene recalls a key point in the Iliad, when the chief hero, Akhilleus, dismisses the lavish gifts of Agamemnon, who has dishonored him. In both cases, symbolic capital, a warrior’s reputation and ability to defend his possessions, far outweighs material compensation. Unbound by modern legal or ethical notions, Odyssean justice recognizes nearly unlimited revenge. This is the most troubling dimension of the poem. As it turns out, Zeus and Athene will have to intervene to stop the vendetta that this slaughter ignites.
22.88 Death-mist promptly flowed. This and other phrases in the scene narrating wounds and death are identical to formulas used in the Iliad to describe the battle between Greeks and Trojans. Poetically, Odysseus’s revenge is the equivalent of an international war, one that also happened to have been fought over a woman, the cousin of Penelopeia—Helen.
22.154 I made the mistake. Yet another sign of the young man’s maturity, this claiming of responsibility does not prompt a rebuke from his father, an equally telling detail of characterization. As if the two have already dismissed the incident, violent punishment of the goat-herd Melanthios, who has ransacked the unlocked storeroom for weapons, is left to the other servants to carry out.
22.237 She wanted to test the vigor. Just as Odysseus himself has been engaged, in a somewhat different mode, testing the suitors and servants, his patroness withdraws in order to leave a challenge for him. The attitude is quintessentially Greek: the gods bring out the excellence of mortals not by pampering them but by posing difficulties that they must overcome by drawing on all their inner resources. Athene’s metamorphosis into bird form recalls the conclusion of her initial visit as Mentes to Telemakhos (1.320).
22.318 I was their soothsayer. Until he utters this line, Leiodes may have had a chance at obtaining his plea for mercy. But Odysseus now assumes either that the man foresaw his own arrival and tried to avert it, or was a fraud, seeking easy employment from the suitors. Like bards, seers are depicted either as traveling about or working for patrons in palaces. Their persons were not sacrosanct.
22.344 respect me, have pity. Like the soothsayer, the bard might be suspected of abetting the enemy, but Phemios defends himself by claiming that the suitors forced him to sing for them. His further defense—that he is divinely inspired yet taught himself—has been thought by some critics to contain a contradiction. But in the context, it can imply that his full emotional art (the divine inspiration) comes into play only when he sings for his own master, and that in that case he does not borrow another’s generic phrases for his poems but sings the praises of Odysseus, “as though for a god,” based on personal knowledge of his patron. This flattering approach, with its promise of continuing poetic fame for his master, seems to work. Of course Odysseus, himself an expert storyteller, can appreciate the bardic art. A similar personal connection leads Telemakhos to spare the herald Medon (line 357).
22.412 Rejoicing over men. The ferocity of Odysseus’s revenge is tempered by his rebuke of Eurukleia. Treating the suitors as a threat to civil life, and therefore more than personal opponents, he also colors his own action as that of an instrument of the gods, who must inevitably punish such brash and hubristic arrogance.
22.468 broad-winged thrushes. Like the dead suitors, who were compared to a pile of gasping fish (line 384ff.), their paramours are made less than human by this simile treating them as victims of another sort of snare. Furthermore, the comparison to creatures that will become food naturalizes the killing, making it seem a necessity for survival. In each simile, the skill of the captors, fishermen or bird-catchers, is contrasted with the helplessness of the doomed prey, but we are not therefore meant to feel sorry for either group. The involuntary twitching of the hanged girls is noted clinically, as if the victims are beneath sympathy. The brutal treatment of Melanthios makes a similarly grim and chill finale.
23.15 Why do you fool me. Throughout the poem, Penelopeia has been depicted as cautious; her regular epithet is “thought-full” or “intelligent.” She distrusts dreams, oracles, and beggars, even one as apparently convincing as Odysseus in book 19. At this moment when an audience wants her to rush to her husband, the poet has Penelopeia maintain her resistance, a realistic touch that speaks volumes about character. At the same time, the mention of how sweet her sleep has been (line 16) hints that she realizes, at least unconsciously, that the twenty years of anxiety have ended.
23.51 with sulfur. The purging with sulfur is an important detail, since the only other mention of this cleansing element in the poem comes in the line describing the smell that filled the air immediately after Zeus’s thunderbolt blasted the ship and impious crew of Odysseus (12.417; cf. 14.307, Odysseus’s lie). The poetic analogy between his own disobedient men and the disrespectful suitors once again elevates the hero to the position of a vengeful god.
23.85 mulling a great deal. The suspense moves to a new level, as Penelopeia now seems to contemplate not whether the man before her is Odysseus but whether he is the same, emotionally, as the man who departed two decades before. In the triangular arrangement of wife, husband, and son, all on stage at last, each plays the role we have come to expect: Penelopeia immovable, Telemakhos impatient, and Odysseus indifferent to what others think.
23.136 it’s a wedding. This is ironic, since the local people expect a marriage to one of the suitors, whereas a remarriage of sorts has just happened between the long-separated pair. The comments reported (lines 149–51) from anonymous passers-by confirm the intensity of the critical observation with which Penelopeia has struggled all along, and recall again the key role of constantly shifting praise or blame in structuring this archaic society.
23.181 to test her man. The tables are turned on the man who has been testing others all along. By coolly ordering what she knows is an impossibility—that the rooted bed be moved—Penelopeia elicits the proof she has been wanting. This is more than just the recognition of shared secret signs. The deep emotion behind Odysseus’s response shows that he still values their marriage, as symbolized by the olive-tree bed he so carefully crafted. His identity as a maker and shaper (whether of plans or objects) is thus finally brought together with his identity as husband, harmoniously fitted to the exactly right wife.
23.218 Helen of Argos. By alluding to her cousin’s predicament, Penelopeia points to the power of public opinion in keeping order. If Helen had imagined she would have to come back home, her behavior would have been different; just so, if Penelopeia had trusted a visitor (like Paris) she might have remarried (either a false Odysseus or a suitor) and ended up equally embarrassed. A clearer point comes from her neat summing up of the entire Trojan saga—the separation of the Ithakan couple arose from Helen’s abandonment of her own husband.
23.233–34 a welcome / sight to a swimmer. Odysseus has been the actual shipwrecked swimmer, but the simile makes Penelopeia the person who escapes a sea of trouble to find solid land—in this case, a stability and strength represented by her husband. The comparison echoes and reverses the episode of Odysseus’s desperate swim to land at Skherie, where the young woman Nausikaa represented safety.
23.310 He told her how. Prompted by his wife, Odysseus has already mentioned his next trip, the journey inland to appease Poseidon. Now he offers a brief digest of all the major episodes we have heard him tell in books 9 through 12, including the sojourns with Kirke and Kalupso. The length of time he spent with the former goes unmentioned, as does the exact detail of his relation with the latter, while Odysseus mentions the danger of both and his resistance.
23.357 get some back by looting. The poet offers us a glimpse into early economic and legal procedure. Raiding and counter-raiding made up a large part of the process for increasing one’s stock of goods and animals, and played an important role in the training of young warriors. Cattle were the common currency of exchange, with goods and even women or slaves being valued in terms of the number of cows they were worth. By “Akhaians” Odysseus most likely refers to his fellow islanders who owe him for supporting or not stopping the suitors’ depredations.
24.1 from Mount Kullene. Mount Kullene was the favorite haunt of Hermes, in the wilds of Arcadia in central Greece. Hermes’ wand (called the kerukeion) makes him resemble a herald, who can pass across borders to bring messages. His further functions as a god of exchange, of thievery, of communication, and of herding all revolve around his ability to move easily throughout the universe.
24.11 Leukas Rock. Leukas Rock was not Leukada, the promontory near Ithaka, but a mythical “White Rock” marking the boundaries of consciousness, near the cosmic river Okeanos.
24.16 Antilokhos. Antilokhos was the son of Nestor who died while trying to rescue his father in the battle outside Troy (see 4.202).
24.37 You died at Troy. The Iliad, concentrated on one episode late in the war, ends before the death and burial of its protagonist, Akhilleus. The Odyssey manages to complete the story, providing a view of the great warrior’s funeral through this retrospective conversation in the underworld. The chorus of mourning nymphs, led by his divine mother Thetis, and the presence of all nine Muses as lamenters, mark the cosmic importance of this finale to the greatest Greek saga. At the same time, the event now fades into the past, a topic for reminiscences, in contrast to the living fame of Odysseus, which the suitors’ ghosts will transmit even to the dead.
24.119 We barely prevailed. This is a possible allusion to the reluctance of Odysseus when he was asked to join the Trojan expeditionary force. Other sources relate that he feigned madness to avoid going to war, until a ruse by Palamedes, who accompanied Agamemnon and Menelaos, forced Odysseus to show his sanity. Although pretending to plow a field crazily, he nevertheless swerved to avoid hitting his infant son, whom Palamedes placed in the way. Agamemnon’s reference to the recruiting trip, even more than the previous conversation, takes us back further into the early part of the saga.
24.123 I’ll tell you myself. Amphimedon is of course a biased witness, one of the men who courted the queen and paid for it with his life. In his partial view, Penelopeia secretly planned the killing (line 127), in the same way she deceived the suitors for three years with her ruse of the shroud. Telemakhos was also in on the plot (line 153), as was “one of the Gods” (line 182). The opportunity for the enemy to tell his story recalls Homeric technique in the Iliad, in which both sides get equal treatment from the poet and sympathy from the audience. The skewed summary in this speech, however, contrasts with the truthful sketch of the voyages given by Odysseus in book 23. Nor do we feel sympathy for Amphimedon, even as he complains he was duped.
24.192 Happy son of Laertes. Instead of answering the dead suitor directly, Agamemnon apostrophizes his former companion Odysseus, praising him for his good luck and good sense. The poet thus builds into the narrative an overarching comment on the power of women, and gives it authority and perspective by placing it in the mouth of Agamemnon, who should know. The artful ring composition returns us to the story of this hero, killed by his wife Klutaimnestre (daughter of Tundareos) on homecoming, the tale that opened the Odyssey. The murdered king contrasts the reputations of two archetypal wives, his own and that of Odysseus. The song of praise that will forever commemorate Penelopeia (lines 197–98) is of course the very poem in which he speaks, the Odyssey.
24.221 to test his father. Some critics have found this further probing by the hero to be unnecessary and distasteful. Since antiquity, when some Homeric scholars of the third century B.C. declared the entire last book of the poem to be an addition, readers have sought to find ways to justify an earlier ending of the Odyssey, one that would privilege the reunion of husband and wife as the proper conclusion to the epic. Ancient critics suggested 23.296 as the “end” of the poem, but it is unclear whether the Greek word used meant absolute finish or just a denouement. Against supporters of a shorter Odyssey it might be argued that the hero is not fully restored to his status as king, son, husband, and father until he rejoins his own father, Laertes. The further episode about the incipient vendetta by the suitors’ relatives is in keeping with the Odyssey’s generally practical outlook. And the hero’s urge to keep on testing his kin matches the trajectory of his character thus far: incessant wariness and disguise are as much identifying marks as his scar. His testing thus tells his father it is really Odysseus home at last.
24.304 I’m from Alubas. This place and the names that follow are meant to echo other words. Odysseus jokingly identifies himself as “In the Fight” (Eperitos) from “Wanderland” (Alubas), the son of “Unsparing” (Alpheidas) who is in turn “Son of much pain” or “of much gain” (Polupemon). Sikanie is Sicily, a real location. Unable to maintain his façade when his father finally breaks down, Odysseus then identifies himself by the scar and by the shared inheritance of the land—the trees and vines his father gave him.
24.404 know it for certain. Dolios does not know that Penelopeia has been rejoined to her husband. Much worse—if this is meant to be the same Dolios named earlier (17.212) as the father of the disloyal Melanthios and Melantho—he has apparently not yet learned that his children have been put to death by Odysseus’s servants at his command.
24.428 lost the hollow ships. Odysseus has not given his explanation yet to the townspeople or other islanders who sent their sons with him to Troy. In the paradoxical situation of the lone survivor, information about the loss of the crew must rest on the testimony of a man whose experience was, by definition, ultimately separate from that of the rest. Only his word remains to persuade others about the disobedience of his men or the disasters they underwent. The realistic speech, like the vendetta preparations, reminds us of the local political consequences of war.
24.472 Athene spoke to Zeus. The poem ends as it began, with a conversation between the chief goddess and her father. Since this situation results from Athene’s original plea on behalf of Odysseus, Zeus lets her decide, though he urges her to end the whole business with amnesty. The resolution by divine intervention—the prototype of tragic drama’s deus ex machina endings—particularly resonates with the local history of Athens, where the Furies (Erinus) pursuing Orestes for his kin-murder were appeased thanks to the action of Athene (a process dramatized in Aeschylus’s Eumenides, 458 B.C.).
24.520 Pallas Athene paused. As the scene unfolds, four major Greek beliefs are reasserted. First, the gods when prayed to can fill one with preternatural strength: so it happens with the weak and aged Laertes before he casts his spear. Second, peace among humans depends on cooperation with the will of the gods. Third, self-control—the primary virtue of the thoughtful Odysseus—is what enables one to end vendettas and follow the gods’ will. And fourth—perhaps less obvious to us—the gods’ action is a function of memory and mindfulness. The na
me Mentor—the human disguise taken by Athene once more—actually means “he who calls to mind.” It gives English a word for instructor and guide. Yet in the terms of the Odyssey, a greater theology is at work: human mindfulness, divine reminders, and the poet’s mastery of memory all collaborate to keep mortals humane and alive.
Names in the Odyssey
This translation continues a strong trend that began in the twentieth century to revive the original spelling and pronunciation of Homer’s proper names. Given that the Odyssey was originally performed aloud, the musical flavor of those names undoubtedly contributed to the epic singer’s effectiveness. But later Latinizations and Anglicizations of the names often took their sounds a long way from the rugged strength of the Greek. Homer’s Kuklops, for example, a name for the race of Giants of whom Poluphemos is a member, evolved strangely into our “Cyclops.” In Homer’s day it sounded harsher and stronger, rather like KOOK-lohps. This pronunciation guide aims to restore a good deal of Homer’s music with W. Sidney Allen’s Vox Graeca, the standard treatment of ancient Greek pronunciation, in mind.
Some names of course have complicated the picture. Homer’s Penelopeia does not appear in this book as “Penelope” but as PAY-neh-law-PEY-uh, a name that often ends its line as a beautiful dactyl-trochee combination. Later redactors, however, placed an accent mark, or diacritic, on the third syllable: pay-neh-LAW-pey-uh. Which is the better guide, these marks or the meter as described above? Often the two do not conflict. But (1) since scholars continue to puzzle over the exact significance and origin of the diacritics, (2) since our knowledge of the meter is now quite extensive, and (3) since I cannot imagine, as a poet and translator, that Homer’s meter played a minor role in performance, the entries here give the nod in most cases to the metrical pronunciation. Furthermore, whenever an old diacritic falls on the last syllable, as in the River ahl-phey-AWSS (Alpheios), I’ve moved the accent to another syllable to help the word sound like English (rather than French): ahl-P(H)AY-awss. Admittedly some new forms of the old misspellings will take getting used to. For Homer’s death-god, for example, this translation does not use the traditional “Hades” (presumably HEY-deez) but rather Homeric Aides, pronounced AI-dayss.