Chapter 7. The Cloak After the conclusion of Odysseus’ Cretan tale, once her tears stop flowing, Penelope returns to the task at hand, the testing of her interlocutor. This transition from emotion to practicality, from premonitions of the poem’s denouement to Penelope’s suspicions about her guest’s veracity is a good illustration of the narrative tension peculiar to this part of the Odyssey. At the same time, the questioning by no means negates the impression… Read more
Chapter 8. The Pin As remarkable as the cloak itself is the golden pin Odysseus uses to fasten it, another object Penelope herself gave to Odysseus on departure: χλαῖναν πορφυρέην οὔλην ἔχε δῖος Ὀδυσσεύς,διπλῆν· ἐν δ’ ἄρα οἱ περόνη χρυσοῖο τέτυκτο αὐλοῖσιν διδύμοισι· πάροιθε δὲ δαίδαλον ἦεν· ἐν προτέροισι πόδεσσι κύων ἔχε ποικίλον ἐλλόν,ἀσπαίροντα λάων· τὸ δὲ θαυμάζεσκον ἅπαντες,ὡς οἱ χρύσεοι ἐόντες ὁ… Read more
Chapter 9. Eurybates The final token Odysseus-Aithon gives to Penelope is the description of his herald Eurybates: καὶ μέν οἱ κῆρυξ ὀλίγον προγενέστερος αὐτοῦεἵπετο· καὶ τόν τοι μυθήσομαι, οἷος ἔην περ·γυρὸς ἐν ὤμοισιν, μελανόχροος, οὐλοκάρηνος,Εὐρυβάτης δ’ ὄνομ’ ἔσκε· τίεν δέ μιν ἔξοχον ἄλλωνὧν ἑτάρων Ὀδυσεύς, ὅτι οἱ φρεσὶν ἄρτια ᾔδη. (Odyssey 19.244–248) And a herald, a little older than… Read more
Chapter 10. Odysseus and the Boar The dialogue between Penelope and Odysseus is broken into two parts by Odysseus’ footbath and the recollection of his boar hunt on Mount Parnassus. The change of scene is dramatic: here we see Odysseus just reaching maturity (hebe), unmarried, and performing a hunting feat in the company of his relatives. Eurykleia’s recognition of Odysseus by his scar prompts the digression, but the explanation of… Read more
Chapter 11. The Conversation I focus initially on the second part of the dialogue, after Odysseus’ footbath. At this point, the conversation between Penelope and Odysseus changes in tone and substance: Penelope now takes the center stage, the beggar primarily expresses his agreement, and the fictional Odysseus in Thesprotia drops out of view. The focus shifts back to Penelope’s position and options, and now there is talk of… Read more
Chapter 12. Aedon Penelope begins in a striking way, with an extended comparison between herself and the nightingale – Aedon, the daughter of Pandareos. Although technically a simile, the comparison is so extensive as to amount to a mythological exemplum, and this is a noteworthy fact since Penelope’s previous narratives were all about herself and her present and her immediate past. This, by contrast, is a story about the events and people of the… Read more
Part II. Chapter 2. Les Amis Mortels [1] Battle in the Iliad is far from wordless carnage, resonating only with the sound of armor clashing. The general description of the poem’s first military encounter begins strikingly by contrasting the eerie silence of the Greek troops with the heteroglossia of the Trojans. But once the battle is joined: ἔνθα δ’ ἅμ’ οἰμωγή… Read more
Part II. Chapter 3. Composition by Theme and the Mêtis of the Odyssey Why is the narrative structure of the Odyssey so complicated? Although the plot of the poem is perfectly straightforward—Aristotle observed that it was the imitation of a single action—nevertheless the ordering of its narrative is elaborately nonlinear. The Iliad gets under way with a question from which ensues a linear, chronological account of the… Read more
Part II. Chapter 4. Genre and Generation in the Odyssey In recent years, much brilliant and invaluable work elucidating Greek myths has been done by Jean-Pierre Vernant and Marcel Detienne, [1] who have looked across texts and across historical periods in order to discern and retrieve a given myth’s dispersed but essential components, which, seen in their relation to each other, yield… Read more
Part II. Chapter 5. The Poetics of Exchange in the Iliad [1] ξένια γὰρ Ἄρεος τραύματα, φόνοι —scholia Sophocles Electra 96 Τhe far-reaching implications of Marcel Mauss’s Essai sur le Don, [2] much admired by ethnographers and anthropological theorists, have contributed greatly to our grasp of how thoroughly a code of reciprocity,… Read more
