Examples Of Greed In The Odyssey

The outcome was them being blasted all the way to where they started. They also disobeyed Odysseus by eating cows that he told them not to. They were not just regular cows, they were sacred cows of the sun god. He was furious. He told Zeus to punish them, so Zeus sent a lightning bolt down to Earth which destroyed the ship, and killed everyone, except Odysseus, because he didn’t eat the

In the epic the odyssey written by homer the theme of reciprocity clearly affects the characters of the odyssey.reciprocity clearly affect the characters odysseus, his men and antinous

Penelope was able to keep Odysseus’s land from the suitors through deceitful acts. Was she making the shroud for herself instead of for Laertes? “It was a shawl she made, something warm a man might wrap around her shoulders windy nights one of the suitors perhaps.” (Pastan 264) Penelope lived in a time where women could not rule as a king. Ithaca needed a king and for twenty years they were without a king because of Penelope selfish choices. The right thing for Penelope to do was to marry one of the suitors because one of the suitors would have become king and would have been able to rule Ithaca with all of the authority and power of a king. This was a sacrifice that Penelope was unwilling to make because she liked the power to much. She did not remarry because she wanted to rule Ithaca. Penelope did not want Odysseus to return because then she would be the ruler and nobody would be able to tell her what to do. When Odysseus returns home from his long journey she does not even seem happy to see him. Odysseus says to Penelope “Things back where habit said they belonged: your own husband lying in your bed …Yet you had to leave it.”(Howard 262) Instead of being over joyous that her husband has finally retuned home and showing him how much she loves him, she decides it is best if she leave his side the first night he is home while he is sleeping. Penelope

Unlike Odysseus Penelope is confined by the gender roles of her time and cannot use physical strength against the suitors or even direct verbal rejection, instead Penelope resorts to her emotional resilience and wit in order to challenge the suitors. She wrongly reassures the suitors that once she finishes weaving a gift for Odysseus’s father, she will choose someone to marry her, “’Young men, my suitors, let me finish my weaving, before I marry’…every day she wove on the great loom but every night by torchlight she unwove it.” (II. 103-104, 112-113) Penelope’s actions are strategic and well calculated. Her main goal, like Odysseus, is to successfully overcome her situation. She understands that she may not be able to physically fight the suitors but she can trick them until Telemachus or Odysseus are able to. By crafting a lie that delays the suitors from marrying her immediately, Penelope restrains the suitors from seizing Ithaca, her household, and posing a threat to Telemachus or Odysseus. Her lie gives Odysseus a crucial advantage in the physical fight against the suitors as he comes back to a city and household where Penelope

Odysseus’s actions may seem selfless and/or heroic however they are actually being mistaken for acts of selfishness. “They tied me up, then, plumb amidships, back to the mast, lashed to the mast and took themselves again to rowing” (Homer 1134). Homer is describing the crew lashing Odysseus to the mast so that he may hear the sirens sing. Odysseus thinks he is being heroic and manly, but he is actually placing his life and that of the crews in danger all because he wants to hear the song of the sirens. Odysseus knows how loyal his crew is to him so, if one of them was to untie him they could have all ended up dead. Odysseus might think he was performing a heroic action but in actuality he was performing an act of selfishness. When Circe captured Odysseus’s men he was advised not to save them by his best man, Eurylochus, however “Against this advice, Odysseus rushes to save his men from the enchantress” (Homer 1125). Odysseus appears to be heroic but looking closer this rash decision was selfish. He rushed to save his men for honor. He cares more about honor than the safety of his crew. The rest of his crew that wasn’t under Circes spell would have been lost if Odysseus died because they rely so heavily on him. When a leader mistakes his selfish decisions as heroic it can place him and the people around him in danger. Odysseus’s inability to think through his rash decisions and recognize the right choice over the honorable and selfish one makes him unfit to be a

The Cicones episode and the Cattle of the Sun episode in The Odyssey have some differences, despite their major similarity. In the Cicones episode, the threat that faces Odysseus and his men are the people of Thrace and their anger. In the Cattle of the sun episode, however, the threat that faces Odysseus and his men is the wrath of the gods. On Thrace, Odysseus manages to escape alive and with all but six of his crew-members form each ship. Additionally, the men of Thrace fought Odysseus’s men on land. On Thrinacia, the island that Helios’s cattle roamed on, though, is not where Zeus strikes them down. Zeus strikes down Odysseus’s men on the open water, not posing a fight, but rather extermination. Unlike the men of Thrace, too, Zeus takes

Penelope says she is weaving the shroud for the eventual funeral of Odysseus’s father, her father-in-law, Laertes. Penelope does a very good job of convincing the suitors to keep waiting for her. Antinous complains about it at an assembly in Book 2. He says “So she spoke, and the proud heart in us was persuaded thereafter in the daytime she would weave at her great loom, but in the night she would have torches set by, and undo it. So for three years she was secret in her design,” (2). Penelope spends all day weaving, but at night she undoes all of her work from the previous day, promising to choose a husband as soon as she finishes the shroud. Because the suitors see her working all day, they assume she is making progress. This buys Penelope nearly four years to wait for Odysseus, until a maid reveals her

Odysseus proves his selfishness by disregarding any advice given to him by others and doing what he thinks will have the best outcome for himself. His egocentric attitude continues to be portrayed as he puts his health and well-being before his men. Aeolus, ruler of the winds, presents Odysseus with a bag of wind to guide him and his crew home, but instead of putting his pride aside and letting his men know what it is, he lets their imagination take over to where they assume it is filled with treasure that he is selfishly taking for himself. Although he was not actually taking treasure, it is selfish of him to keep this information from his men knowing they will open it. He puts all the blame on them when he says, ‘My coward comrades did me in’ (10.71). Odysseus could have easily prevented this, but he was too stubborn. Along their way home, the crew docks on Helios’ island where they are advised not to eat the cattle, but while Odysseus was away attempting to call on the gods, they sacrificed the best cows. A good leader would have explained to them consequences, but he was only worried about his own personal agenda. Because of this, Zeus punishes them when he says, ‘As for those sinners, I’ll soon strike their ship/with blazing lightning’ (12.394-395). These instances cause his

During his visit to the underworld, Odysseus was informed of one of his most formidable enemies: desire. Teiresias plainly told him that “if [he could] contain [his] own desire, and contain [his] companions… [they] might all make [their] way back to Ithaca” (Homer 171). When they finally saw the island, Odysseus did feel the desire to stop at the island, but tried to heed the warnings he received. His men however did not feel the same way he did. His me pestered him until he felt they had “[forced him] to it” but in reality he was just making an excuse to give in to his desires” (Homer 193). After indulging in his (and his crew’s) desires, he thought they would soon proceed off the island, however this was not the case. While exploring the island, his food deprived crew came upon the cattle of Helios, and being starving, began to cook and eat them, even sacrificing a part to the gods. Odysseus was walking back to their camp on his own when “the pleasant savor of cooking meat came drifting around [him], and [he] cried out [his] grief aloud to the gods immortal (Homer 194). Once he smelled the meat he knew that the horrific actions that were predicted would come true. All these things happened because Odysseus’ crew did not follow the instruction of their leader and instead followed their desires, but an even worse fate comes true when they disobey the gods themselves.

Penelope has a very complex and interesting character. For example her determination to wait and to mislead the suitors for so long shows that she had great intelligence and perseverance. Penelope's wit is acknowledged in this quote from Antinous "For all the Achean beauties of former times, none had at her command such wits as she."(Page 20, Book 2). Penelope's wit is also shown in her scheme to mislead the suitors by saying that they must wait for her to weave a shroud for Odysseus's father Laertes. She told them

Odysseus and his crew came across the land of the Cyclopes. Odysseus was aware of these “Lawless savages who leave everything up to the gods.”3 Odysseus and his crew see an island just off the shore untouched by man and thriving with animals and nature. That is where they beach their ships in the midst of night. When morning came the crew hunted down a hundred or so goats and feasted all day, while marveling at the Cyclopes across the water from them. Being the intellectual he is Odysseus decides that it would be a good idea

When they landed on the island of Hyperion, bad winds prevented them from leaving. Food soon became low, and when Odysseus was asleep, the crew killed the cows of Hyperion against the god's warnings. Hyperion was enraged to see this and had all of Odysseus' men killed in a great storm. After the storm all Odysseus had left was his own strength and the favor of Athena. Odysseus learned that the gods must be respected in order for any man to succeed.

In book five Odysseus is presented with a very great and tempting barrier. Calypso confronts him with this statement, “But if you only knew, down deep, what pains are fated to fill your cup before you reach that shore, you’d stay right here, preside in our house with me and be immortal.” She promised him that he would possess a trait that no other human in the odyssey has, immortality. Even though her offers are very tempting and would be self fulfilling, he promptly rejects because all he wants is to go home and the love of his life, Penelope. This act alone shows that he was willing to give himself and up for a greater cause. He showed great discipline and faithfulness to reject Calypso’s offer and to continue on his journey home. At the beginning of the epic, Odysseus did have one flaw that could have been detrimental to his homecoming journey and that was self-glorification. By the end of the Odyssey, Odysseus overcame his pride and tempered it with patience because at the end of the day he didn’t really know that Penelope would be waiting on him, but he was willing to put in the effort to find out what was at the end of the road.

So when the Cicones gather an army from inland to ward off the Greek invaders, Odysseus loses many men and rather than acknowledge his error in judgment, he shifts the blame of the defeat to his crew. Convincing himself that he is not at fault for having been defeated, but rather his selfish crew who refused to leave, he justifies his actions, “Then I urged them to cut and run, set sail, but would they listen? Not those mutinous; there was too much wine to swill, too many sheep to slaughter”(9.50-52). Odysseus knows that if he stays on the island, the Cicones will rally an army and come to kill Odysseus and his men. Despite this, he stays and reassures himself that the major defeat was by Zeus’ hand, “Zeus presented us with disaster us, me and my comrades doomed to suffer”(9.61-62). Homer teaches us that no matter how many great accolades one holds, they are destined to fail if they cannot own up to their mistakes and actions.

Odysseus left Calypso’s Island and began his journey back home. His odyssey might be described as one’s own life struggles. There are ups and downs to every situation, and through reading The Odyssey, readers can connect parallels between Odysseus’ experiences and lessons learned in their own life. Human weaknesses can still prevail through even the strongest men you may think of; examples of this are shown in this epic. Even though there is a large gap in space between Odysseus’ travels and the present, human nature and weakness still share the same obstacles.