Odysseus' Bad Decisions

Also in The Odyssey, Odysseus makes careless decisions which lead them into trouble. Odysseus makes a plan to stab the cyclops in the eye, which leads the crew members to run for their lives to get to their ships. In another place in the book Odysseus leads his ships to the land of the Laestrygonians. When they get there they see a giantess who then calls her husband. In the book it states, “ She at once called to her husband Antiphates, who immediately began killing my men.” Odysseus then cuts the cable from his own ship to save himself. Therefore, Odysseus is not a hero.

The Odyssey is a story telling about the long journey of Odysseus, and his adventures with his crew. It tells about his dangerous encounters with a Cyclops, sea monsters and Sirens, and eventually making it home safe to his wife, Penelope. Although modern literary scholars of The Odyssey have argued that Odysseus is a hero, closer examination shows that Odysseus is not a hero. He is selfish to his crew by making decisions to put them in danger, he is unfaithful to his wife on the journey and does unjust actions by killing the Cyclops without a good explanation, and going out of his way to a sea monster. These actions put his crew in jeopardy. While a good leader and a hero do selfless acts, Odysseus did selfish acts.

In the epic poem The Odyssey by Homer, Odysseus demonstrates his unimpressive and weak leadership skills. He is brave in his decision-making because he knows what is best for him and what must be done to get back to Ithaca, but it is done out of selfishness. His selfishness is portrayed by being thoughtless about putting his men into dangerous situations even if it results in their deaths along the way. Although he puts himself and his safety before his shipmates, he frightens them into not questioning him which causes them to obey his orders. He does not take advice from anyone because everything he does is to make an impression on the gods and capture their attention. Hardships are thrown his way throughout his journey, and he distracted

Journal 2: Odysseus’ weakness causes his journey to take a lot longer than it should, and puts his men in danger. Odysseus tantalized Polyphemus when he was leaving the island by saying, “‘If I could I would take your time away, and hurl you down to hell! The god of earthquake could not heal you there’” (9.71-73). Polyphemus almost sank Odysseus’ ship by throwing a rock after Odysseus said this, but if he had been silent, Polyphemus wouldn't have heard them, and couldn't have thrown the boulder if he didn't know where the ship and men were. Arrogance can cause unnecessary and avoidable harm to come, and can create issues for the future. Later, when Odysseus is about to start home again, Poseidon is still angry about his son’s eye, and sees Odysseus on his way back and says, “ While I was gone the gods have changed their minds about Odysseus...still I can

Often consequences of actions are not considered until they make themselves known and are something of a joke until they begin to have effects. In the epic poem The Odyssey by Homer, translated by Robert Fagles, Odysseus, the main character who has been on a harrowing journey for nearly half of his life, is trying to make it back to his home in Ithaca. On his way, he comes across many difficult trials in which he has to make decisions that will either improve his journey, or elongate it. The gods, specifically Poseidon, are not particularly fond of him, either, so that only causes the already terrifying outcomes to become worse. Odysseus is not a man who is known for his good decisions because he continually does not learn from his mistakes

When Odysseus made landfall on the island of Aiolia, the king there gave him a bag of wind. This bag was meant to be opened at sea, and it would bring Odysseus’ ship home to Ithaka. However, the crew let their greed get ahead of their loyalty, and they disrupted the plan. This incident is shown when they say, “‘I say we ought to crack that bag, there’s gold and silver, plenty, in that bag!’ Temptation had its way with my companions, and they untied the bag. Then every wind roared into hurricanes” (X, 50). Not only did the crew ruin the opportunity to use the wind to guide them home, but they got their ship blown back to the island of Aiolia. Here, Aiolos believes that Odysseus is not as much of a hero as he had thought, due to the actions of his shipmates. In fact, Aiolos says, “Take yourself out of this island, creeping thing — no law, no wisdom [...] Your voyage here was cursed by heaven!” (X, 80). Thus, the crew jeopardized Odysseus’ chances of returning home with ease, and they caused Aiolos to think lowly of him. Moreover, the crew members were unfaithful to Odysseus again when they were on the island of Thrinakia. Kirke and Tiresias both told him that when he visited Helios, his crew was not to eat the cattle there, or else there would be destruction for his ship and crew. Although Odysseus told his men this

The Odyssey, is a series of books about the epic journey of the hero Odysseus, the legendary king of Ithaca. Throughout the book Homer tries to establish theme by showing things may not appear as they seem and that many actions have its consequence. Odysseus barely came out alive with Scylla because of her appearance and his crew died due to their excessive pride. Homer uses figurative language, such as similes and repetition, to develop theme.

This long journey home from the trojan war was cursed to last several years because of his simple mistake. In act one Odysseus and his men are trapped in the cyclops, Polyphemus’ cave “Yet I refused (to leave the island). I wished to see the cave man, what he had to offer” (Homer 172). Odysseus’ men offer to take all the goods available to them and leave safely, yet he refused, he wished to challenge the Cyclops, Polyphemus. Which led to their capture in Polyphemus cave, they later blind the cyclops and disguise themselves as ram and escape the island without Polyphemus knowledge.

Odysseus was also very irresponsible which led to some negative outcomes. First of all he was irresponsible by not telling his crew members what was inside of the bag of winds, and did not keep it away from them good enough which caused the men to open it when they were within sight of Ithaca but then sending them all the way back to where they came from. Another major example of him being irresponsible was that he was not able to prevent his crew members from eating Helio’s sheep which resulted in the death of everyone but Odysseus. Finally, Odysseus is an anti-hero because of his eagerness to ransack and kill. One of the reasons that Odysseus and his men were forced to go on his long journey is because Odysseus decided to pillage the city of Cicones after coming back from the Trojan war, which Zeus did not like.

In the poem The Odyssey by Homer, Odysseus, the main character, travels away from his home and finds himself in a situation that prevents him from going back for a long period of time. During the times of trouble, Odysseus reveals characteristics about himself that might otherwise have been hidden if it were not for the journey. This defines his character and shows him to be not an admirable hero. Odysseus first shows this when he successfully escapes from the Cyclops’s home but made a drastic mistake and says: ‘O Cyclops! Would you feast on my companions?

When escaping from Polyphemus, Odysseus has to make the smart decision to “sling a man under each middle” (207) sheep. His decision saves him and his men from death (HOW?). This conflict shows that Odysseus can make smart decisions quickly and under pressure. If this choice was not made, he and his men would be killed by the cyclops

When the Cyclops entered and saw that there were men eating his food and sitting around his fire, he was not a happy camper. In the first 2 nights he ate 6 of Odysseus’s men while the other men were trapped in his cave by a massive boulder in front of the cave’s mouth. It took Odysseus’s quick thinking and intelligence for them to escape the cave with their lives. They crafted a spear out of a giant

There were many instances in which Odysseus made poor decisions throughout the expedition, but the worst one was after he landed in Poseidon’s son’s island and fed on Polyphemusin, the King of the Cyclops’ food. Soon after the incident, Odysseus and his crew were imprisoned in Polyphemusin’s lair as sustenance. “Rolled a huge stone to the mouth of the cave- so huge that two and twenty strong four- wheeled wagons would not be enough to draw it from its place against the doorway.” (Homer 106) Odysseus and his men waited until the Cyclops fell asleep, and once he did, they drove an axe into Cyclops’ eye and blinded Polyphemusin. (Homer 110)” This infuriated Neptune, because Polyphemus was his son.

Homer’s The Odyssey is an epic tale that delves us into the world of Odysseus, a hero of the Trojan war who must make his way home from battle. Throughout his journey, he encounters countless gods, creatures and catastrophes that hinder his progress. Many of these events depicted in the story have gone on to become modern day metaphors for human conflicts, as readers begin to draw parallels between their lives and the struggles Odysseus encounters while on his journey. As a reader of the Odyssey, I began to realize that I could often relate to Odysseus’ problems, despite not being a Greek war hero countless miles away from their homeland. Perhaps the best example of this is when Odysseus is confronted with a decision in which he cannot win; whatever the choice he makes, it will have negative consequences. Recently, I have experienced a situation similar to this in nature, in which no matter what I decided, I would face negative consequences.

There are two instances where first Odysseus doesn't listen to the gods,and things turn bad, but next time he does listen and things turn out good for him and his men. According to the story, “Circe's, bidding against arms, slipped my mind, so I strapped on my cuirass, and took hold two spears and went above deck.” (Lines 786-790) Shortly after Odysseus disobeyed the orders he got six of his best men killed. According to the story, I tried to say untie me to the crew! But they were silenced with the wax lodged in their ears.” ( Lines 745-750) Odysseus learned that when he obeys his gods, and does what they say he will get through whatever obstacle he's faced