Odysseus Character Analysis

“Now shrugging off his rags the wiliest fighter of the islands leapt and stood on the broad door still, his own bow in his hand” (Homer 557). In epic poem The Odyssey by Homer, Odysseus is a hero because he makes a clever decisions by gaining a close connection with Circe, he is cautious for he built his bed out of an olive tree, protecting his family from imposters, and he is cunning, for he allows his men to successfully escape Polyphemus’ cave.

In the Odyssey, Odysseus exemplified strong leadership and outstanding noble qualities. Like Achilles, Odysseus carried some flaws at the beginning of the story. A strong case can be made that his biggest flaw as a character was pride as it caused him unnecessary risks that only delayed his journey and possibly endangered his men. This is evidently shown when Odysseus and his crew wander around in Polyphemos ' cave. After the confrontation with the Polyphemos, Odysseus and his men escaped by stabbing Polyphemos’ in the eye while he was asleep. Once Odysseus and his men were safe on board on their ship, Odysseus took it upon himself to reveal his true identity and proceeded to taunt Polyphemos. At

Odysseus thinks that his reasoning are final and his activities are constantly just and right, although he frequently allows his ego control his rational thinking, resulting harm to his group and messing with the gods’s plans. His men could have went back home Securely for it is the desire of Athena and the other heavenly gods who surround to her in Mount Olympus, however Odysseus takes it to himself to outrage and blind Polyphemus, the monstrous son of Poseidon, adored by his dad yet abhorred by the people, In this way distrusting their whole arrangement . Subsequent to being blinded by the heroine, Polyphemus tosses huge pieces of rocks at Odysseus's ship, nearly obliterating them at the same time. But instead of retreating for safety, Odysseus keeps on provoking Polyphemus and “[calls] out to the cyclopes again, with [his] men hanging all over [him] begging him not to”(Book 9, 491-492). His feeling of pride and presumption influences to disregard the requests of his people even in these critical circumstances . He will fulfill his own feeling of interest and pleasure without thinking of the result it would have on his crew. Despite the fact that he is bound to get away from all passings and assaults, his group isn’t so blessed. Their lives are in mortal peril since Odysseus considers them as child sheeps who should forfeit their lives for him when the circumstances comes, much the same as how mortals make conciliatory offerings of sheeps for the heavenly gods. He is willing to fulfill his own feeling of interest without thinking of his groups lives or their suppositions and is regularly infuriated when they negate his request. If they hurt his sense of pride and self-importance and pomposity , Odysseus will be overcome with outrage and

“Are you flesh and blood, Odysseus, to endure more than a man can? Do you never tire? God, look at you, iron is what you’re made of” (12.162-164). In the epic poem, The Odyssey by Homer, the focus is on the journey of Odysseus, the island of Ithaca’s king, after he defeated the Trojans in a war that spanned ten years. He travels far and wide in an attempt to get home to his wife and son, but is repeatedly blocked from doing so by gods, nymphs, and monsters alike. He’s a skilled warrior that fears next to nothing and this poem follows him as he uses these facts to his advantage. Odysseus is persuasive and clever and refuses to shy away from a challenge that requires either one of these characteristics.

Odysseus’ hubris played a negative role when Odysseus revealed his identity to Polyphemus. Odysseus and his crew had just managed to escape from the Cyclops, Polyphemus, after driving a stake into his eye. But then, Odysseus told the blinded Cyclops his identity by shouting, “Cyclops – if any man on the face of the earth should ask you who blinded you, shamed you so- say Odysseus, raider of cities, he gouged out you eye, Laertes’ son who makes his home in Ithaca” (9, 558-562). Odysseus managed to tell Polyphemus his name, father, and home. Polyphemus then prayed to Poseidon, his father, to get revenge on Odysseus. Poseidon ended up killing Odysseus’ entire crew and delaying Odysseus for 10 years. None of those terrible consequences would have happened if Odysseus had suppressed his enormous pride. Odysseus’ hubris resulted in a lot of suffering for many people. Odysseus’ hubris prevents Odysseus and his crew from getting back to Ithaca again when Odysseus did

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 has a sense of hubris that leads to adversity and causes him harm, he also has humility; however, the lack of balance between these emotions takes Odysseus through many tough obstacles. When Odysseus tricks Polyphemos, he does it logically, and he uses his mind and reason; however, his hubris comes out when he feels the need to expose his true identity thus leading to his difficulty to return to Ithaka and future problems. Odysseus’s men beg him to stop harassing the beast, but Odysseus has one other plan in mind when he says, “Kyklops / … Odysseus raider of cities, took your eye: / Laertes’ son, whose home’s on Ithaka!” (Homer 160). This provoking of Polyphemos that Odysseus displays is a cause for the pain Ithaka is going though, as well as personal and direct grieving directed at Odysseus and his immediate

Feeling confident, him and his men stop in Ismara and engage in battle with the Ciconians fell asleep and lost many men. They made a stop at the land of the Cyclopes. He leads his crew into a cyclops' cave not knowing who the home belonged to and waited for the owners to return. When the owner of the cave does return the he's very angry with the Odysseus and his crew for eating his food. They are trapped there for a couple days and come up with a plan to escape. they plunged a wooden stake into the eye of the Cyclopes and manage to escape. The Cyclops Polyphemus then calls for the help of his father Poseidon, god of the sea to avenge

After arriving on the island of the phaeacians, Odysseus is trying to prove to the court that he is odysseus by telling them of his life between leaving troy, and arriving on their island. It is in this part of the retelling that Odysseus and his men have been trapped by the cyclops Polyphêmos, a son of poseidon. There are other cyclopes in caves nearby. Polyphemos is a shepherd and goatherd, every morning he takes his flock out to graze and every night he brings them into his cave to be milked. Many of Odysseus’ problems stem from Poseidon being angry with him, and he is repeatedly angering him further.

“I would not give the clean death of a beast/ to trulls who made a mockery of my mother/ and of me too— you sluts, who lay with suitors.” (Lines 514-516, Book XXII) Instead of forgiveness, which other heroes exhibit, Odysseus portrays jealousy, hate, and rage to those who have affected his high and mighty complex in the

Firstly, the sharp character of Odysseus is revealed by the external conflict between him and Polyphemus, the cyclops. Stuck in the cyclops’ cave and looking for a way to get elsewhere, Odysseus and his men “bored that great eye socket” (382) of the cyclops as step one of the process out of the cave. Odysseus thinks there is no way out until his quick thinking comes in action and he thinks of a way to blind Polyphemus. Odysseus and his men

As he gets the Cyclops drunk he then says his name is nobody. He then pierces the spear through the sleeping Cyclops’s eye, blinding the giant beast. The Cyclops then tells everyone that nobody blinded his eye. Nobody is actually Odysseus who is king of Ithaca who can be very smart and cunning in the story. The author of this story is a man named Homer. Homer cannot be proven the author of this book because there is no proof he ever existed. Odysseus king of Ithaca set sail with his crew to fight at Troy, but Odysseus and his crew run into some problems returning to Ithaca. Odysseus’s character in the story shows he is very cunning, he is very cocky, and he is very brave.

One of the more famous characters of the ancient Greeks, Odysseus, has been written about for millennia. Homer composed an epic poem entirely about him. Dante wrote about Odysseus while describing his journey through the afterlife in Inferno. These two writers, though describing the same man, portray him in different lights – Homer lauding him as a valiant hero and Dante condemning him to burn for eternity. Each portrayal is a product of the different times in which the two authors lived. Through how the two authors abbreviate, augment, and tell the story of Odysseus, their personal values on acts such as lying, sacrifice, and the capabilities of mankind against the gods

A grieving man, Odysseus, filled with sorrow, watching the lapping waves come closer and closer to him, wondering when he will return home when he was stuck on an island owned by a beautiful goddess, Kalypso. Separated from his family after the Trojan War, the cunning tale of the Odyssey, written by Homer, demonstrates the journey of the mortal man, Odysseus, undergoing many hardships and difficulties to reach home safe. With the loss of family communication and the hardships of knowing one another is hurt, Odysseus sets out on the sea to reunite with his wife, Penelope and his son, Telemachos. Traveling through monstrous creatures and landing up on people's island, he has had some sexual affairs with goddesses that question people’s thought about whether Odysseus is a loyal man to Penelope. While Odysseus is physically unfaithful to Penelope, he is never mentally and/or emotionally content with other women besides Penelope until he reaches home.

We live in an existence where we deal with conflicts every day. They could be internal or external, but we do not face conflicts with terrifying monsters or nightmarish creatures. Conflict is a clash or an argument between opposing powers. Odysseus is a Greek hero who spends 10 years wandering after the Trojan War to get home. On his way back home, he encountered plenty of obstacles. Some of the barriers were created by the gods and some were created by mythical creatures. None of the complications stopped him from going back to his family in any way. In the epic poem, The Odyssey by Homer, some of the daunting conflicts that Odysseus faces are the formidable forces. While confronting these contentions he utilized a significant number of his character qualities like quick-wit, cunning, intelligence, perseverance, bravery, and humility to combat them.