Essay on myth of sisyphus

Odysseus goes through experiences where justice prevails over hardship. For example, Odysseus loses many of his men during the trip, but he still survives. At one island, some of his men are killed and before he would get killed too, Odysseus starts sailing away with his remaining men. After finding out his men have been killed, Odysseus says, “From that place we sailed on, glad enough to have come off with our lives, but sad to lose our companions” (114-115). Even though Odysseus loses some of his companions, he is able to continue along with his journey. Shortly after, Odysseus came to the underworld and got to talk to the dead and hear their stories. While speaking to the dead, his mom appears and Odysseus realizes she is dead. She wants to talk to him because Odysseus did not see or hear from her since the start of his journey. Odysseus asks his mom how everyone is doing at home. Odysseus says, “‘But do tell me, really and truly, what was the cause of youth death? how did you die? Was it a long disease? or did Artemis Archeress kill you with her gentle shafts? And tell me about my father and the son I left behind me: do they still hold my honours and my possessions, or have they passed to some other man because people think I will never return? And tell me of my wedded wife, what she thinks and what she means to do. Does she remain with the boy and keep all safe, or has she already married the best man who offered?’ My beloved mother answered (127). Although Odysseus is very sad his mom isn’t alive anymore, he is very happy to hear how his family is doing at home. Getting the updates on his family, helps Odysseus deal the grieving he has because of his mother's death.Odysseus is able to overcome hardships, which help him develop into more of a hero.

Circe gives him a life of ease and self-indulgence on an enchanted island. In Phaecia, Odysseus is offered the love of a young princess and her hand in marriage. The Sirens tempt him to live in the memory of the glorious past. Calypso, the goddess with whom he spends seven years, offers him the greatest temptation of all: immortality. In refusing, Odysseus chooses the human condition, with all its struggle, its disappointments, and its inevitable end. And the end, death, is ever-present. But he hangs on tenaciously and, in the midst of his ordeals, he is sent living to the world of the dead to see for himself what death means.” (Lawall,

We can wander the earth searching for eternal life, looking out for an answer to ourselves and a chance at prolonging our success; however, true strength comes from one’s willingness to accept personal limits.

Selflessly Overcoming Obstacles Contrary to popular belief, seemingly devastating hardships motivate people to push themselves away from those very difficulties and fight against them. Far too often, one exhausts all the vitality he finds within himself, struggling to stay afloat on the verge of hopelessness. But just when he almost surrenders, an unexpected wave of inspiration secures him, giving him hope to carry on and eventually start a fight against the misery that once confined them. Throughout both the literary and the real world, this pattern emerges regardless of the time or context. Consider Odysseus, stuck on Calypso’s island, who faces the choice of fighting temptation or remaining faithful to his wife and returning home.

During the course of his journey home, Odysseus cunningly tricks the cyclops Polyphemus into believing he has no name. Moreover, he manifests his god-like strength, stringing his bow and killing the suitors who plague his kingdom. And lastly, Odysseus deals with the outcomes of his unrestrainable pride, tackling on Poseidon’s rage and learning to plead to the gods. So, even when Odysseus faces struggles and numerous obstacles, Odysseus induces an “extraordinary quality from within himself”, which is, in fact, the definition of an epic

With everything going on with the upcoming presidential election, the political community has been very prominent in society the past several months. While doing research on myths, I came across The Myth of Sisyphus and immediately made many connections between the two subjects. Both of these topics have a lot to do with manipulation and deception. With politics especially, people today have a lot of opinions on the dynamics of that community. They both deal with continuous repetition and constantly giving your all to make accomplish a task. What is interesting though is exactly to what extent can The Myth of Sisyphus be related to our modern day political community?

Camus explanations of the Myth of Sisyphus, presented the concept of the absurd by outlining the beliefs that an individuals life has worth but only his live in a world that denies such worth to survive. Therefore, the absurdity in the statement, explains the fact of a clash between the orders through which an individuals mind hard for, likewise the lack of order that we as humans find in the world.

Not only embodying absurdism but speaking it by the end of the novel, Meursault parrots the same conclusion Camus reached in The Myth of Sisyphus, in which Sisyphus is charged with the meaningless task of pushing a rock up a mountain for eternity, each time watching it role back down to the bottom. He understands why his mother took a fiancé as she was approaching death, as if she were starting her life over: she would have

The myth of Sisyphus focuses on a king who was said to be deceitful and spiteful in nature. He was supposedly

What makes life meaningless? Taylor states that there are two characteristics of Sisyphus’s life that make life pointless. The main trademark is the purposelessness of his life. Taylor stresses the way that there is no good reason for the labor that Sisyphus is compelled to do because of the gods. I concur with Taylor that the purposelessness in performing this action demonstrates that his life is good for nothing. Perhaps, as specified in class, if his punishment brought about something advantageous. For instance, when Sisyphus rolled the rocks up the hill, rather than falling back down, they shaped into a beautiful architecture, which would give his life meaning. In the book, Taylor stated, “Activity... even long, drawn out and repetitive activity, has a meaning if it has some significant culmination… activity,” showing that possibly if the rocks did form a figure it could give meaning to Sisyphus’s life. The second characteristic that makes Sisyphus’s life meaningless is the idea of endless repetition of his punishment given by the gods. Taylor claimed that if the act of repetition would have led to an achievement or goal his life may not have been meaningless, yet Sisyphus’s labor did not lead to anything besides pointless repetition.

"Oedipus the King" is a tragic play showing a shift from the belief of fate to freedom of choice. Therefore, Oedipus the king is a great example of those who run from fate ends up fulfilling their fate

In Camus’s major works, ‘absurdism’ was a frequent subject. The term ‘absurdism’ refers to a feud or conflict between our expectations or ideals and reality. Among his widely praised works, the “The Stranger” and “The myth of Sisyphus” can be read as an example of the absurdism. “The Stranger” is a story of an insensitive individual man, who lives for the

Taylor broke up his paper into two parts: the meaningless existence and the meaninglessness of life. The first part, meaningless existence, is where Taylor first mentions the story of Sisyphus. He uses Sisyphus as “a perfect image of meaninglessness” (Taylor). He describes the awful and meaningless life that he has. He was punished by the Gods to roll up a heavy rock up a hill, only for it to roll back down (Camus). Sisyphus would then do this process over and over again, until the end of time (Camus).

to accept and endure it when found."(qtd. In Rollins 1) This view is more correct of Oedipus as shown in

Camus’s separate work, The Myth of Sisyphus, includes imagery that provides an extended metaphor for this idea. The character Sisyphus begins to roll a boulder to the top of a mountain and upon reaching the summit, the boulder rolls back down. Sisyphus’s repetitive actions symbolize man’s constant need for an answer to the purpose of life, and as the boulder rolls back it acts as man’s responses belying his existence (Stanford Encyclopedia). For Meursault, his abnormal reactions and behaviors warrants discomfort from others. His lack of ambition to find an answer for the main question behind absurdism makes his characterization simple. Meursault speaks what he believes and knows. There are no genuine underlying sinister traits behind Meursault’s being, he simply acts upon his whims. The same whims throw him into an agreement to marry a girl, trap an abusive man’s ex-girlfriend, and kill an Arab man. All of which he does not with the intent to harm, but just the inability to explain why he should not. Meursault most often gives up on trying to explain his beliefs or intentions to those who do not immediately understand, such as his neighbors, lawyer, and