Turning a Blind Eye: How Blindness Connects with The Odyssey and
O’ Brother Where Art Thou? While reading The Odyssey for class, something that really struck me was how many characters were blind in this epic. At first, I didn’t really get the hint, but after seeing this reoccurring theme more than a few times, I began to really take notice of how often blindness would show up. We meet Demodocus, Polyphemus, Tiresias, and Odysseus’s dog- Argos throughout the epic: All have some sort of visual impairment for a very important reason. We also meet Penelope and other characters who don’t see Odysseus, even without being visually impaired.
Now in the film O’ Brother Where Art Thou, which is loosely based off Homer’s epic, we meet visually impaired …show more content…
Polyphemus is one of the most important characters that Odysseus meets. Through the time spent on the island with Polyphemus, we see Odysseus’s intelligence, quick-wit and cunning ways to get himself out of trouble. When Polyphemus eats two of Odysseus’s men, he needs to come up with a way to get off the island and avenge with men. Polyphemus asks for Odysseus’s name right before he blinds Polyphemus with a stake, and states his name as “Nobody” [IX 156]. He does this to protect and hide his identity from Polyphemus and the other cyclopes when they come to ask who hurt Polyphemus, he “blinds” them from his true identity by using the name “Nobody.” Odysseus then is able to come up with his escape plan because Polyphemus is truly blinded.
Odysseus uses Polyphemus’s vision to create an understanding between the two of them, Polyphemus is more trusting when he can see, but then after the trust had been created over the wine Odysseus betrays that connection, by blinding Polyphemus. Although Polyphemus lost his vision, he gains a new way to truly see Odysseus, so it is almost as if Odysseus gave Polyphemus the gift of sight while taking it …show more content…
Being a prophet Tiresias was able to foresee the future and truly helped Odysseus in more ways than one. When Tiresias speaks his prophecy to Odysseus, it suggests, When you make landfall on Thrinakia first and quit the violet sea, dark on the land you’ll find the grazing herds of Helios by whom all things are seen, all speech is known. Avoid those kine, hold fast to your intent, and hard seafaring brings you all to Ithaka. But if you raid the beeves, I see destruction for ship and crew. Though you survive alone, bereft of all companions, lost for years under strange sail shall you come home, to find your own house filled with trouble: insolent men eating your livestock as they court your lady. Aye, you shall make those men atone in blood (XI lines 120-132)!
The prophecy that Tiresias sees for Odysseus and his men is so important because this blind man can see more without his eyes than Odysseus and all of his men can see with their eyes. He warns them of their future and how to escape the most harm possible. Odysseus was given another pair of eyes, metaphorical eyes that gave him a glimpse into the future through Tiresias and his
O’ Brother Where Art Thou? While reading The Odyssey for class, something that really struck me was how many characters were blind in this epic. At first, I didn’t really get the hint, but after seeing this reoccurring theme more than a few times, I began to really take notice of how often blindness would show up. We meet Demodocus, Polyphemus, Tiresias, and Odysseus’s dog- Argos throughout the epic: All have some sort of visual impairment for a very important reason. We also meet Penelope and other characters who don’t see Odysseus, even without being visually impaired.
Now in the film O’ Brother Where Art Thou, which is loosely based off Homer’s epic, we meet visually impaired …show more content…
Polyphemus is one of the most important characters that Odysseus meets. Through the time spent on the island with Polyphemus, we see Odysseus’s intelligence, quick-wit and cunning ways to get himself out of trouble. When Polyphemus eats two of Odysseus’s men, he needs to come up with a way to get off the island and avenge with men. Polyphemus asks for Odysseus’s name right before he blinds Polyphemus with a stake, and states his name as “Nobody” [IX 156]. He does this to protect and hide his identity from Polyphemus and the other cyclopes when they come to ask who hurt Polyphemus, he “blinds” them from his true identity by using the name “Nobody.” Odysseus then is able to come up with his escape plan because Polyphemus is truly blinded.
Odysseus uses Polyphemus’s vision to create an understanding between the two of them, Polyphemus is more trusting when he can see, but then after the trust had been created over the wine Odysseus betrays that connection, by blinding Polyphemus. Although Polyphemus lost his vision, he gains a new way to truly see Odysseus, so it is almost as if Odysseus gave Polyphemus the gift of sight while taking it …show more content…
Being a prophet Tiresias was able to foresee the future and truly helped Odysseus in more ways than one. When Tiresias speaks his prophecy to Odysseus, it suggests, When you make landfall on Thrinakia first and quit the violet sea, dark on the land you’ll find the grazing herds of Helios by whom all things are seen, all speech is known. Avoid those kine, hold fast to your intent, and hard seafaring brings you all to Ithaka. But if you raid the beeves, I see destruction for ship and crew. Though you survive alone, bereft of all companions, lost for years under strange sail shall you come home, to find your own house filled with trouble: insolent men eating your livestock as they court your lady. Aye, you shall make those men atone in blood (XI lines 120-132)!
The prophecy that Tiresias sees for Odysseus and his men is so important because this blind man can see more without his eyes than Odysseus and all of his men can see with their eyes. He warns them of their future and how to escape the most harm possible. Odysseus was given another pair of eyes, metaphorical eyes that gave him a glimpse into the future through Tiresias and his