The Two Types of People
(An Analysis of the differences and similarities between Odysseus and Achilles) There are only two types of people in this world; people like Achilles, the epic hero from The Iliad (Homer 800-700 B.C.) or people like Odysseus, the epic hero of The Odyssey (Homer 800-700B.C.). These two epic poems have the greatest heroes from Greek culture are the groundwork for all other heroes who came after them. There are traces of Achilles’ the straightforward mindset in many of the world’s most popular heroes. Odysseus passes on his cunning and respect, through great authors who used him as the example for their own heroes. Not only in books do we find odyssean and achilliean types; people in our live can be described as one or …show more content…
Men like to take pride in being stoic and unwavering in hard times, but these two act like elementary kids who have been put in time out. Both of them face hardships recurrently. Achilles gets disrespected by the leader of the Achaeans during the Trojan War. Odysseus is trapped on the island of the sea goddess Calypso. When Achilles’ prize woman gets stolen, he says to his mother: “For wide-ruling Agamemnon, Atreus’ son, has shamed me, has taken away my prize, appropriated it for his own use.”(The Iliad pg. ln.). He is in the middle of a war and all he is worried about is his prize. Countless Achaean soldiers are dying, because his feelings are hurt; he is complaining to his mom. The same behavior can be seen on school playgrounds; the fifth graders take a ball from a fourth grader, causing the fourth grade to pout and complain to his mom when he gets home. Then in the odyssey, the first time Odysseus is seen, he is stuck on an island with beautiful women. Instead of being with the most beautiful goddess in the world, who wants him to be her husband, he is sitting on a rock weeping. (pg157 ln173). At night he is sleeping with the most beautiful women alive and yet during his days he cries for his wife and home. Heroes that sit around and feel sorry for themselves are not the very heroic, but maybe this is what makes them human. Homer shows through this act of grumbling from both heroes, …show more content…
Throughout both epics, it is obvious that most of what the mortals are doing is due to the will of gods. Achilles is encouraged and helped multiple times by the Goddess Pallas Athena. When he is about to attack Agamemnon she comes to his side to check his anger. She is always looking out for Achilles during the Trojan War, this is most evident when she helps him destroy hector. (afldhgasnfsda) she tricks hector into believing he can beat Achilles and retrieves the spear that Achilles uses to kill Hector. Athena is very proactive in the mortal world, like in The Iliad with Achilles, she pleads on Odysseus’s behalf to Zeus. She says :( djfjdas) this persuades Zeus to send Hermes to calypso ordering the release of her captive Odysseus. Even before we are met with Odysseus’s predicament, she is telling his son Telemachus, back in Ithaca, to go and discover the truth of his father’s fate. She pushes him to prove his name as Odysseus’s son by sailing to Sparta and Pylos. None of the other Olympians living on Mt. Olympus are as influential in the epics of Achilles and Odysseus as the Goddess of Strategy and Battle, Athena. Her nature for strategy is show both by her love of the doomed Achilles and her affection for the witty and intelligent Odysseus. The similarities between the heroes are the reason why she assists and feels affection for both of these men along their treacherous and
(An Analysis of the differences and similarities between Odysseus and Achilles) There are only two types of people in this world; people like Achilles, the epic hero from The Iliad (Homer 800-700 B.C.) or people like Odysseus, the epic hero of The Odyssey (Homer 800-700B.C.). These two epic poems have the greatest heroes from Greek culture are the groundwork for all other heroes who came after them. There are traces of Achilles’ the straightforward mindset in many of the world’s most popular heroes. Odysseus passes on his cunning and respect, through great authors who used him as the example for their own heroes. Not only in books do we find odyssean and achilliean types; people in our live can be described as one or …show more content…
Men like to take pride in being stoic and unwavering in hard times, but these two act like elementary kids who have been put in time out. Both of them face hardships recurrently. Achilles gets disrespected by the leader of the Achaeans during the Trojan War. Odysseus is trapped on the island of the sea goddess Calypso. When Achilles’ prize woman gets stolen, he says to his mother: “For wide-ruling Agamemnon, Atreus’ son, has shamed me, has taken away my prize, appropriated it for his own use.”(The Iliad pg. ln.). He is in the middle of a war and all he is worried about is his prize. Countless Achaean soldiers are dying, because his feelings are hurt; he is complaining to his mom. The same behavior can be seen on school playgrounds; the fifth graders take a ball from a fourth grader, causing the fourth grade to pout and complain to his mom when he gets home. Then in the odyssey, the first time Odysseus is seen, he is stuck on an island with beautiful women. Instead of being with the most beautiful goddess in the world, who wants him to be her husband, he is sitting on a rock weeping. (pg157 ln173). At night he is sleeping with the most beautiful women alive and yet during his days he cries for his wife and home. Heroes that sit around and feel sorry for themselves are not the very heroic, but maybe this is what makes them human. Homer shows through this act of grumbling from both heroes, …show more content…
Throughout both epics, it is obvious that most of what the mortals are doing is due to the will of gods. Achilles is encouraged and helped multiple times by the Goddess Pallas Athena. When he is about to attack Agamemnon she comes to his side to check his anger. She is always looking out for Achilles during the Trojan War, this is most evident when she helps him destroy hector. (afldhgasnfsda) she tricks hector into believing he can beat Achilles and retrieves the spear that Achilles uses to kill Hector. Athena is very proactive in the mortal world, like in The Iliad with Achilles, she pleads on Odysseus’s behalf to Zeus. She says :( djfjdas) this persuades Zeus to send Hermes to calypso ordering the release of her captive Odysseus. Even before we are met with Odysseus’s predicament, she is telling his son Telemachus, back in Ithaca, to go and discover the truth of his father’s fate. She pushes him to prove his name as Odysseus’s son by sailing to Sparta and Pylos. None of the other Olympians living on Mt. Olympus are as influential in the epics of Achilles and Odysseus as the Goddess of Strategy and Battle, Athena. Her nature for strategy is show both by her love of the doomed Achilles and her affection for the witty and intelligent Odysseus. The similarities between the heroes are the reason why she assists and feels affection for both of these men along their treacherous and