If one were to describe the qualities of a hero, what would they say? Quick-wittedness, generosity, and kindness would be common answers, but few people, if any, would answer perplexedness, selfishness, and maliciousness. Odysseus, undoubtedly a great hero, portrays flaws when surrounded death while on his journey home. Death in The Odyssey often overshadows Odysseus’s heroic glory and brings about key flaws in his characterization such as perplexedness after the crewmen kill the cattle of Helios, selfishness after Elpenor’s death, and maliciousness when he murders the suitors.
Odysseus is perplexed as to what to do after he has discovered his men have killed the cattle of Helios; Odysseus is unsure of the actions he should take because animals, …show more content…
The suitors, as they are attempting to attack Odysseus, are “blind to the fact that all their necks were in the noose, their doom sealed” (Homer 22.37-38). The suitors have angered Odysseus by ruining his home and now trying to kill him. Homer is telling the reader that Odysseus will not show any mercy to the suitors at this point in the epic- all of the suitors will be murdered. Odysseus has decided that he will not hold back while punishing the suitors. He has plotted this slaughter since his arrival in Ithaca and the time has finally come to kill the men. Odysseus is malicious in this book because he goes to extraordinary lengths, such as staying with the servants to plot his revenge and hiding the weapons, to harm the suitors when he just as easily could have forced them out or banished them from Ithaca.
The true evil in this scene is Odysseus’ warped sense of justice. Odysseus, as a hero, should have an infallible sense of judgment, but it is clear this is not the case because of the brutality he exhibits. Ironically, to reclaim his place as the leader of Ithaca and prove himself as a successful hero, Odysseus must overstep his role as a hero and become a villain in a sense for the reader to consider his journey a success. In a sense, Odysseus, “as he kills the leader of the suitors’ relatives, momentarily displaces his son as leader” (Bloom
Odysseus is perplexed as to what to do after he has discovered his men have killed the cattle of Helios; Odysseus is unsure of the actions he should take because animals, …show more content…
The suitors, as they are attempting to attack Odysseus, are “blind to the fact that all their necks were in the noose, their doom sealed” (Homer 22.37-38). The suitors have angered Odysseus by ruining his home and now trying to kill him. Homer is telling the reader that Odysseus will not show any mercy to the suitors at this point in the epic- all of the suitors will be murdered. Odysseus has decided that he will not hold back while punishing the suitors. He has plotted this slaughter since his arrival in Ithaca and the time has finally come to kill the men. Odysseus is malicious in this book because he goes to extraordinary lengths, such as staying with the servants to plot his revenge and hiding the weapons, to harm the suitors when he just as easily could have forced them out or banished them from Ithaca.
The true evil in this scene is Odysseus’ warped sense of justice. Odysseus, as a hero, should have an infallible sense of judgment, but it is clear this is not the case because of the brutality he exhibits. Ironically, to reclaim his place as the leader of Ithaca and prove himself as a successful hero, Odysseus must overstep his role as a hero and become a villain in a sense for the reader to consider his journey a success. In a sense, Odysseus, “as he kills the leader of the suitors’ relatives, momentarily displaces his son as leader” (Bloom