Qualities Of Odysseus As A Hero In Homer's Odyssey

What qualities do you consider in a hero? Most people think of bravery and determination. However, those are just a few of the qualities present in Odysseus. He is the hero in Homer’s well known epic, Odyssey. Odysseus helped defeat the Trojan army as a soldier in the Trojan War. Once the war was over, he and the whole Greek army went on a ten year journey to get back home to Ithaca. During the ten year journey, he faced many battles, fought off many monsters, dealt with numerous storms, and resisted beautiful goddesses—the likes of which Odysseus stayed with for a few of the ten years. To become a hero, he had to endure all of the challenges he was faced with to be able to return home. In Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseus proves to be an epic …show more content…
In this story, Odysseus has to deal with many forces that bring him trouble on his way back to Ithaca. He shows resilience against the armies he faces on islands and monsters that cause either conflict or destruction. In book 9, “Odysseus describes his encounter with the Cyclops named Polyphemus, Poseidon’s one-eyed monster son. Polyphemus may represent the brute forces that any hero must overcome before he can reach home.”(Beers and Odell 760). In this part, Odysseus meets Polyphemus who is not very friendly to him and his men. So Odysseus has to come up with a way to defeat him in order to escape. Therefore Odysseus must show resilience against the Cyclops in order to be considered a hero. Odysseus also explains that “Scarce had they drunk when [Circe] flew after them with her long stick—and shut them in a pigsty—bodies, voices, heads, and bristles, all swinish now, though minds were still unchanged.”(Beers and Odell 774). In this book, Odysseus and his men land on the island of Circe, where his men go into her cave. She gives them some wine with a vile punch to make them not want to leave and then put them in a pigsty where she turns them into swine. When Odysseus finds out what happened, he goes to try to save them by fighting Circe’s magic off with a special plant. Furthermore, Daniel B. Levine says that “The man of many turns makes his way home alive by escaping from the dangers that …show more content…
In this story, Odysseus succeeds at many of the battles he faces, but that does not mean he does not fail. He may fail or he may succeed, but he always perseveres through his challenges. Odysseus says “So with our brand we bored that great eye socket while blood ran out around the red-hot bar.”(Beers and Odell 765-766). When Odysseus is with the cyclops, he and his men are trapped in the Cyclops’s cave. Odysseus comes up with a plan to stab Polyphemus but he soon realizes that it would only cause more problems. So Odysseus becomes the hero who perseveres to come up with the plan to stab Polyphemus in the eye and blind him. Odysseus also said “I would not heed them in my glorying spirit, but let my anger flare and yelled: ‘Cyclops, if every mortal man inquire how you were put to shame and blinded, tell him Odysseus, raider of cities, took your eye: Laertes’ son, whose home’s on Ithaca!”(Beers and Odell 769). After Odysseus blinded Polyphemus, he comes up with a plan to escape without getting caught. Once he and his men escape, he and Polyphemus get into an argument of words. When Odysseus blinded Polyphemus, he told him that his name was Nohbody but during the argument he accidentally told the Cyclops that he was Odysseus which made Polyphemus tell Poseidon to give them a hard journey home. Even though Odysseus failed by telling his name he persevered in defeating the Cyclops. Additionally,