The Odyssey Essay
Everyone loves a great hero who can help save the day. Epic heroes have admiring qualities from which all of us can truly learn from. An example of this is in Homer’s novel, The Odyssey. The son of Laertes shows us some of these respectful attributes on his great journey back home to Ithaca. Odysseus has characteristics of a greek hero including cleverness, leadership, and obedience.
Odysseus proves that he can be clever in difficult situations. You have to wonder how he manages to get him and usually his crew out of sticky situations again and again. His intelligence plays a huge role in saving himself. An example is when he tells the cyclops “Nohbody, Nohbody’s tricked me, Nohbody’s ruined me! (Homer, The Odyssey 12, 443) This way, when the monster cries for help, his friends will only be confused and think everything is fine. Also when the leader and his crew sail pass the sirens, Odysseus knows if he sings the song he will be allured so he comes up with a plan. He tells his crew to “Tie me up, tight as a splint, erect along the mast, lashed to the mast, and if I shout and beg to be untied, take more turns of the …show more content…
Even though his amount of men continues to decrease, he still cares about them and wants to lose as few as possible. As he continues with his trip, he faces having to choose between a 6 headed monster and a deadly whirlpool. He knows that if he moves toward Scylla, the monster, will take at least 6 men. Yet if he continues on to Charybdis, he could lose every single one of his crew members. He intelligently chooses to “send them on towards Scylla” (12, 289) so he will face a smaller loss. Another time, he shows his leadership is when he “carries wax along the line and lays it thick in their ears” (12, 213-214 He enforces this so they will not be influenced by the siren song. Along with leadership, every leader still needs to prove they can follow directions and
Everyone loves a great hero who can help save the day. Epic heroes have admiring qualities from which all of us can truly learn from. An example of this is in Homer’s novel, The Odyssey. The son of Laertes shows us some of these respectful attributes on his great journey back home to Ithaca. Odysseus has characteristics of a greek hero including cleverness, leadership, and obedience.
Odysseus proves that he can be clever in difficult situations. You have to wonder how he manages to get him and usually his crew out of sticky situations again and again. His intelligence plays a huge role in saving himself. An example is when he tells the cyclops “Nohbody, Nohbody’s tricked me, Nohbody’s ruined me! (Homer, The Odyssey 12, 443) This way, when the monster cries for help, his friends will only be confused and think everything is fine. Also when the leader and his crew sail pass the sirens, Odysseus knows if he sings the song he will be allured so he comes up with a plan. He tells his crew to “Tie me up, tight as a splint, erect along the mast, lashed to the mast, and if I shout and beg to be untied, take more turns of the …show more content…
Even though his amount of men continues to decrease, he still cares about them and wants to lose as few as possible. As he continues with his trip, he faces having to choose between a 6 headed monster and a deadly whirlpool. He knows that if he moves toward Scylla, the monster, will take at least 6 men. Yet if he continues on to Charybdis, he could lose every single one of his crew members. He intelligently chooses to “send them on towards Scylla” (12, 289) so he will face a smaller loss. Another time, he shows his leadership is when he “carries wax along the line and lays it thick in their ears” (12, 213-214 He enforces this so they will not be influenced by the siren song. Along with leadership, every leader still needs to prove they can follow directions and