The Odyssey Group

Question:

payah
payah
Student
High School - 9th Grade

Is Book 1 of "The Odyssey" mainly about Odysseus?

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Posted by payah on Tuesday March 17, 2009 at 6:57 PM and tagged with book 1, homer, literature, odysseus, the odyssey.

Answers:

  1. joe30pl
    joe30pl Teacher
    Community / Jr. College

    If by part you mean Book, then you are partially correct. Odyseus is mentioned, certainly (an allusion by the goddess Athena), but the main characters are the goddess and Odyseus's son, Telemachus.

    Telemachus is at home when Athena comes to him and gives him information about his father being alive. She doesn't say in so many words, Odyseus being still out of favor with several gods after the Fall of Troy and his persecution at the hands of Neptune:

    The rest, all those who had perdition ’scaped
    By war or on the Deep, dwelt now at home;
    Him only, of his country and his wife
    Alike desirous, in her hollow grots
    Calypso, Goddess beautiful, detained
    Wooing him to her arms. But when, at length,
    (Many a long year elapsed) the year arrived
    Of his return (by the decree of heav’n)
    To Ithaca, not even then had he,
    Although surrounded by his people, reach’d
    The period of his suff’rings and his toils.
    Yet all the Gods, with pity moved, beheld
    His woes, save Neptune; He alone with wrath
    Unceasing and implacable pursued
    Godlike Ulysses to his native shores.

    (Taken from William Cowper's translation)

    Book I focuses mainly on the homefront since the end of the Trojan War and Odyseus's attempts to come home.

    Sources:
    http://www.enotes.com/odyssey/overview

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    Posted by joe30pl on Tuesday March 17, 2009 at 7:18 PM