Odyssey Questions

1. Linear vs. Non-linear plot

Background: Some stories are told from earliest event to the latest (linear plot) while others are told from a later event which then flashes back to earlier events.

Question: What are the advantages of each kind of plot?

2. The Tapestry part 1:

Background: Penelope says she will not marry a suitor until she finishes weaving a shroud for her father-in-law. She works on weaving it every day, and then each night, unweaves part of it so that it seems like she will never finish it.

Question: How does this action characterize Penelope?

3. The Tapestry Part 2:

Background: The suitors discover Penelope’s trick and demand that she immediately chooses one of them to marry. This is happening at the very beginning of the Odyssey.

Question: What is the importance of this timeline for the reader?

4. Point of view:

Background: Review all of the events on the blue sheet that happen before the flashback.

Question: Based on these events, do you believe that Homer is writing using first person, third person limited, or third person omniscient? How will this compare with his narration later in the story?

5. Lotus Eaters:

Background: Odysseus puts in at the land of the Lotus Eaters, which is a country with an addictive flower that makes people lose all desires or worries. He refused to eat the flower and bodily removes his men who have been affected by the plant.

Question: How does this event characterize Odysseus? What does it show about him?

6. Circe:

Background: Odysseus demands that the sorceress Circe change his men back from the pigs she has transformed them into. She then treats them so well, she and Odysseus begin an affair, and the men relax on her island for a year. In the 1990s movie version, Circe will only change the men back of Odysseus agrees to “get to know her better” and believes he has spent three days with her when she has tricked him into staying three years with her.

Question: Why do the movie makers change this major detail? How does it affect the modern day audience’s opinion of Odysseus?

7. The Sirens:

Background: Odysseus faces the threat of the sirens: bird-like women who with their beautiful voices, lure sailors to crash their ships on the rocks of their island. Sometimes tales in Mythology have their origins in real-world events. Some people speculate that the cyclopes story comes from the practice of ancient blacksmiths leaving only one eye uncovered so as not to be blinded by sparks in both eyes. Others think that the idea of cyclopes may have originated from people seeing a large central whole on elephant skulls and assuming they belonged to a one eyed monster.

Question: What “real-world” situation may have resulted in the explanation of sirens luring ships to crash against rocks?

8. The Cattle of the Sun-God:

Background: Odysseus tells his starving and ship wrecked crew that under no condition are they to eat the cattle of the sun or the gods will punish them. He leaves them alone, and when he returns, he finds that one of the men has persuaded them to eat the cattle.

Question: Write a brief speech that you imagine might be what the man said to persuade the others to eat the cattle of the sun-god.