The Odyssey Homer

In The Odyssey by Homer, and the Epic of Gilgamesh the titular protagonists of their respective narratives, Odysseus and Gilgamesh face their own perilous journeys, by their own hands and at the caprice of the fickle gods. Odysseus is left to his...

Giants, monsters, and other mythical creatures are seemingly ubiquitous throughout Eastern and Western folklore. These figures are often depicted as man-eating diabolical entities, and it is up to the heroes to stop them. Although giants are...

The element of disguise is often associated with deception and suspense. This literary device is seemingly ubiquitous throughout Eastern and Western folklore, and is seen in Homer’s Odyssey and the Turkish epic The Book of Dede Korkut. Despite the...

Penelope of The Odyssey is a widely disputed and studied character. She is often understood as unique to Greek mythology in her rejection of the stereotypical femininity that is apparent in most other female characters, like Nausicaa of The...

Though pride can have a negative connotation and is often thought of as a synonym for being full of one’s self, it can also be an honest and healthy feeling of genuine satisfaction with one’s own achievements. In other instances, pride can also...

The Ancient Greek society that birthed the Odyssey, written around the eighth century BC by Homer, differed greatly from individualistic modern culture. Whereas today civilization can be defined in terms of technology, wealth, or healthcare,...

The Odyssey by Homer tells the story of the hero Odysseus’ decade long journey home. Throughout this journey the characters use lying to for a variety of reasons, and occasionally, they lie for no reason at all. The lies in The Odyssey do not have...

The portrayal of gender and hierarchical power in Homer’s epic poem, The Odyssey, is reimagined in The Penelopiad to adhere to the values of Atwood’s post-Modernist context. Texts reflect their context but a comparative study reveals the eternal....

J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Fellowship of the Ring, and Homer’s Odyssey are what many consider to be the greatest fantastical stories of their times. While the heroes differ in many ways, their circumstances bear multiple similarities. Both characters...

In Homer’s The Odyssey, tears are a reencountered motif that lends insight to the characters’ motives, true emotions, and defining qualities. The Odyssey splits tears into two categories-- restrained and unrestrained. The criteria for making the...

Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home has the polished surface appearance of a charming comic about a young girl’s coming of age and struggles with self-identity. Bechdel’s strong personal voice emanates from the text with a captivating candor that renders ...

Virgil’s Aeneid shares parallel with The Iliad and The Odyssey, however, while the plot shares similarities to both of these poems, Aeneas in Virgil’s epic is vastly different in character and in action to Odysseus in The Odyssey. While there are...

While Hector and Odysseus in Homer’s The Iliad and The Odyssey are seen as clear heroes, the Argonautica differs in its approach to Jason, as his relatively average abilities are matched by his typically anti-heroic habit of letting others do the...

A comparative study of Homer’s Odyssey and Margaret Atwood’s The Penelopiad reveals that texts are reflective of their context, whereby they reinforce the suited cultural values of its time, composer, and audience. Atwood reimagines the story of...

The agency women possess in The Odyssey and The Book of Genesis is harbored in their traditional domestic skills. These domestic skills, while underestimated by men in regards to the Greeks and Israelites, often play an essential role in the...

Although Plato does not specifically mention the Sirens in Homer’s The Odyssey, it is clear from his writing in Republic, Book X, that his negative perception of poetry would extend to these mythical creatures. Plato states that the “whole genre...

“Athena, [in pursuit of her] adventures as a woman, [tied to an immortal and moral world that is] dominated by a male ethos”, is used to highlight the importance of gender in an unforgiving society. As a woman, Athena is enslaved to her gender, in...

Gods and goddesses played significant roles within the literature in the everyday lives of the ancient Greeks. Homer's The Odyssey was certainly no different. Divine figures appear throughout the epic, interacting with characters on both physical...

In The Iliad and The Odyssey, there are numerous minor and major female characters who are depicted in varying forms in terms of femininity and ideality. Most of the female characters in both epics are depicted as feeble, delicate, manipulative,...