So, in thirteen through sixteen, there's a
kind of reunion that's happening about Odysseus to his native land but it's
happening in fits and starts. He's constantly lying, he's telling people
half truths and full lies. He's making connections with people but
not quite his own inner circle yet. Well that's, this changes in Book sixteen.
He does have an actual reunion that comes with someone in his, in his inner circle.
He gets reunited with his own son, Telemachus, in quite a moving scene.
The beginning of sixteen, as it starts, is quite, quite interesting stuff, isn't it?
There's a wonderful simile that starts this book off.
I thought we'd take a chance to, to take a look at this.
Homeric similes Homer uses similes to tremendous effect through the poems in
both the Iliad and the Odyssey. In they work slightly different in each
epic. In the Odyssey what we often get is a way
for the, the characters in the story to change places.
They get compared to things that seem like other characters should be being compared
to. And so, connections are drawn among the
characters inside the stories. Let's take a look at this example.
Telemachus comes home. And when he does, we hear Odysseus looking
at him and thinking about him. And then, the narrative seamlessly moves
in this direction. Straight to the prince he rushed, and
kissed his face, and kissed his shining eyes.
Both hands, as the tears rolled down his cheeks.
As a father brimming with love, welcomes home his darling only son in a warm
embrace, what pain he's borne for him and him alone.
Home now, in the tenth year from far abroad.
So, the loyal swineherd hugged the beaming prince.
He clung for dear life, covering with kisses, yes, like one escaped from death.
Now, what has Howard done in the simile? Well, we got into it quite subtly, it's a
little bit hard to tell at the very beginning.
Who's the one who's running straight to the prince and kissing him?
It seems like it could be Odysseus. Welcome, welcoming him like a father
welcomes someone home. He's been gone for a long time.
Well, look what's happened here. Homer has put Eumaeus in the place of
Odysseus. So, Eumaeus here, gets to be the father
figure that Homer is not quite ready to have Odysseus be.
Odysseus still needs to keep his distance, keep far away.
Telemachus gets to get reconciled with a kind of father figure here by the simile
but in this case, it's Eumaeus. So, Eumaeus gets a chance to play Odysseus
here. But then also, read a little bit further,
it's as long, in a subtle way, Telemachus gets a chance to be Odysseus, too.
Because when Eumaeus welcomes him home, he welcomes him home like someone who's been
gone for ten years from far abroad. Long away and being far abroad in, in, in
far away voyages. So, Telemachus, although he hasn't been
gone for twenty years he's been gone for ten.
It's in a way, he's compared to Odysseus' ten, at least the ten years of Odysseus'
absence where he, himself, is far away. So, each character gets a chance to kind
of step into the shoes of the other, and they show some really wonderful
connections between them. Now Eumaeus at that point, goes off on his
mission, and Odysseus, to bring messages to Penelope, and Odysseus is alone with
Telemachus. At that point, Athena leaves and notice
what she does when she leaves, she gives a kind of wink, she nod, gives a nod and
well, wrinkles her eyebrows over at Odysseus as if, hey now's the time.
This wink back and forth between them, secret sign, a secret conveyance of
information between Athena and Odysseus. Telemachus doesn't see her.
Telemachus is not in on it yet. Odysseus is involved in his own circle of
knowledge with Athena, Telemachus in a, in a different circle of knowledge that is
not overlapping. Soon enough, these two are going to
overlap. But for now they're in slightly different
worlds. At that point, Odysseus reveals himself to
Telemachus and the revelation of father to son is abrupt.
It's not gradual. Eumaeus is going to take a long time for
Odysseus to come back and get ready to get to know him, but with Telemachus, he jumps
right out and, and he's ready to show himself to Telemachus.
Telemachus is confused, doesn't realize, wait a minute it can't really be you.
And then they just break down and have a wonderful tender embrace.
Telemachus quickly mistakes Odysseus for a god, and just like Odysseus did when he
washed up on Scheria, he is quick to say no, no, no.
I'm not a god. No, no, no, I'm not a god.
When, when a, when a hero is identifying him or herself, what the hero does first
is to disclaim a divine aspect. That shows great deference to the
divinities. So, you got to say, no, no, no, I'm not
more than I am. I'm just a human being.
So, Odysseus does that just as he does on, on the island of Scheria.
After the long tender embrace and tears wetting the ground, Odysseus is ready for
business. Let's get down to business.
Tell me about the suitors. How many are there?
How are they armed? How, you know, unarm them and what's our
plan? He lays everything out and gets right down
to business. Now, in this communication that we've seen
between Odysseus and Athena, we've seen this kind of sly, careful way that they
come back and forth but we're only just now getting introduced to the real secret
communication, that's going to be happening in these closing books.
That's the one between Odysseus and Penelope.
Eumaeus is off and remember, the journey that he is off on, he is going to bring a
message from the stranger that's washed up on shore to Penelope.
Eumaeus will be shuttled back and forth bringing messages between the Penelope and
Odysseus at first. Soon enough, Odysseus is going have his
chance to make his own case, to make his own pitch to Penelope.
We'll see that the lying will continue. It's not about to just waltz right in,
and, say, hi honey, I'm home. That doesn't work so well, we've seen that
in Agamemnon's case and he's going to have to make his way though more subtly and
more slyly to Penelope. We're also going to need to keep an eye on
what Penelope knows. It's not a simple case of her not quite
knowing what's happening. There are some points in her narration, in
her story of how the events are, are coming that make us wonder about how much
Penelope knows and when she knows it. It seems like she's moving along this
course of events not just as a passive player but as a very active player.
She makes an entrance now in this next part of the epic.
Here's that there was some plot against her son, comes down and scolds the
suitors. And at that point, after she drops her
bombs, and, and lays down some nasty words against the suitors, she disappears and
goes upstairs, and goes to sleep. You'll notice that Penelope does a lot of
this in the coming book. She'll come down, make some statements, go
upstairs, I've got the vapors, I've got to go to sleep.
When she does this kind of disappearing act though watch out because oftentimes
something has gone on in the message that should just, that she's just laid down.
Someone's overheard something that she intended or, it's hard to tell.
And it's going to carefully, subtly move this back and forth.
That subtleness that Odysseus is conveying through his own techniques is going to be
met with a similar kind of. And even more an Even deeper kind of
subtleness, caution, and circumspectness in the figure of Penelope.