The last of Antikleia’s words to her longing son Odysseus encapsulate the entirety of his journey: “You must crave sunlight soon” (XI 238). There is something seemingly dangerous in remaining too long with death or with thoughts of the past. In Homer’s epic The Odyssey, the hero recounts his journey as a storyteller. Yet, until this point, Odysseus’s trials are not stories; they are painful sentiments that so intensely shape his present mentality and motivation. Deconstructing his encounters in Hades propels Odysseus forward to finally return home. There is an element found in the underworld of Hades that provides a successful means to return. Why? What depth is there in the caution of Antikleia? Perhaps if Odysseus remained in Hades longer than he did, he would lose his motivation and reason to return home. The darkness would overcome him without exposure to sunlight. If there is no sunlight in the underworld, then why would Odysseus descend to such a place? To unearth the compelling nature of Hades, we must meticulously analyze Odysseus’s conversations with key characters in the underground graveyard. While truth exists in the protagonist’s longing to return home to his wife, child, and estate, there is an apparent truism about the human condition found in these lines: so long as a thought of the past is not categorized as a memory, it can and will be longed for. It is through these crucial interactions in Hades that Odysseus is able to relinquish his hold on memories of old, and embrace the path that has been laid before him by the prophet: one in which he no longer gleams in the glory of war and heroism, but becomes “wearied out with rich, old age” (XI 144) as a simple father and husband in his homeland Ithaca.
In contrast to Helen and the lotus eaters who combat onset depression from sorrowful memories with suppression, Odysseus struggles to the blood of his flesh in order to not forget, but contextualize all that has happened in his life. In conversing with his mother, Odysseus explains that he was “driven to the land of death in want of prophecy from Tiresias’ shade.” Circe instructs Odysseus that this is the only way to discover the proper path home. Yet, Circe says nothing of encountering other shades. In fact, ostensibly, speaking with other shades is a hindrance for Odysseus’s return home. Therefore, there must be a positive nature to Odysseus’s interactions with shades of friends and family past.
Memories are deceiving. They can dominate life as aspirations for that which cannot be: it is impossible to recreate a person, relationship, or sentiment that once existed. For our protagonist, this longing was still omnipotent in his heart. Therefore, in the underworld, one specific memory drinks from the blood of the slaughtered animals to speak to Odysseus: Antikleia, our hero’s mother. The interaction between mother and son may be the most significant of the epic. As Odysseus is teetering on the fence between remaining a hero in embracing the glory that has been so donned on him and returning home to claim the identity of family man, his mother is the wave that rides him out of the sea and onto the land of his home. “But come now, tell me this, and tell me clearly,” says Odysseus. “What was the bane that pinned you down in Death? Some ravaging long illness, or mild arrows a-flying down one day from Artemis?” (XI 182-183). Antikleia’s response is shocking:
[Your father] lies now even so, with aching heart, and longs for your return, while age comes on him. So I, too, pined away, so doom befell me, not that keen-eyed huntress with her shafts had marked me down and shot to kill me; not that illness overtook me—no true illness wasting the body to undo the spirit; only my loneliness for you, Odysseus, for your kind heart and counsel, gentle Odysseus, took my own life away.
It is because of this potentially detrimental news that Antikleia is initially prevented from drinking of the black blood. Odysseus needed to first hear of Tiresias’s prophecy. It is possible that had he not, he would have elected to remain in the underworld and forgo his journey home. It is crucial for the hero to learn of his future—to know that he will arrive in Ithika and reclaim his home and its order.
- Elaboration of Tiresias’s prophecy and its significance in Odysseus’s future
- The second passage will be that of Tiresias’s prophecy
- After Antikleia informs Odysseus that he was the cause of her death, the ensuing moment encapsulates the transition of Odysseus being forced to move on.
- Third passage: In brief, he extends his arms to hug his mother, and catches nothing but air “impalpable as shadows are.” She wavered like a dream, and that is all she was. No longer a part of his life, he has to let her go. And the most fascinating part, I find, is he immediately moves forward to the proceeding shades after his mother’s words. The process of moving forward has already begun, and it will lead him home.
- Conclusion of sorts (very rough):
All his journeying could only have been done by someone of his stature. However, that is all in the past, and he is both mentally ready and it seems as though the gods are prepared for him to return home. It is only once he has recounted each story, aloud, in front of a room with a bard who can remember all that is said and tell it over for generation of the great hero that once was, that Odysseus can return home. The proof in the pudding is that when Odysseus recounts every detail of his trials to Penelope, no detail is given to the listeners of the epic. These are now memories. When Odysseus told the story over in Phaeacia, each event was still so present in his being because he remained at sea away from home. Odysseus needed to tie up lose ends in order to complete his odyssey. He had to understand how each person in his life died and, even more significant, how he would move forward (through the prophecy of Tiresias). His future is predicted deep into time, and he is told exactly what will happen and what he must do in order to lighten the load of his past and construct a new future on land, at home, with his family—as a seasoned, old man who just wants to be.
Your post seems to be a combination of a rough draft and outline, which was initially a little confusing. However, from what you have presented so far, it seems like you have drafted out your first main point about the mother-son relationship between Odysseus and his mother and how their interaction in Hades helps Odysseus move on and leave. Removing your initial point with Elpenor was a good decision because it made your argument more focused. You should reconsider the organization of your points because I think in the case of your essay, a more chronological arrangement would be more effective in communicating your argument. Overall, your foundation for your essay seems pretty concrete. I am sure that as you write and revise you will smooth out the edges.
Steven,
I think your draft is great. I remember lots of points from your last brainstorming post, specifically how you said the examples you intended to mention would be cases of Odysseus tying up loose ends on his way home. You explained that idea really well here, like here: “As Odysseus is teetering on the fence between remaining a hero in embracing the glory that has been so donned on him and returning home to claim the identity of family man, his mother is the wave that rides him out of the sea and onto the land of his home.” Being alive in the underworld and talking to the dead, and specifically to his deceased mother, is a perfectly clear intersection of epic hero and family man. Such an interesting analysis. I also love how you include the detail that Odysseus immediately moves forward in the underworld after connecting with his mother, which is a concrete and easy-to-visualize example of Odysseus moving forward, moving on, on his journey home, and leaving the past behind him. I also think your conclusion reads well so far and ties together your ideas nicely.
Really the only critique is along the lines if Fean’s comment. The ideas are a little bit scattered, but with some rearrangement it’ll be great. My favorite point is that memories are deceiving. It’s thought-provoking, and puts Odysseus’s journey in a different light. All he really wants is what he had before his time away, and that’s what he thinks he’ll end up with. However, exact recreation of that isn’t possible. Your conclusion is definitely coming along well, and I love how you included the deeper significance of the journey that Odysseus takes, beyond the purpose of getting home. He had to dot all of his “i’s” and get past what was holding him back; his need for mending and lack of a plan. Your essay seems like it’ll be wonderful!
Hi Steve,
This is a very rich, suggestive draft–there’s so much to work with here! In revising, I want you to work on organization and clarity. It seems to me that your thesis or claim is something like: “Odysseus’ relationship to his own memories changes in Hades; this change allows him to relinquish his heroic past and prepare for old age.” Your evidence for this hinges not only on his interactions with his mother and Tiresias, but also on how he tells his own story afterwards: first, in Phaeacia, making himself a kind of foregrounded hero, and second, to Penelope, relegating the “heroic” portion of his life to the past. (You are in fact making, here, the sophisticated point that Homer’s representational strategies reflect a change in Odysseus’ relation to his own past, his own story).
As a reader, I found your use of the word “memory” in the intro a little confusing (“so long as a thought of the past is not categorized as a memory, it can and will be longed for”–who or what is doing this categorizing? What is a thought of the past, if not a memory?) I think in fact your essay draws a distinction between two ways of thinking of the past: as heroic, and linked to an ongoing struggle in the present, and as another country–a different realm–whose rules and values differ from those demanded by the present. This is not the same as a distinction between memory/non-memory.
I’m excited to see the final paper. Do you think Odysseus’ conversations with Achilles, or Heracles, or Agamemnon are part of this change you are charting? (I think they might be…)