The Odyssey: Book 1
These unwanted guests have taken over Odysseus's home, eating his food and competing to marry Penelope.
Who are the suitors?
Zeus sends this messenger to Calypso's island with orders that Odysseus must be released.
Who is Hermes?
A recurring character, symbol, or situation that appears across stories, myths, religions, and cultures.
What is an archetype?
Homer is traditionally credited with these two great Greek epics.
What are The Iliad and The Odyssey?
Wife of Odysseus, mother of Telemachus, and woman whom the suitors are competing to marry.
Who is Penelope?
Athena disguises herself as this person when she visits Telemachus in Ithaca.
Who is Mentes?
Calypso offers Odysseus this extraordinary gift if he stays with her instead of returning home.
What is immortality?
What is the Quest?
Before they were written down, Homeric epics were performed aloud by these singer-poets.
Who are bards?
Son of Odysseus who begins Book 1 frustrated and largely powerless but starts asserting authority after receiving Athena's guidance.
Who is Telemachus?
Telemachus's "Call to Adventure" begins when Athena tells him he should undertake this mission.
What is sailing in search of news about his father?
When Calypso complains about the gods, she accuses the male gods of practicing this unfair social behavior.
What is hypocrisy/a double standard?
This situational archetype occurs when a young character gives up childhood innocence and becomes a responsible adult.
What is the Initiation?
"Grey-eyed Athena" is an example of this epic convention: a repeated descriptive phrase attached to a character.
What is an epithet?
Identify BOTH characters: One reluctantly obeys Zeus' command to release Odysseus, the other delivers that command but does not make the decision himself.
Who are Calypso and Hermes?
The gods discuss Odysseus's fate while one major Olympian is absent from their council. Who is missing AND why does his absence matter to our story?
Odysseus admits that Calypso surpasses Penelope in immortal beauty, but still desires to return home. What major value does this contrast reveal?
What is loyalty (to home)?
A peaceful island where an exhausted hero can recover before returning to danger would demonstrate this symbolic archetype.
What is Haven vs. Wilderness?
Rather than beginning with the Trojan War or Odysseus leaving Troy, The Odyssey begins while his journey is already underway. Name this epic convention.
What is in medias res?
This man took Agamemnon's wife while Agamemnon was away at Troy and later helped murder him when he returned home (only to be killed later by Orestes, Agamemnon's son).
Who is Aegisthus?
This is Telemachus's "Crossing of the Threshold" in Book 1.
What is standing up to the suitors and assuming authority in his household?
What is moira?
Your notes warn against assuming that every character fits neatly into only one archetype. Why?
What is because a character can embody multiple archetypes, including at different stages of a story?
Rhythm, repetition, formulaic diction, and recurring phrases weren't originally just artistic choices. Explain the practical reason they mattered to Homeric storytellers.
What is helping bards remember and orally perform extremely long stories while helping audiences follow them?
This character is neither god, warrior, king, nor suitor. His song, nevertheless, causes Penelope to break down in tears in Book 1 (Character's name, not title, required).
Who is Phemius?