Conversation in the “Odyssey” Author(s): Scott Richardson Source: College Literature, Vol. 34, No. 2, Reading Homer in the 21st Century (Spring, 2007), pp. 132-149 Published by: College Literature Stable URL: http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/stable\/25115424 . Accessed: 15\/09\/2014 13:02<\/p>\n
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\nConversation in the Odyssey<\/p>\n
Scott Richardson<\/p>\n
Scott Richardson is professor of<\/p>\n
classics at St. John’s University,<\/p>\n
Minnesota, where he teaches<\/p>\n
courses in comparative literature<\/p>\n
and classical languages and liter<\/p>\n
ature. He has published a book,<\/p>\n
The Homeric Narrator (1990)<\/p>\n
and articles on Homer.<\/p>\n
The epigrammatic saying that speech has<\/p>\n
been given to us for the purpose of con<\/p>\n
cealing our thoughts came into his<\/p>\n
mind. (Joseph Conrad, Under Western<\/p>\n
Eyes)<\/p>\n
hen it occurs to Nausicaa that she<\/p>\n
had better do laundry in preparation for her own wedding day, which will<\/p>\n
surely come soon, she delays her father’s<\/p>\n
workday with a request for the proper equip ment, explaining, with a fa?ade of ingenuity<\/p>\n
that might have fooled anyone else that she<\/p>\n
must look out for her family’s hygiene:<\/p>\n
“It is proper for you yourself to plan<\/p>\n
plans<\/p>\n
with the chiefs wearing clean clothes on<\/p>\n
your skin.<\/p>\n
But you have five sons in your house,<\/p>\n
two married, but three red-blooded<\/p>\n
bachelors;<\/p>\n
they always want to go to dances wearing<\/p>\n
w<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 133<\/p>\n
freshly cleaned clothes; I have to think about all these things.” (Odyssey 6.60-65)1<\/p>\n
Alcinous has no trouble decoding his daughter’s appeal and grants it without<\/p>\n
betraying his understanding of her true intention:<\/p>\n
Thus she spoke, for she was ashamed to name her youthful marriage<\/p>\n
to her dear father. And he understood everything and replied:<\/p>\n
“I do not begrudge you mules, child, nor<\/p>\n
anything else.<\/p>\n
Go! The slaves will prepare for you a wagon<\/p>\n
lofty and well-wheeled, fitted with a wagon cover.” (Odyssey 6.66-70)<\/p>\n
We have just heard a conversation in which the communication takes place beneath the surface of the words: what is spoken by both parties is not what<\/p>\n
is truly conveyed by Nausicaa nor meant by Alcinous. This indirect inter<\/p>\n
change is a paradigm of the distinctive mode of conversation in the Odyssey. I like to think of language as a medium for the clear disclosure of what<\/p>\n
people want to<\/p>\n
get across. In conversation, words transmit information,<\/p>\n
requests, and the thoughts of my interlocutor. It is a straightforward process:<\/p>\n
say what you mean, use language to convey what you are thinking, and then<\/p>\n
I will understand. But I can see the author of the Odyssey rolling his eyes in<\/p>\n
disgust at my banal literalness and naively unimaginative attitude toward lan<\/p>\n
guage. In this poet’s hands language tends toward obfuscation rather than<\/p>\n
illumination. His characters do not as a rule say what they mean, and con<\/p>\n
versation in his epic is something of a game at which some people are bet<\/p>\n
ter players than others. Playing the game properly requires a keen ability to<\/p>\n
use words to convey meaning indirectly and a sensitive awareness of what has<\/p>\n
been said despite what has been said. The first speaker in this Henry James<\/p>\n
dialogue does not stand a chance in the world of the Odyssey:<\/p>\n
“Why is it so necessary for you to go to the theatre tonight, if Miss Rooth<\/p>\n
doesn’t want you to?”<\/p>\n
“My dear child, she does. But that has nothing to do with it.”<\/p>\n
“Why then did she say that she doesn’t?”<\/p>\n
“Oh, because she meant just the contrary.”<\/p>\n
“Is she so false then?is she so vulgar?”<\/p>\n
“She speaks a<\/p>\n
special language; practically it isn’t false, because it renders her<\/p>\n
thought, and those who know her understand it.” (James 1948, 437)<\/p>\n
Likewise, conversation in the Odyssey is a cryptic puzzle, intelligible and<\/p>\n
rewarding to those who know how to solve it, baffling to those who take it<\/p>\n
at face value.<\/p>\n
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\n134 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
Homer’s attitude toward language extends to a generally suspicious view of the way the world works.2 Dialogue in the Odyssey is founded on<\/p>\n
indirection, and the characters’ success in life, even their survival, owes a<\/p>\n
great deal to both using and recognizing speech as a means of disguising<\/p>\n
thoughts and intent. This view of language as smoke and mirrors not only comments on the nature of human communication3 but also supports a<\/p>\n
worldview at the heart of the Odyssey as a whole, one characterized by dis<\/p>\n
trust and uncertainty.<\/p>\n
Apart from instructions, gestures of hospitality, laments, prayers, and<\/p>\n
requests (and even some of these are not only what they appear), the bulk of<\/p>\n
dialogue that is straightforward and honest comes from the mouths of char<\/p>\n
acters who prove in other ways artless: Zeus, Nestor, the servants, the suitors<\/p>\n
other than Eurymachus, Telemachus early on, and Alcinous most of the time.<\/p>\n
Zeus and Nestor, the divine and human voices of social and narrative order, stand above the game; the others either do not realize there even is such a<\/p>\n
game or have not yet learned to play it very well. The great majority of con<\/p>\n
versations in the Odyssey,4 however, feature one or more of these techniques: indirect address, implication, hidden or coded meaning, lying, feigned igno rance, injunction to secrecy, concealment of facts, expressions of disbelief,<\/p>\n
evasion, disguised sentiments, testing, indirect steering or goading, presenta tion of false reasons, or performances<\/p>\n
in character.<\/p>\n
Odysseus, of course, an eminently suspicious man, is the champion of all<\/p>\n
these kinds of indirection and concealment, the consummate manipulator of<\/p>\n
language to suit his advantage. It might be instructive, however, to return first<\/p>\n
to our apprentice conversationalist,<\/p>\n
who shows promise but has<\/p>\n
not yet<\/p>\n
reached the finesse that gives Odysseus his edge. Nausicaa has the proper<\/p>\n
Odyssean instinct when she manipulates her father into giving her mules and<\/p>\n
a wagon, but it seems to escape her notice that Alcinous has seen through her<\/p>\n
coded request. She also fails to acknowledge that she did not come up with<\/p>\n
the laundry idea on her own. Athena, who wants a warm reception for her<\/p>\n
hero, cold-bloodedly misleads her with the cock-and-bull expectation of an<\/p>\n
impending marriage (6.25-40), and the girl innocently takes Athena’s words<\/p>\n
at face value and pays for it in subsequent disappointment. Unaware of the<\/p>\n
divine machinations and relishing her apparent success at concealing her<\/p>\n
meaning and still getting her way, she goes on to ply her novice talent on the<\/p>\n
master deceiver by the stream. After Odysseus delivers a masterful speech in<\/p>\n
which his hints and flattery impart all the characteristics of a potential hus<\/p>\n
band without disclosing his identity or his true intentions toward her, Nausicaa offers herself to him with what she thinks to be a cleverly disguised<\/p>\n
proposition through indirection. She worries that if they are seen together,<\/p>\n
people will talk:<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 135<\/p>\n
“And then some worthless fellow would meet us and say,<\/p>\n
‘Who is this tall and handsome stranger walking with<\/p>\n
Nausicaa? Where did she find him? He’s going to be her husband.'”<\/p>\n
(Odyssey 6.275-77)<\/p>\n
A great part of the girl’s adolescent charm is her delight in participating in<\/p>\n
conversational indirection without recognizing its transparency in her hands<\/p>\n
and without realizing that others are engaged in the same gambit with her.<\/p>\n
Her obviousness highlights by contrast the techniques of the Odysseys sea<\/p>\n
soned conversationalists, and her natural impulse to speak obliquely suggests that an attitude toward language as a power to use judiciously and to one’s<\/p>\n
advantage is innate to the characters in the world of the Odyssey.<\/p>\n
Though some years her senior, Telemachus is only now beginning to<\/p>\n
fathom the game of language, which for him, as for his father, can mean sur<\/p>\n
vival. The ability to conceal, lie, and feign innocence with words is a hallmark<\/p>\n
ofTelemachus’s education in the Odyssey.5 By the end he is still rather imma<\/p>\n
ture in this respect but a far cry from the blunt-speaking youth we see at the<\/p>\n
beginning. After Athena’s visit rouses him from inaction, he asserts himself<\/p>\n
before the suitors in no uncertain terms, calling them insolent, claiming dominion over his father’s house, telling them that he will order them out at<\/p>\n
the assembly he himself will call the next day, calling on Zeus to destroy them, and claiming dominion over his father’s house (1.367-80, 389-98). A<\/p>\n
bit of Athena, goddess of deception, does cling to him, however, after she<\/p>\n
leaves: when asked about his mysterious visitor, Telemachus dissembles and<\/p>\n
gives Athena’s prepared legend, though he now realizes, as Homer tells us, that his guest was a deity (417-20). His virgin address to the assembly in<\/p>\n
Book 2 brings him back to the fumbling stage of the concealment game: he<\/p>\n
announces forthrightly his disgust with the suitors (50-58, 63-67), his wish<\/p>\n
that they would leave his household alone and even that they would be<\/p>\n
slaughtered (58-62, 68-79, 138-45), his intention to leave Ithaca in search of<\/p>\n
news of his father (212-17), and his plans thereafter (218-23)?no subtlety here, nothing but straightforward communication to his mortal enemies of<\/p>\n
his thought and intent.<\/p>\n
By the time he returns home, however, he has learned the value of telling less than he knows and saying something other than what he means. An ally of his new-found father, Telemachus can now tell bald-faced lies even to his<\/p>\n
mother, give no sign that the new beggar is anyone special, and play his role<\/p>\n
in Odysseus s subterfuge convincingly. He has learned the way of the world, and the survival of father and son depends on this particular education. He<\/p>\n
can give his father a knowing glance and remain silent when Eumaeus wor<\/p>\n
ries about the suitors’ violence (16.476-77). He holds his tongue when first<\/p>\n
an object is thrown at his father (17.489-91) and speaks cunningly at the sec<\/p>\n
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\n136 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
ond throw (18.406-09). Nevertheless, he is still a beginner. He cannot con<\/p>\n
trol his temper after the third assault but lashes out with a torrent of heart<\/p>\n
felt abuse first toward the culprit and then toward the suitors as a whole<\/p>\n
(20.304-19).6 A more telling sign of immaturity comes in the recognition scene between Odysseus and Penelope, when the boy reverts to his naive<\/p>\n
view of language and scolds his mother for not believing the simple truth<\/p>\n
that has been uttered clearly in plain Greek, that the man before her is her<\/p>\n
husband (23.97-103). Her reply shows her to be one of the elite:<\/p>\n
“If truly indeed<\/p>\n
this is Odysseus and he has come home, we two would<\/p>\n
certainly know each other best of all; for there are between us<\/p>\n
signs which we know, hidden from everyone else.” (Odyssey 23.107-10)<\/p>\n
Of course, the true addressee of this retort is not her son at all but the man<\/p>\n
she is about to test with the fiendishly clever bed trick, and the indirectness<\/p>\n
itself of this challenge testifies to her high level of play. Her son, however, still<\/p>\n
has a lot to learn about the game of communication.<\/p>\n
Penelope’s indirect address to the man claiming to be her husband by<\/p>\n
way of an apparently direct statement to her son and the implication in her<\/p>\n
bed trick that she has been a faithful wife represent the two most prevalent forms of indirect communication in the Odyssey.7 Addressing someone other<\/p>\n
than the one intended to listen is a tactic that arises early in life when, as<\/p>\n
small children, we tell visitors about ourselves by directing our words toward<\/p>\n
our parents. Even the suitors can<\/p>\n
manage that. Deliberate implication shows<\/p>\n
more skill and greater awareness of conversation as a game.<\/p>\n
Penelope’s entry in Book 1 marks the first instance of indirect address,<\/p>\n
which will become almost the norm in conversation with more than two<\/p>\n
people present. When she berates the bard Phemios for his song about mis<\/p>\n
adventure on the return from Troy (337-44), her real targets are the hateful<\/p>\n
suitors who relish the topic (sample nursing essay examples by the best nursing assignment writing service). Telemachus, possibly another indirect addressee,<\/p>\n
responds to his mother with a harsh reprimand (346-59) that is actually meant, though clumsy in execution, as an attempt to impress upon the suit<\/p>\n
ors that he is now an adult, a man among men. In Book 18, mother and son<\/p>\n
again indirectly confront the suitors in the guise of a conversation with each<\/p>\n
other (215-25, 227-42). At the assembly in Book 2 Telemachus and the suit<\/p>\n
ors insult each other by means of addresses to the Ithacan people (40-79,<\/p>\n
178-207). Speaking to one party while formally addressing another early on<\/p>\n
becomes a typical strategy of communication in this epic that scorns the<\/p>\n
direct approach. To convey information or sentiments by implication asks for coopera<\/p>\n
tion between interlocutors, so the one who pursues this method and expects<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 137<\/p>\n
to be met halfway by the other indicates a certain amount of respect for the<\/p>\n
other’s ability to participate. Gauging that ability is part of the game.<\/p>\n
Odysseus’s brilliantly controlled speech to Nausicaa (6.149-85) flatters her by<\/p>\n
treating her like an adult, since she is asked to read between the lines, and at<\/p>\n
the same time he makes sure that the adolescent gets very broad hints of his<\/p>\n
implications: that he has been a leader of men, that he finds her marriage<\/p>\n
able, that he is a great man brought low, that she has no reason to be afraid.<\/p>\n
Perhaps he is rather obvious in our eyes, but, since he has left it for her to<\/p>\n
pick up on the unstated, the inexperienced girl gratefully and eagerly falls for<\/p>\n
the stranger’s lure, especially his disingenuous suggestion of an imminent<\/p>\n
marriage. Her response implies a worldly awareness of suffering (187-90), and her indirect address to him via her friends about the Phaeacians’ close<\/p>\n
relationship to the gods implies that he will be treated well but he had bet<\/p>\n
ter behave himself (199-210). His refusal of help with a bath implies that he<\/p>\n
is no sexual threat (218-22). Her next indirect address awkwardly implies that he would be an ideal husband (239-46), a suggestion she elaborates<\/p>\n
soon with transparent indirection (273-90). This conversation has won<\/p>\n
Nausicaa over to the stranger’s cause more<\/p>\n
firmly than a<\/p>\n
straightforward<\/p>\n
exchange possibly could: the demands of implications have created a bond<\/p>\n
of mutual participation, an intimacy that Odysseus is careful, for his benefit, that she misunderstand.<\/p>\n
The conversations between Odysseus and the Phaeacians in Books 7 and<\/p>\n
8 involve a great amount of implication at a somewhat more subtle level than<\/p>\n
with Nausicaa. After Odysseus s direct supplication of Arete (7.146-52), we<\/p>\n
follow a series of implied questions concerning the visitor’s identity, back<\/p>\n
ground, and abilities; a veiled discussion of the relationship between the<\/p>\n
stranger and Nausicaa, culminating in an outright proposal by Alcinous that<\/p>\n
the man marry his daughter, which must then be smoothed over as a blun<\/p>\n
der; indirect self-characterizations by Odysseus without revealing his identi<\/p>\n
ty, suggesting the quantity and seriousness of his woes, his piety, his fame, his<\/p>\n
participation in the Trojan War, and, after the open offer of marriage, his lack<\/p>\n
of interest in wedding the girl; indirect insults and reconciliation; and implied<\/p>\n
plans for an escort home. At the end Alcinous finally comes right out and<\/p>\n
asks in a long speech for the stranger to tell his story (536-86), launching the<\/p>\n
Apologue of Books 9-12. Their badinage until this point has been largely conducted at the level of hints and inference with reasonable accuracy of<\/p>\n
mutual comprehension, typical of the conversations throughout the Odyssey. When characters can make themselves understood with suggestion or insin<\/p>\n
uation, they tend to avoid straightforward statements. Outright assertions or<\/p>\n
questions expose the speakers; indirect speaking keeps them more securely hidden and protected.<\/p>\n
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\n138 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
Early in his apprenticeship Telemachus finds himself the middleman, with ho apparent awareness of the subtext, in a married couple’s indirect<\/p>\n
conversation rich in implications that amount to hidden meanings. The<\/p>\n
uneasy reconciliation of Helen and Menelaus finds expression in an encod<\/p>\n
ed swapping of tales ostensibly meant to give their young visitor a picture of his father in Trojan War days, but their discourse is actually directed<\/p>\n
toward each other. Helen, claiming to be repentant now of her folly years<\/p>\n
before, tells of once rescuing the disguised Odysseus within the Trojan walls<\/p>\n
(4.240-64), an anecdote really meant for her husband, who is to understand<\/p>\n
that she was working for the Greek cause from the inside and deserves to<\/p>\n
be thought well of now. Menelaus responds in kind with a tale of her<\/p>\n
treachery at the very end of the war when Helen tried, by mimicry of their<\/p>\n
wives’ voices, to lure the warriors out of the Trojan Horse (271-89). Telemachus hears two fine stories about his father and gives no sign that he<\/p>\n
is following the exchange below the surface. The married couple, however, who speak each other’s language, are engaged in what must have been a<\/p>\n
common meta-conversation: “I was really<\/p>\n
on your side.” “No, you weren’t,<\/p>\n
you shameless liar.”<\/p>\n
The Spartan couple understands each other’s coded messages as Alcinous<\/p>\n
deciphers Nausicaa’s more simply encrypted request. We see other instances<\/p>\n
in which the words spoken mask a message understood only by the initiat<\/p>\n
ed. When Antinous calls on the suitors to obey Telemachus, he comes very close to making an open admission of their plot to kill the boy, but not quite: it is clear to those in the know, not to anyone else (20.271-74). Odysseus asks<\/p>\n
for a turn at the bow contest in a way that gives a clear signal of his<\/p>\n
mur<\/p>\n
derous intention to Telemachus and the herdsmen but goes right by the suit<\/p>\n
ors and Penelope (22.275-84). Once Odysseus has figured out that<\/p>\n
Penelope’s bed ruse (23.174-80) was her test of his identity, he can go fur<\/p>\n
ther and interpret her choice of this sign as a clear message, not stated open<\/p>\n
ly by either of them, that there is no one else who could have known their<\/p>\n
secret: the test itself was an encoded implication of her faithfulness. Such<\/p>\n
exchanges that exclude by-standers without access to the conversation below<\/p>\n
the surface reflect the nature of dialogue in the Odyssey generally: we cannot<\/p>\n
trust the face value of the words to convey what is in the speaker’s mind.<\/p>\n
In some instances of hidden meaning, however, we cannot be certain<\/p>\n
who understands what or even if there is a hidden meaning at all, and a good<\/p>\n
part of our narrative enjoyment comes from the ambiguity. The recognitions and self-disclosures of Odysseus have spurred some scholarly controversy.<\/p>\n
Many take Homer at his word that no one recognizes the hero until he says<\/p>\n
so, whereas others have presented various forms of the argument that<\/p>\n
Penelope and even Eumaeus have some awareness, ranging from<\/p>\n
a vague<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 139<\/p>\n
notion to absolute certainty, well before the formal self-declaration.8 The<\/p>\n
encounters between husband and wife in Books 18 and 19, no matter how<\/p>\n
one gauges their level of knowledge, are indeed characterized by speeches<\/p>\n
that, at least in one direction, convey information indirectly or can be inter<\/p>\n
preted by the listener as a coded message. The first “conversation” between husband and wife after a twenty-year<\/p>\n
separation can serve, at least in Odysseus s mind, as a model for successful<\/p>\n
indirect communication such as we saw, in a rather spiteful form, with<\/p>\n
Helen and Menelaus. Athena prompts Penelope to make her first appear ance to her husband without telling her the real reason for going downstairs<\/p>\n
(18.158-68).Typically, there is a discrepancy between Athena’s purpose and<\/p>\n
Penelope’s stated reason for this unaccustomed move: they have in common<\/p>\n
that the queen is to show herself before the suitors (though Penelope does<\/p>\n
not understand why), but Athena wants her to excite the admiration of her<\/p>\n
husband and son (161-62), whereas Penelope, who does not know that her<\/p>\n
husband is in the hall, says she will warn her son to beware of the suitors<\/p>\n
(166-68). In fact, she makes no such warning but rather scolds Telemachus<\/p>\n
for negligence as a host to the beleaguered stranger, a shortcoming he is in<\/p>\n
fact feigning to conceal Odysseus s identity (215-25). She goes on to address<\/p>\n
the suitors with a narrative whose truth-value is uncertain (except to<\/p>\n
Odysseus, and he tells us nothing) and then with an admonition that sug<\/p>\n
gests an intention whose sincerity is ambiguous even to the external audi<\/p>\n
ence.9 She says that her husband upon his departure instructed her to marry another if he had not returned from the war by the time of their son’s emer<\/p>\n
gence into adulthood (that is, now), virtually announcing her impending decision to choose from among them, hateful though such a marriage<\/p>\n
would be (257-73).10 She follows up this mixed message of enticement and<\/p>\n
repulsion with a plea for a proper courtship with gifts, the effectiveness of<\/p>\n
which perhaps owes something to its being put indirectly (an implied neg ative comparison to proper suitors of the past) rather than with a direct<\/p>\n
request (274-80). The suitors accept her words as both a true account of the past and a<\/p>\n
promise of her intention to marry soon. Odysseus, on the other hand, receives with joy what another might regard as a direful announcement from<\/p>\n
the wife he sees and hears now for the first time in twenty years:<\/p>\n
Thus she spoke, and much-suffering godlike Odysseus rejoiced,<\/p>\n
because she was wheedling gifts from them and was<\/p>\n
charming their hearts<\/p>\n
with soothing words, but her mind was intending other things. (Odyssey<\/p>\n
18.281-83)<\/p>\n
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\n140 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
We cannot be certain whether Odysseus is correct that his wife has other<\/p>\n
intentions nor why he could be confident in his interpretation nor even<\/p>\n
what he assumes those other intentions to be. In this situation he is in much<\/p>\n
the same position as the narrative audience trying to analyze the text of this<\/p>\n
ambiguous speech. He feels certain of his exegesis, but we cannot share his<\/p>\n
certainty. What we can tell is that, in the spirit of their famous like-minded<\/p>\n
ness, the hero of indirect communication is imputing some of his craft to his<\/p>\n
wife and assumes that her words mean something other than what they<\/p>\n
appear to mean.11 In his mind she is, as it were, directing her speech over the<\/p>\n
heads of the suitors toward the stranger in the back, who readily decodes her<\/p>\n
message as a clever subterfuge that works in his favor.<\/p>\n
We can agree that the fireside interview between beggar and queen in<\/p>\n
Book 19 is a treasure house of indirect communication even if we differ<\/p>\n
widely about which statements are meant to be taken, by us or by either of<\/p>\n
the interlocutors, at face value and which as encrypted messages. Her tale<\/p>\n
of the shroud trick and pressure to remarry (137-61), his false autobiogra<\/p>\n
phy (172-202), her test question (215-19), his detailed reply (221-48), her<\/p>\n
assertion of her husband’s death (257-60), his counter-assertion of his<\/p>\n
imminent return (268-307),12 the by-play about washing his feet and his<\/p>\n
resemblance to Odysseus (317-60), her self-interpreting dream (535-53), his confirmation of the obvious interpretation (555-58), her sudden and<\/p>\n
bizarre announcement of the bow contest to settle the marriage question<\/p>\n
(571-81), his approval of this contest and prediction of the winner (583<\/p>\n
87)?the entire conversation, which the maids in the room can safely hear<\/p>\n
with a literal ear, gives us the distinct sense that the real communication is<\/p>\n
carried on well below the surface of the words, though we cannot be sure<\/p>\n
exactly what is meant and what is picked up by whom. The only blatant<\/p>\n
statement in this interview is Penelope’s direct quote of the victorious<\/p>\n
eagle in the dream she claims to have had, who tells her in plain words<\/p>\n
what the dream signifies (546-53), an interpretation she quickly dismisses<\/p>\n
as a false prophecy (560-69). We would like to know what Odysseus and Penelope each understand<\/p>\n
to be going on during their conversation and to what extent they are<\/p>\n
attuned to each other’s mind, but we must resign ourselves to informed<\/p>\n
speculation and intuition. Our imperfect knowledge leads us to the recog nition that the characters of the Odyssey are not the only practitioners of<\/p>\n
indirect communication. I would attribute the notorious ambiguity of Book<\/p>\n
19 to the ethos of obfuscation in the epic and place our narrator among those who practice indirection with no compunction.13 Another author,<\/p>\n
Tolstoy for example, who regularly interprets signs the reader might not<\/p>\n
catch and conveys his characters’ actual thoughts, would be happy to clari<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 141<\/p>\n
fy the situation and leave us in no doubt that Penelope knows or does not<\/p>\n
know, that Odysseus knows she knows or does not know whether she<\/p>\n
knows and so on. Homer, however, is not always interested in the direct<\/p>\n
communication of the characters’ true knowledge or conjectures.14 Rather, he delights in giving us hints.<\/p>\n
The second half of the Odyssey is essentially a grand performance, with<\/p>\n
Odysseus as director as well as lead actor, guiding the rest of the cast in what<\/p>\n
they might or might not realize to be roles in his show. His false autobiogra<\/p>\n
phies form the most salient contribution to this atmosphere, 15 and they are<\/p>\n
joined by the techniques of indirection already discussed as well as close rel<\/p>\n
atives of lies that create a false presentation of reality designed to attain vic<\/p>\n
tory and reunion: feigned ignorance, concealment of facts, false reasons, eva<\/p>\n
sion, secrecy, disguised feelings, indirect direction of the plot, and words to<\/p>\n
preserve a false persona.<\/p>\n
We have seen such performances throughout the Odyssey, and not only<\/p>\n
by its hero. Athena sets the tone even before her impersonation of Mentes<\/p>\n
when she steers the Olympian conversation away from Zeus’s topic (sample nursing essay examples by the best nursing assignment writing service) to the<\/p>\n
family that matters to her and pretends to believe that her favorite is hated<\/p>\n
by Zeus, thereby getting the plot of the Odyssey under way. This goddess serves as the divine embodiment of the very set of attributes we have been<\/p>\n
talking about?trickery, lies, deception, communication by indirection. She<\/p>\n
then visits Telemachus in disguise and gives him advice in an underhanded<\/p>\n
fashion. She sends him off to Pylos and Sparta for, as she tells him and has<\/p>\n
already told Zeus, the purpose of learning about his father (93-95, 280-92), but she later confesses to his father that her true mission was to make a man<\/p>\n
out of him (13.421-24). She could tell the boy directly and fully all he wants<\/p>\n
to know about Odysseus, but the indirect nature of communication she helps to promote in this narrative serves her purpose here whereas a straightfor<\/p>\n
ward message would ruin the plan. The point is not for Telemachus to know<\/p>\n
the facts but rather for him to advance toward adulthood so that he will rise<\/p>\n
to the demands of his conspiratorial role on his return. Secrecy is vital to<\/p>\n
attain this end. The false reason for his journey and the concealment of the<\/p>\n
facts lead to the maturity and self-confidence she needs him to gain to be of<\/p>\n
practical help to his father upon their reunion.<\/p>\n
A similar and more important instance of divine misleading arises when<\/p>\n
Odysseus asks Circe permission to depart. She gives him the bad news that<\/p>\n
he must first enter the kingdom of Hades to consult the prophet Teiresias,<\/p>\n
for, she says,<\/p>\n
“He will tell you the road and measures of the path<\/p>\n
and how you will make the return on the fishy sea.” (Odyssey 10.539-40)<\/p>\n
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\n142 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
Teiresias does no such thing. He barely mentions the sea voyage and tells<\/p>\n
Odysseus nothing on that score that Circe does not already know. Later, the<\/p>\n
goddess herself gives detailed instructions for the journey (12.25-27, 37<\/p>\n
110).The trip to the underworld has been superfluous, a pointless agony, if<\/p>\n
we are to believe Circe, and some erudite readers have taken Circe at her<\/p>\n
word and have worked out explanations, defenses, and solutions as drastic as<\/p>\n
excising all of Book ll.16 But the underworld adventure does belong here.<\/p>\n
It is central to the development of Odysseus’s character and to the themes of<\/p>\n
identity, family, and mortality. It is telling that Odysseus himself does not<\/p>\n
think the journey superfluous at all. Unlike many scholars, he is not upset with Circe for sending him on a wild goose chase when she had the infor<\/p>\n
mation all along. Like Telemachus s voyage, this journey has had as its object<\/p>\n
something more profound than the specious reason given by the dispatching<\/p>\n
goddess. After two or three years of listless wandering and malingering with<\/p>\n
no particular sense of urgency, Odysseus has reached an ambivalence that<\/p>\n
must turn into determination if he is to make Ithaca the priority and the<\/p>\n
Trojan War an episode of the past. His conversations with Anticleia,<\/p>\n
Agamemnon, and Achilles about fathers, wives, and sons encourage him not<\/p>\n
to dwell on his previous persona and push him toward reaffirming his<\/p>\n
Ithacan identity as son, husband, and father.17 If we believe Circe’s actual<\/p>\n
words, we have missed the point. Odysseus, in this case, is a better reader than<\/p>\n
most of us. He knows the idiom. He knows how language can be used to<\/p>\n
conceal the true message. He can read between the lines.<\/p>\n
Hermes gives a splendid cameo performance in his scene with Calypso. When he comes to order Odysseus off the island, the goddess’s reception of<\/p>\n
her visitor (5.87-91) betrays the suspicion the perceptive characters properly maintain toward friendly overtures, and she is treated to what Hermes calls a<\/p>\n
truthful account of his mission, a sure sign of disingenuousness (97-115). He<\/p>\n
feigns reluctance to take on this duty, implying that she too must accede<\/p>\n
though reluctant, and pretends to know little about this person she has on<\/p>\n
the island or what he means to her; he implies that Athena has nothing to do<\/p>\n
with it, that fate is to blame. Calypso is no less talented an actress. When<\/p>\n
Hermes leaves, she approaches Odysseus with the new plan as though it were<\/p>\n
her idea, and she tries to steer him away from accepting the offer by falsely<\/p>\n
implying that she is eager for his departure but is not so sure about the gods’<\/p>\n
willingness; she feigns compassion and invents troubles ahead that Hermes<\/p>\n
said nothing of (160-70,182-91,203-13). Odysseus does not fall for her per<\/p>\n
formance, convincing though it might have been. Master actor that he is, the<\/p>\n
hero has learned to be as suspicious of others’ words as others should be of<\/p>\n
his. Only after a thorough examination will he decide which lines to believe<\/p>\n
and which to dismiss as false.<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 143<\/p>\n
He brings that attitude with him to Ithaca. It would be out of keeping with the ethos of the Odyssey for Odysseus to make a direct approach to<\/p>\n
regaining his position on Ithaca, practical problems aside. In fact, I suspect we<\/p>\n
generally overemphasize the practical in considering his behavior. Despite the urge to insist that Odysseus must keep his secret from Penelope and<\/p>\n
Eumaeus so that they do not blow his cover or so that he can test their loy<\/p>\n
alty, the essential reason Odysseus maintains the pretense before even his emi<\/p>\n
nently and obviously loyal wife and swineherd till the last possible moment is<\/p>\n
that in his world the straightforward must on principle be avoided.<\/p>\n
That practicality is not necessarily the main point can be seen in the fas<\/p>\n
cinating encounter with Laertes after the slaughter of the suitors. With noth<\/p>\n
ing to gain by it, Odysseus treats his father to a false tale that causes him<\/p>\n
needless grief.18 This apparently absurd behavior makes sense only by con<\/p>\n
sidering the nature of conversation in the Odyssey as a whole. Forthright<\/p>\n
speaking implies either naivete or trust. A winner, a survivor, in this world<\/p>\n
does not walk straight toward the destination but approaches it obliquely. The<\/p>\n
goal is to come out a winner, even if that means needless pain or prolonga tion of uncertainty along the way. Odysseus, the most successful player of this<\/p>\n
game, has great respect for the power of indirection, and he maintains this<\/p>\n
course until directness is absolutely necessary to go on. He keeps all his loved<\/p>\n
ones on a need-to-know basis, and he follows faithfully his strategy of keep<\/p>\n
ing everyone in the dark until the last possible moment in order for his plot to succeed.<\/p>\n
As a director who cannot afford to be seen as such, Odysseus enjoins<\/p>\n
secrecy on those who know his identity and must use indirect methods to<\/p>\n
steer the course of events and the thoughts and decisions of those unaware.<\/p>\n
For a while those in on the secret do not know who else is in that club.<\/p>\n
Telemachus, the first and, as far as he knows, the only one to join the plot,<\/p>\n
stays in character when, alone with Eurycleia, he asks about “the stranger” and speaks badly of Penelope’s treatment of him (20.129-33); she, also in<\/p>\n
character after threat of death if she slips (19.482-90), defends her mistress<\/p>\n
without letting on that the man is no stranger (135-43). Neither knows that<\/p>\n
they are both part of the same conspiracy until he fails to astound her after<\/p>\n
the battle with the revelation that she is summoned by his “father” (22.397). When Odysseus orders Eumaeus to have Eurycleia lock up the women<\/p>\n
before the battle, the swineherd, new to the deception game after his clum<\/p>\n
sy but successful delivery of the bow to his master, keeps the secret by telling the maid falsely that Telemachus gave the order (21.381-85), ignorant of her<\/p>\n
participation in the plot. From the outset, keeping facts and plans concealed<\/p>\n
from opponents and friends alike has been an important feature of Odyssean conversation: when the gods make their plans secretly in Poseidon’s absence<\/p>\n
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\n144 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
(1.19-95), Athena holds a secret conversation with Telemachus (1.123-318), Telemachus demands that Eurycleia stay mum about his departure (2.349<\/p>\n
76), and the suitors plot an ambush against Telemachus (4.632-72, 770-77). The concealment of Odysseus’s identity and plot on Ithaca through lies, mis<\/p>\n
leading speeches in character, suppression of true feelings, and evasions of<\/p>\n
direct answers is the grand, sustained culmination of a pattern that charac<\/p>\n
terizes conversation throughout.<\/p>\n
If Odysseus is going to control the plot from a position of secrecy, he will<\/p>\n
not have much opportunity to guide the other characters’ actions in a<\/p>\n
straightforward manner. Athena, as so often, shows at the beginning the tech<\/p>\n
nique her favorite will employ masterfully. Her opening speech is a model of<\/p>\n
indirect goading (1.45-62): she reaffirms Zeus s sentiments about Aegisthus, about whom she cares nothing at this point, pretends that Zeus is hard-heart<\/p>\n
ed toward Odysseus after describing his plight, and asks a suggestive question. Without coming out with an open request, she maneuvers Zeus into taking<\/p>\n
steps to get her hero back home. Her initial strategy, as Mentes, with<\/p>\n
Telemachus includes feigned surprise at the presence and outrageous behav<\/p>\n
ior of the suitors (1.224-29), a detailed account of the sorry condition of<\/p>\n
Laertes (188-93), the pointed question whether he is his father’s son (206<\/p>\n
12), a tale (possibly false) suggesting Odysseus’s vicious streak and vengeful nature (253-66), and an indirect comparison between Telemachus and<\/p>\n
Orestes (296-302). In this context of indirect goading, her explicit advice<\/p>\n
(269-85) sinks in readily.<\/p>\n
Odysseus reprises Athena’s role upon meeting his son in Eumaeus s hut.<\/p>\n
At first Odysseus stays quiet while the other two speak to him indirectly. Telemachus almost phrases his question of the stranger’s identity so as to<\/p>\n
address Odysseus but technically puts it to Eumaeus (16.57-59); after sum<\/p>\n
marizing the visitor’s false tale Eumaeus, though formally addressing<\/p>\n
Telemachus, informs the stranger that he is handing him over to the young man (61-67); Telemachus recaps his situation at home for the stranger by<\/p>\n
telling Eumaeus about his inability to offer proper hospitality (69-89).When<\/p>\n
Odysseus breaks into the conversation (91-111), he feigns ignorance of the<\/p>\n
boy’s plight with the suitors and goads him indirectly with his question,<\/p>\n
“Tell me, do you willingly subject yourself, or do the people<\/p>\n
throughout the land hate you, following the voice of a<\/p>\n
god,<\/p>\n
or do you put any blame on your brothers, whom a man<\/p>\n
trusts when they’re fighting if a great quarrel arises?” (Odyssey 16.95-98)<\/p>\n
He wishes he were young again and able to combat their outrage, since he<\/p>\n
would rather die than see it perpetrated in his house. At great length he, like<\/p>\n
Athena, offers his son an outsider’s view of the anomalous situation with the<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 145<\/p>\n
implication that there is no reason to put up with it. Telemachus s shame<\/p>\n
could not be more skillfully aroused by a direct assault, and he now stands<\/p>\n
ready to meet his father and join in his plot. Odysseus performs a similar ploy to get a rise out of Laertes (24.244-79), and he encourages Penelope at the<\/p>\n
interview to ask him further questions and excites her curiosity by pretend<\/p>\n
ing to be coy and unwilling to talk about himself (19.107-22). Odysseus’s manner of directing the scenes consists to a great extent in putting others in<\/p>\n
a state of mind or getting them to take an action without actually telling them what to think or do.<\/p>\n
When the point of one’s words is to manipulate the situation to suit one’s<\/p>\n
interests rather than to reveal and communicate, conversation is game and<\/p>\n
performance. The game of language in the Odyssey can be playful at times, but essentially the obfuscatory use of speech reflects a treacherous and pre carious world in which survival and happiness depend on assuming that<\/p>\n
appearance is deceiving and the straightforward is masking a reality that must<\/p>\n
be deciphered. Those who play the game well listen carefully to what is not<\/p>\n
stated outright and express what they mean by not saying what they mean.<\/p>\n
Notes<\/p>\n
1 All translations of the Odyssey are my own, meant to be literal rather than lit<\/p>\n
erary 2 AsWalcot (1977,14) observes, “No one can permit himself the luxury of trust<\/p>\n
ing anyone else in Homer’s world.” For an<\/p>\n
analysis of this world in terms of the spy<\/p>\n
novel, see Richardson (2006b). 3 Tannen (1986) bases her sociolinguistic analysis of conversation on the prem<\/p>\n
ise that indirect communication is the norm in human interaction. 4 The Odyssey is<\/p>\n
a very talk-oriented epic. According to my count, of the 12,110<\/p>\n
lines of the Odyssey, 8219 are in direct speech (67.9%). If we discount Books 9-12, almost entirely Odysseus’s first-person tales of his adventures, 5996 lines out of 9877<\/p>\n
are in direct speech (60.7%). 5 Todorov (1971, 70) suggests that speaking is the principal sign of the boy’s<\/p>\n
growing up: “Le passage de T?l?maque de l’adolescence ? la virilit? est marqu?<\/p>\n
presque uniquement par le fait qu’il commence ? parler.” I would add that to begin<\/p>\n
to speak is, for the<\/p>\n
son of Odysseus, to<\/p>\n
begin to conceal through speaking; to be an<\/p>\n
adult in his world is to know how to use language to undermine or to distract from the truth.<\/p>\n
6 De Jong (1994, 38-39) discusses these passages in the context of a study of<\/p>\n
unspoken thoughts. 7 In her commentary de Jong (2001) notes each instance of indirect address,<\/p>\n
which she calls “indirect dialogue” and defines in the glossary: “A talks to B about character C or about things which concern C (and which he intends C to hear)<\/p>\n
without addressing C” (xiv). I count 69 speeches in which a person not addressed is<\/p>\n
the principal intended recipient of the message and 86 speeches in which important<\/p>\n
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\n146 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
information (sometimes false) is not stated outright but must be inferred by someone<\/p>\n
listening carefully. Not included are instances of possibly encoded messages<\/p>\n
or state<\/p>\n
ments with a hidden meaning that an uninformed listener would not be able to infer.<\/p>\n
8 Since Harsh s controversial proposal (1950) of Penelope’s early recognition of<\/p>\n
her husband, many have weighed in on the question of how much Penelope knows<\/p>\n
or suspects before her overt recognition in book 23. See especially Whitman (1958,<\/p>\n
303-04), Amory (1963), Austin (1975, 200-38), Russo (1982), Emlyn-Jones (1984), Winkler (1990), and Katz (1991). Roisman (1990) argues for an early recognition of<\/p>\n
his master by Eumaeus.<\/p>\n
9 Various recent interpretations of Penelope’s motivation and speech and of<\/p>\n
Odysseus’s amused reaction can be found in Austin (1975, 208-10), Van Nortwick<\/p>\n
(1979), Emlyn-Jones (1984, 9-12), Byre (1988),Winkler (1990,146-47), Katz (1991,<\/p>\n
78-93), Russo (1992, 58-67), and de Jong (1994, 40-42). 10 De Jong (2001,467) observes that in the interview of Book 19 Penelope fails<\/p>\n
to mention to the beggar these instructions of Odysseus that she remarry when giv<\/p>\n
ing him an<\/p>\n
apparently thorough account of her predicament; “this suggests that the<\/p>\n
instructions were her invention.”<\/p>\n
11 De Jong (1994) brings out their like-mindedness in her analysis of the cou<\/p>\n
ple’s unspoken thoughts (47) and concludes, “Their capacity to control their emo<\/p>\n
tions, to remain silent, or to say something other than what they feel, marks Penelope<\/p>\n
and especially Odysseus as the typical heroes of the Odyssey, poem of disguise and<\/p>\n
dissimulation” (48). 12<\/p>\n
Odysseus introduces this He with the tell-tale avowal of truth: “for I will tell<\/p>\n
you truly and I will not conceal” (19.269). As Todorov (1971, 73) perceptively observes, “L’invocation de la v?rit? est un signe de mensonge.”<\/p>\n
13 For a discussion of the various ways in which this narrator proves to be a par<\/p>\n
ticipant in the game of indirection, see Richardson (2006a).<\/p>\n
14 Winkler (1990, 143) admonishes us not “to assume that Homer is an utterly<\/p>\n
transparent narrator, always telling us all that can be known. As the characters he<\/p>\n
describes are normally devious and cautious about their words, so we should not<\/p>\n
deny to Homer too the possibility that he will avail himself of<\/p>\n
a certain cunning in<\/p>\n
setting out the cross-purposes of his plot.”<\/p>\n
In speaking of the plurality and com<\/p>\n
plexity of narratives in the Odyssey, Slatkin (1996, 229) says “it is clear that it is not<\/p>\n
easy for an audience to get a straight story, to discriminate among stories, or even to<\/p>\n
know what a straight story is.” In preparation for an<\/p>\n
analysis of two narrative prob<\/p>\n
lems in the Odyssey, Scodel (1998,1) asserts “a common narrative technique: the<\/p>\n
nar<\/p>\n
rator seeks to generate both suspense and significance by misdirecting the audience<\/p>\n
about the role the gods are to<\/p>\n
play in the action.” Parry (1994), on the other hand,<\/p>\n
who sees the poet as “the most important recorder of the truthful past” (12), cham<\/p>\n
pions the view that Homer is to be trusted.<\/p>\n
15 The literature on lies and disguise in the Odyssey is extensive. Some of the<\/p>\n
more helpful discussions can be found in Stanford (1950),Trahman (1952),Todorov<\/p>\n
(1971), Heatherington (1976), Stewart (1976), Walcot (1977), Haft (1984), Emlyn<\/p>\n
Jones (1986),Murnaghan (1987), Roisman (1990), Bowie (1993), Pratt (1993), Parry<\/p>\n
(1994), Reece (1994), Richardson (1996), and King (1999). Lateiner (1995) shows<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 147<\/p>\n
how facial gestures, body language, and other nonverbal behavior can convey the<\/p>\n
truth behind concealing words or, when manipulated with talent, enhance the liar’s<\/p>\n
performance; on<\/p>\n
Odysseus’s exploitation of the nonverbal in his lies and disguises,<\/p>\n
see especially chapters 5 (83-92) and 9 (167-202). 16<\/p>\n
Page (1955) is typical of the analyst’s inclination to excise all or much of<\/p>\n
Book 11. 17 It is interesting that the conversations in the underworld<\/p>\n
scene seem them<\/p>\n
selves straightforward and honest, with no undercurrent of hidden messages or innu<\/p>\n
endo. The characters mean what they say. 18 See Scodel (1998) for a recent discussion of Odysseus’s motivation in lying<\/p>\n
to Laertes and an assessment of previous interpretations. Winkler (1990,134-36) dis<\/p>\n
cusses this scene in the context of the contemporary practice in Mediterranean vil<\/p>\n
lages to lie and conceal even to family members<\/p>\n
as a matter of course. See also Friedl<\/p>\n
(1962),Walcot (1977, 18-19), and Most (1989) on the Mediterranean penchant for<\/p>\n
lying on principle, which would account for the lie to Laertes (18-19).<\/p>\n
Works Cited<\/p>\n
Amory, Anne. 1963. “The Reunion of Odysseus and Penelope.” In Essays on the<\/p>\n
Odyssey, ed. C. H.Taylor. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.<\/p>\n
Austin, Norman. 1975. Archery at the Dark of the Moon: Poetic Problems in Homer’s<\/p>\n
Odyssey. Berkeley: University of California Press.<\/p>\n
Bowie, E. 1993. “Lies, Fiction and Slander in Early Greek Poetry.” In Lies and Fiction<\/p>\n
in the Ancient World, ed. Christopher Gill andT. P.Wiseman. Austin: University of<\/p>\n
Texas Press.<\/p>\n
Byre, Calvin S. 1988. “Penelope and the Suitors before Odysseus: Odyssey 18.158<\/p>\n
303.” American Journal of Philology 109:159-73.<\/p>\n
Conradjoseph. 2001. Under Western Eyes. 1911. Reprint. New York: Random House.<\/p>\n
De Jong, Irene J. F. 1994. “Between Words and Deeds: Hidden Thoughts in the<\/p>\n
Odyssey.” In Modern Critical Theory and Classical Literature, ed. Irene J. F. de Jong and J. P. Sullivan. Leiden.<\/p>\n
_. 2001. A Narratological Commentary on the Odyssey. Cambridge: Cambridge<\/p>\n
University Press.<\/p>\n
Emlyn-Jones, C. 1984. “The Reunion of Penelope and Odysseus.” Greece & Rome 31:<\/p>\n
1-18.<\/p>\n
-. 1986. “True and Lying Tales in the Odyssey!’ Greece & Rome 33:1-10.<\/p>\n
Friedl, Ernestine. 1962. Vasilika:A Village in Modern Greece. New York: Holt, Rinehart<\/p>\n
and Winston.<\/p>\n
Haft, Adele J. 1984. “Odysseus, Idomeneus and Meriones:The Cretan Lies of Odyssey 13-19.” Classical Journal 79: 289-306.<\/p>\n
Harsh, P. W. 1950. “Penelope and Odysseus in Odyssey XIX.” American Journal of<\/p>\n
Philology 71: 1-21.<\/p>\n
Heatherington, M. E. 1976. “Chaos, Order, and Cunning in the Odyssey?’ Studies in<\/p>\n
Philology 73: 225-38.<\/p>\n
James, Henry. 1948. The Tragic Muse. 1890. Reprint. London: Penguin.<\/p>\n
This content downloaded from 192.231.40.103 on Mon, 15 Sep 2014 13:02:17 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions<\/p>\n
http:\/\/www.jstor.org\/page\/info\/about\/policies\/terms.jsp
\n148 College Literature 34.2 [Spring 2007]<\/p>\n
Katz, Marilyn A. 1991. Penelope’s Renown: Meaning and Indeterminacy in the Odyssey.<\/p>\n
Princeton: Princeton University Press.<\/p>\n
King, Ben. 1999. “The Rhetoric of the Victim: Odysseus in the Swineherd’s Hut.”<\/p>\n
Classical Antiquity 18: 74-93.<\/p>\n
Lateiner, Donald. 1995. Sardonic Smile: Nonverbal Behavior in Homeric Epic. Ann Arbor:<\/p>\n
University of Michigan Press.<\/p>\n
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\nScott Richardson 149<\/p>\n
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\nArticle Contents
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\nIssue Table of Contents
\nCollege Literature, Vol. 34, No. 2, Reading Homer in the 21st Century (Spring, 2007), pp. i-viii, 1-304
\nFront Matter
\nAbstracts [pp. iv-viii]
\nPreface
\nHomer and the Oral Tradition
\n“Reading” Homer through Oral Tradition [pp. 1-28]
\nReading Homer in the 21st Century [pp. 29-54]
\nInterpreting Homer’s Texts
\n“Res Agens”: Towards an Ontology of the Homeric Self [pp. 56-84]
\nPoulydamas and Hektor [pp. 85-106]
\nHomer’s “Odyssey”, Books 19 and 23: Early Recognition; A Solution to the Enigmas of Ivory and Horns, and the Test of the Bed [pp. 107-131]
\nConversation in the “Odyssey” [pp. 132-149]
\nHomer and the Will of Zeus [pp. 150-173]
\nFeet, Fate, and Finitude: On Standing and Inertia in the “Iliad” [pp. 174-193]
\nMapping Utopia: Homer’s Politics and the Birth of the Polis [pp. 194-214]
\nHomer’s Influence on Contemporary Culture
\nThe Poet Who Sings through Us: Homer’s Influence in Contemporary Western Culture [pp. 216-228]
\nLearning Lessons from the Trojan War: Briseis and the Theme of Force [pp. 229-262]
\nRewriting the “Odyssey” in the Twenty-First Century: Mary Zimmerman’s “Odyssey” and Margaret Atwood’s “Penelopiad” [pp. 263-278]
\nReading “The Gunfighter” as Homeric Epic [pp. 279-300]
\nBooks Received, October 16, 2006 to January 15, 2007 [pp. 302-303]
\nBack Matter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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