The very image of the central character reflected the ideas of what was due, of the human ideal, belonging to different eras. The hero of the epic is always the perfection of physical and moral qualities, but if in the Iliad the central characters differed primarily in physical strength and military talents, then Odysseus- the first hero of world literature, in which bodily perfection is combined with a high mind.
The roots of the image of Odysseus go back to ancient times. The mythological Odysseus is the great-grandson of the god Hermes, the patron of trade and thieves, from whom he inherited intelligence, dexterity, and practicality. His grandfather Autolycus is "the great perjurer and thief", his parents are Laertes and Anticlea. But the poem no longer emphasizes the divine origin of the hero, although, as is typical of the epic hero, he is a brave warrior, a master of hand-to-hand combat and archery. But in military prowess and physical strength, many surpass him. Odysseus has no equal in mind, cunning, initiative, patience, in the art of advice and words. In the Odyssey, for the first time, force is forced to give way to intellect. Mind itself is an ethically neutral quality. It manifests itself in Odysseus in a wide range: from selfish cunning to sublime wisdom. "Polyuminy" and a bright mind are the main virtues of Odysseus. Homer also draws his will, enterprise, his greedy curiosity, interest in new lands, life, love for the family, homeland, but the "divine" Odysseus is also endowed with human weaknesses: he is arrogant, boastful, subject to momentary fear, despair.
All researchers emphasize the amazing breadth of the image of Odysseus, his openness. Odysseus, with his rush into the unknown and at the same time the desire to go home, causing the envy of the gods, experiences the fullness of life. He is the most controversial and therefore the most modern of all the heroes of the ancient epic. T. G. Malchukova lists: "Odysseus is a king, a leader, a guest, a poor wanderer. He is peaceful, but in other circumstances he is cruel. He has an inventive mind, practical and contemplative, and dexterous hands capable of any work. He is a warrior, spearman, archer, the first and in hand-to-hand combat, the husband of the council, a well-spoken speaker and diplomat, a sailor, a helmsman, a merchant, sometimes a pirate, an athlete, a plowman, a reaper, a carpenter, a bricklayer, a saddler.
Such completeness of the disclosure of the image makes it a classic in the above sense. Odysseus embodies the ancient demand for balance, the rejection of extremes. This is a holistic image, presented in all life situations that can befall a man. Only Homer portrayed a man in all his fullness: Odysseus - a wise king, a loving husband and father, a brave warrior, an eloquent and inventive politician, a brave wanderer, a beloved goddess, a suffering exile, a legislator, a triumphant avenger, a favorite of Athena. Odysseus, according to the classic of literature of the twentieth century J. Joyce, is the most "rounded", complete image in the entire history of world literature, and Joyce creates his own, modern version of the Odyssey - this is Leopold Bloom, the hero of his novel "Ulysses".
It is important to emphasize that Homer's Odysseus is the blacksmith of his own happiness, and at the same time he saves society from arbitrariness and anarchy, restoring justice. Odysseus' successes grow out of his patience, which allows him to overcome serious troubles and obstacles on the way home.
The Canadian scientist N. Fry speaks about the wise balance in the Odyssey: “The Odyssey is the story of the adventures of a hero who safely escaped incredible dangers and returned at the last moment to regain his wife and punish the villains. But the moral satisfaction experienced by the reader is based on our complete acceptance of the picture of nature, society, law created by the author: the rightful owner returns to himself everything that belongs to him by right.
The universal, archetypal meaning of the image is revealed by the words of T.G. Malchukova: “The Odyssey is a myth that is created anew at any time, and Odysseus is a prototype, eternally repeating, like a Platonic idea, an archetype. Therefore, modern man is Odysseus dressed differently and named, and the life of a modern hero, or even one episode of it, is an allegory of the Odyssey. That is why this image has a completely unique place in the subsequent history of literature. Its history includes incarnations in the ancient tragedies of Aeschylus and Euripides, Cicero and Seneca, in the "Divine Comedy" (1307-1321) by Dante ("Hell", circle VIII), in "Troilus and Cressida" (1602) Shakespeare, in the unfinished play by I.V. Goethe on Odysseus and Nausicaa and in the works of many other authors. In the 20th century, images comparable to Homer's in significance were created in the novels of the Irishman J. Joyce "Ulysses" (1922) and the Greek N. Kazantzakis "Odyssey" (1938). Various episodes in the history of Odysseus have inspired artists and composers of all times, so it can be said that each cultural epoch offers its own interpretation of the image of Odysseus, more and more distant from the Homeric epic hero.
More for myself, so as not to look elsewhere, but maybe for you, I have collected what I consider interesting from what is currently available in literature and art about the historical Odyssey:
The meaning of the name Odysseus:
- the name "Odysseus" probably comes from the ancient Greek - "oδύσσομαι" ("to be angry", "angry") and thus means "He who is angry" or "He who hates".
- the etymology of the name word Οδυσσεύς (Odysseus) can also come from the root Ζεύς (Zeus), with which, according to the mythological tree, Odysseus has a direct family connection.
- in other languages, Odysseus is referred to as Ulysses, Julis, Ulisses, Ulixes, etc.
- at present, the name Odysseus also has a common sense. Odyssey today is called a long, fascinating journey.
Historical and mythological genealogy of Odysseus:
Odysseus is the son of Laertes and Anticlea,
was born in Alalkomenia, Boeotia.- Laertes- the father of Odysseus in turn - the son of Acrisius and Chalcomedus
- Acrisius- the son of the supreme god Zeus and Euryodie.
- Zeus- the grandfather of Odysseus, the main of the Olympian gods, the third son of the titan Kronos (time) and Rhea (current). Brother of Hades, Hestia, Demeter, Hera and Poseidon. Zeus is the god of the sky, thunder and lightning, in charge of the whole world. Zeus distributes good and evil on earth, determining the fate of people. Zeus foresees the future and announces the fate through dreams, as well as thunder and lightning, and other events of the spiritual and physical world. The whole social order was built by Zeus, he gave people laws, established the power of kings, also protects the family and home, monitors the observance of traditions and customs.
- Anticlea- the mother of Odysseus, the daughter of Autolycus - was a friend of Artemis - the Goddess of the hunt.
- Autolycus- grandfather of Odysseus on the mother's side,son of Hermes and Chione,became famous as the best of thieves, able to transform and change the appearance of objects. He was nicknamed as "the most cunning of the Hellenes" - probably Odysseus got cunning from this grandfather. Autolycus was also a famous wrestler and fist fighter. The famous hero and athlete Hercules was taught the art of wrestling by Autolycus.
- Hermes- the great-grandfather of Odysseus, the father of Autolycus, the god of trade, profit, intelligence, dexterity, trickery, deceit, theft and eloquence, giving wealth and income in trade, the god of wrestlers and athletes. Patron of heralds, ambassadors, shepherds and travelers; patron of magic and astrology. Messenger of the gods and guide of the souls of the dead to the underworld of Hades. He invented measures, numbers, the alphabet and taught people.
Odysseus was married to Penelope- cousin of Helen the Beautiful (Trojan). They had an eldest son Telemachus (Gr. Τηλέμᾰχος - i.e. beating, fighting at a distance) and
the younger Polyport, born after the return of Odysseus from his wanderings to Ithaca.Brief biography of Odysseus
The name Odysseus was given by his grandfather Autolycus. Coat of arms of Odysseus dolphin.
Odysseus became famous as a participant in the Trojan War, as one of the main immortal heroes of the Homeric poem "Iliad", and the protagonist of the poem "Odyssey".
Odysseus arrives in Sparta to participate in the matchmaking for Helen the Beautiful. Offers Elena's father, Tyndareus, to bind all suitors with an oath of help to Elena's future husband in order to avoid conflicts. During this visit, he meets Penelope and, having won the race for the hand of Penelope, marries her. In honor of this, he erects three temples in Sparta: Athens of Kelevtia, and a statue of Poseidon Hippias in Fenea (Arcadia). Then he returns to Ithaca.
After long requests from the Spartan King Agamemnon, Odysseus decided to take part in the campaign against Troy. On 12 ships, he led the Cefalenians there. He was the first person and strategist in the Greek camp, and thanks to his wise advice and participation, impregnable Troy was taken. He personally killed 17 Trojans, he commanded the Greek "landing force" hidden in the "Trojan" horse invented by him. During the war and subsequent unimaginable adventures upon returning home, Odysseus lost all the soldiers with whom he went to Troy.
After returning home with his son Telemachus, Odysseus arranges a bloody massacre, having exterminated several dozen people, Penelope's suitors. The outbreak of an uprising of the relatives of the suitors is suppressed by Odysseus, Telemachus and Laertes, but the parents of the dead suitors, prominent people, bring charges against Odysseus. The king of Epirus Neoptoles is chosen as the arbitrator. He delivers a verdict: Odysseus is expelled for 10 years from his kingdom, and Telemachus becomes the king of Ithaca.
Odysseus built in Arcadia, on Mount Borea, the temple of Athena Sotera and Poseidon.
Odysseus died peacefully in Epirus, where he was revered as a hero, endowed with the gift of posthumous divination. He was buried on Mount Perga near Cortona in Etruria.
The life and adventures of Odysseus are described in detail: by Homer in the Iliad, Odyssey and Telegonia, as well as by Virgil, Sophocles, Euripides, Apollodorus and Ovid, in many drawings on antique vases and frescoes.
Realizing that inin the biography of Odysseus in many ways there are mythical, i.e., fabulous moments, yet there is a very high degree of probability that a real and in many ways similar person, King, warrior-hero and traveler, actually lived in ancient times. This is practically confirmed not only by the huge number of references to Odysseus in the cultures of different peoples, but also by the practical discovery by Schliemann of the legendary city of Troy, described in numerous ancient sources. (for reference: Schliemann, without further ado, slyly searched for the legendary Troy in the ancient Greek texts of Homer ... and found it! And this is precisely what confirms that the stories and characters of the Iliad and the Odyssey are at least based on real events and characters from the past. Thus, if the city of Troy described in many ancient sources is a reality, then Odysseus is certainly a real historical character, much of whose character and life is reflected in the Iliad and Odyssey by Homer, where Odysseus, the King of Ithaca, is the main current character!
Odysseus as a historical, mythological and literary character:
- Odysseus was known as a clever and quirky speaker.
- Odysseus was distinguished not only by courage, but also by a cunning, dodgy mind (hence his nickname "cunning").
- Odysseus is one of the key characters of the Iliad, the protagonist of the poem "Odyssey" - two immortal works of the great ancient Greek poet Homer.
- Odysseus is a character in ancient Greek myths, parables and fairy tales.
- Odysseus is a character and image in fine arts, sculptures, etc.
Odysseus - the prototype of the search for the ideal man of the past (excerpts from Wikipedia)
The image and character of Odysseus is most fully revealed in the Homeric poems "Iliad" and "Odyssey". Although the poems are heroic, heroic features are not the main thing in the image of the protagonist. They recede into the background compared to such qualities as intelligence, cunning, ingenuity and prudence. The main feature of Odysseus is an irresistible desire to return home to his family.
Judging by both Homeric poems, Odysseus is a truly epic hero and at the same time what is called a "comprehensively developed personality" (πολύτροπον ἀνέρος): a brave warrior and an intelligent military leader, an experienced scout, the first athlete in fisticuffs and running, a brave sailor, skillful carpenter, hunter, merchant, diligent owner, storyteller. He is a loving son, husband and father, but he is also the lover of the insidiously beautiful nymphs Kirk and Calypso. The image of Odysseus is woven from contradictions, hyperbole and grotesque. It highlights the fluidity of human nature, its ability to metamorphose in the eternal search for new aspects of being. Odysseus is patronized by the wise and warlike Athena, and he himself sometimes resembles the sea god Proteus with his ability to easily change his appearance. During the ten years of his return home, he appears as a navigator, a robber, a shaman, summoning the souls of the dead (scenes in Hades), a victim of a shipwreck, a poor old man, etc.
It is felt that the hero at the same time, as it were, “splits”: he sincerely experiences the death of friends, suffering, longs to return home, but he also enjoys the game of life, easily and skillfully plays the roles offered to him by circumstances (a man named “Nobody” in the cave of Polyphemus , a resident of Crete, an inhabitant of the island of Syrah, etc.). Tragic and comic, lofty feelings (patriotism, reverence for the gods) and worldly prose are inextricably intertwined in his personality and fate. Other negative aspects of Odysseus' personality are also shown, such that every ordinary person has - he sometimes behaves not in the best way: he is greedy, saves himself the best piece at the feast, waits for gifts even from Polyphemus, shows cruelty to slaves, lies and dodges for the sake of some benefit. And yet the overall balance and sympathy is in favor of Odysseus - a sufferer, a patriot and a tireless traveler, a warrior, a sage, a discoverer of new spaces and new opportunities for man. Odysseus eventually realizes, repents and copes with his passions and always achieves his goal!
Odysseus is a creative, searching person, constantly in search, wandering. But, as in a labyrinth, in every wandering there is a risk of getting lost. If you manage to get out of the labyrinth, get to your hearth, then you become different. The wanderings of Odysseus are the path to the Center, to Ithaca, that is, the path to yourself. In each of us there is something from Odysseus, when we are looking for ourselves, we hope to reach the goal, and when we reach it, we again, with a new meaning, find our homeland, home, family and ourselves!
Odysseus is one of the famous heroes of the poems "Iliad" and "Odyssey" by Homer. Why is Odysseus famous? What feats did Odysseus perform?
Homer - the first ancient Greek poet, lived in the VIII century BC. His epic poems show the magnificent world of ancient Greek mythology and had a great influence on the development of European culture.
Common hero of both Homer's poems- Odysseus, king of Ithaca, participant in the Trojan War.
If in the Iliad he is one of the minor actors the siege of Troy, then in the "Odyssey" - the main character.
Biography of Odysseus
The name "Odysseus" in ancient Greek means "angry" or "wrathful". The Romans called him Ulysses.
Odysseus is the son of the Argonaut Laertes and the companion of Artemis Anticlea. According to legend, the grandfather of Odysseus was Zeus, the supreme Olympian god.
The wife of Odysseus is Penelope, her name has become a symbol of marital fidelity. For a long twenty years she waited for her husband from a military campaign, deceiving numerous suitors.
Fateful events in the life of Odysseus:
- participation in the matchmaking to Elena the Beautiful, where Odysseus meets his future wife Penelope;
- participation in the Trojan War;
- protection of the body of Achilles;
- creation of a Trojan horse;
- a ten-year journey by sea and numerous adventures in which Odysseus loses all his companions;
- return to Ithaca in the form of a beggar old man;
- the cruel extermination of the numerous suitors of Penelope;
- happy family reunion.
Characteristics of Odysseus
Homer created the image of a comprehensively developed person. Odysseus is not only a brave hero and winner on the battlefield, he performs feats among monsters and wizards.
He is cunning and reasonable, cruel, but devoted to his homeland, family and friends, inquisitive and cunning. Odysseus is a wonderful speaker and wise adviser, a brave sailor and a skilled carpenter and merchant. He refused eternal youth and love, offered by the nymph Calypso, who was in love with him, in order to return to his homeland, to his family.
Thanks to his cunning and resourcefulness, Odysseus overcame numerous dangers on the way home.
In fact, the voyage of Odysseus is the path to the unknown, the comprehension and development of the unknown, the road to oneself and the acquisition of one's own personality.
The legendary hero appears in Homer's poems as a representative of all mankind, discovering and knowing the world. The image of Odysseus embodied all the richness of human nature, its weaknesses and boundlessness.
Many writers and poets addressed the image of Odysseus: Sophocles, Ovid, Dante, Shakespeare, Lope de Vega, P. Corneille, L. Feuchtwanger, D. Joyce, T. Pratchett and others.
Today, an odyssey is a long, dangerous, adventure-filled journey.
The ODYSSEY is a Greek epic poem, along with the Iliad, attributed to Homer. Being completed later than the Iliad, O. adjoins an earlier epic, without constituting, however, a direct continuation of the Iliad. The theme of the Odyssey is the wanderings of the cunning Odysseus, king of Ithaca, who was returning from the Trojan campaign; in separate references there are episodes of the saga, the time of which was timed to coincide with the period between the action of the Iliad and the action of the Odyssey.
COMPOSITION "O". built on very archaic material. The plot of a husband returning unrecognized to his homeland after long wanderings and ending up at his wife's wedding is one of the most widespread folklore plots, as well as the plot of "a son going in search of his father." Almost all episodes of Odysseus' wanderings have numerous fairy-tale parallels. The very form of the story in the first person, used for the stories about the wanderings of Odysseus, is traditional in this genre and is known from the Egyptian literature of the beginning of the 2nd millennium.
Narrative technique in "O." in general close to the Iliad, but the younger epic is distinguished by greater art in combining diverse material. Separate episodes are less isolated and form integral groups. The composition of the Odyssey is more complex than the Iliad.
The plot of the Iliad is presented in a linear sequence, in the Odyssey this sequence is shifted: the narrative begins in the middle of the action, and the listener learns about the previous events only later, from the story of Odysseus himself about his wanderings, i.e. one of artistic means is a flashback.
The "song" theory, which explained the emergence of large poems by the mechanical "stitching" of individual "songs", was therefore rarely applied to "O."; Much more widespread among researchers is Kirchhoff's hypothesis that "O." is a reworking of several "small epics" ("Telemachia", "wanderings", "the return of Odysseus", etc.).
The disadvantage of this construction is that it breaks apart the plot of the “return of the husband”, the integrity of which is evidenced by parallel stories in the folklore of other peoples, which have a more primitive form than “O.”; theoretically a very plausible hypothesis of one or more "proto-dysseys", i.e. poems that contained the plot completely and formed the basis of the canonical "O.", encounters great difficulties when trying to restore the course of action of any "proto-dyssey" .
The poem opens, after the usual invocation of the Muse, brief description situations: all participants in the Trojan campaign, who escaped death, returned safely home, one Odysseus languishes in separation from his family, forcibly held by the nymph Calypso. Further details are put into the mouths of the gods discussing the issue of Odysseus at their council: Odysseus is on the distant island of Ogygia, and the seductress Calypso wants to keep him with her, hoping that he will forget about his native Ithaca, ... but, in vain, wanting to see at least smoke Rising from his native shores in the distance, he prays to the one death.
The gods do not give him help because Poseidon is angry with him, whose son, Cyclops Polyphemus, was once blinded by Odysseus. Athena, who patronizes Odysseus, offers to send the messenger of the gods Hermes to Calypso with the order to release Odysseus, and she herself goes to Ithaca, to Odysseus' son Telemachus. In Ithaca, at this time, suitors wooing Penelope feast daily in the house of Odysseus and squander his wealth. Athena encourages Telemachus to go to Nestor and Menelaus, who have returned from Troy, to find out about their father and prepare for revenge on the suitors (Book 1).
The second book gives a picture of the popular assembly of Ithaca. Telemachus brings a complaint against the suitors, but the people are powerless against the noble youth, who demand that Penelope choose someone else. Along the way, the image of the “reasonable” Penelope arises, with the help of tricks delaying consent to marriage. With the help of Athena, Telemachus equips the ship and secretly leaves Ithaca for Pylos to Nestor (Book 2). Nestor informs Telemachus about the return of the Achaeans from under Troy and about the death of Agamemnon. Having escaped, thanks to the miraculous intervention of the goddess Levkofei, from the storm raised by Poseidon, Odysseus swims ashore about. Scheria, where happy people live - feaks, navigators who have fabulous ships, fast, "like light wings or thoughts", who do not need a rudder and understand the thoughts of their sailors.
The meeting of Odysseus on the shore with Nausicaa, the daughter of the Phaeacian king Alminoy, who came to the sea to wash clothes and play ball with the servants, is the content of the 6th book, rich in idyllic moments. Alkina, with his wife Areta, receives the wanderer in a luxurious palace (book 7) and arranges games and a feast in his honor, where the blind singer Demodocus sings about the exploits of Odysseus and thereby brings tears to the eyes of the guest (book 8). The picture of the happy life of the feacs is very curious. There is reason to think that, according to the original meaning of the myth, the feacs are death shippers, carriers to the kingdom of the dead, but this mythological meaning has already been forgotten in the Odyssey, and death shippers have been replaced by a fabulous “gay-loving” people of sailors leading a peaceful and magnificent lifestyle, in which , along with the features of the life of the trading cities of Ionia in the 8th - 7th centuries, one can also see memories of the era of the power of Crete.
Finally, Odysseus reveals his name to the Phaeacians and tells of his ill-fated adventures on the road from Troy. The story of Odysseus occupies the 9th - 12th book of the poem and contains a number of folklore plots, often found in the tales of the New Age. The form of the story in the first person is also traditional for narratives about fabulous adventures navigators and is known to us from the Egyptian monuments of the II millennium BC. e. (the so-called "story of the shipwrecked").
The first adventure is still quite realistic: Odysseus and his companions rob the city of the Kikons (in Thrace), but then a storm carries his ships over the waves for many days, and he ends up in distant, wonderful countries. At first it is a country of peaceful lotophages, "devourers of the lotus", a wonderful sweet flower; having tasted it, a person forgets about his homeland and forever remains a lotus collector.
Then Odysseus finds himself in the land of the Cyclopes (Cyclops), one-eyed monsters, where the cannibal giant Polyphemus devours several of Odysseus' companions in his cave. Odysseus saves himself by drugging and blinding Polyphemus, and then exits the cave, along with other comrades, hanging under the belly of long-haired sheep. Odysseus avoids revenge from other Cyclopes, prudently calling himself "Nobody": the Cyclopes ask Polyphemus who offended him, but, having received the answer - "Nobody", they refuse to interfere; however, the blinding of Polyphemus becomes the source of numerous misadventures of Odysseus, since from now on he is pursued by the wrath of Posidon, the father of Polyphemus (book 9).
The folklore of navigators is characterized by a legend about the god of the winds Eol living on a floating island. Aeolus amiably handed Odysseus a fur with unfavorable winds tied in it, but not far from their native shores, Odysseus' companions untied the fur, and the storm again threw them into the sea. Then they again find themselves in the country of the cannibal giants, the Laestrigons, where "the paths of day and night converge" (obviously, distant rumors about the short nights of the northern summer reached the Greeks); the lestrigons destroyed all the ships of Odysseus, except for one, which then landed on the island of the sorceress Kirka (Circe).
Kirka, like a typical folklore witch, lives in a dark forest, in a house from which smoke rises above the forest; she turns Odysseus' companions into pigs, but Odysseus, with the help of a wonderful plant indicated to him by Hermes, overcomes the spell and enjoys Kirk's love for a year (book 10). Then, at the direction of Kirk, he goes to the realm of the dead in order to question the soul of the famous Theban soothsayer Tiresias.
In the context of the Odyssey, the need to visit the realm of the dead is completely unmotivated, but this element of the story contains, apparently, in naked form, the main mythological meaning of the entire plot about the husband’s “wanderings” and his return (death and resurrection; cf. p. 19). on Ithaca and the journey of Telemachus, and from the 5th book attention is concentrated almost exclusively around Odysseus: the motif of unrecognizability of the returning husband is used, as we have seen, in the same function as the absence of the hero in the Iliad, and meanwhile the listener does not lose Odysseus out of sight - and this also testifies to the improvement of the art of epic storytelling.
Odysseus (in the Roman tradition, Ulysses is the king of Ithaca, the protagonist of Homer's Odyssey and one of the minor characters in the Iliad), O.'s courage is combined with cunning and prudence. O. himself considers cunning to be the main feature of his character: “I am Odysseus, the son of Laertes, everywhere the invention of many / Glorious tricks and loud rumors ascended to heaven.” The father of Anticlea, mother O., - Autolycus, "the great perjurer and thief", was the son of Hermes, a god who was famous for dexterity and ingenuity. Thus, cunning is a hereditary trait of O. However, not only natural ingenuity, but also rich life experience helps O. in his many years of wandering. Thanks to his resourcefulness and ability to deceive the enemy, O. manages to cope with the terrible cannibal-cyclops Polyphemus, and then with the sorceress Circe, who, with the help of a miraculous potion, turns his companions into pigs. Homer constantly emphasizes that not only courage and physical strength, but wisdom often helps his hero. Among the many characters in the Odyssey and the Iliad, O. is the most striking figure. It is no coincidence that many writers and poets turned to this image in their work (Lopé de Vega, Calderon, I. Pindemonte, Ya. V. Knyaznin, L. Feuchtwanger, D. Joyce, etc.). Compared with other heroes (like Hector, Achilles, Agamemnon, Paris, etc.), whose characters are determined by any one feature, O. is a multifaceted figure. Courage, the lack of which cannot be reproached, is adjacent to reasonable practicality, the ability to turn the most unfavorable circumstances to one's advantage. O. is alien to the stubborn arrogance of those warrior heroes whose heroism lies entirely in action and who despise prudence and caution, identifying them with cowardice. O.'s weapon is not only a sword, but also a word, and with its help he often wins brilliant victories. The amazing adventures that O. happened to experience serve to Homer only as a kind of background in order to show how much his hero yearns for his native Ithaca. No forces are able to wrest from the soul of O. the memory of his homeland, and this is the greatness of his image.
Essay on literature on the topic: Characteristics of the image of Odysseus
Other writings:
- "Philoctetes". The question of the relationship between the interests of the individual and the interests of the state. Odysseus and Neptolem, the son of Allylus, are on about. Lemnos, in order to force Philoctetes, who owns the miraculous bow and arrows of Hercules, to go under Troy. Philoctetes was bitten poisonous snake and left by the allies on the island, Read More ......
- Nestor is a character in the Iliad and the Odyssey, the king of Pylos. In the poems, N. appears as an old man, wise over the years, whose main task is to help younger heroes with advice. He becomes an intermediary in the quarrel between Achilles and Agamemnon: already in the 1st song, he tries to prevent Read More ......
- Mephistopheles, one of the central characters of the tragedy, is very meaningful in terms of meaning. M., on the one hand, embodies that world of impure, “devilish” power, with which Faust enters into an agreement, hoping to quench his thirst for immense knowledge and pleasure. However, M. embodies Read More ......
- Gulliver Lemuel is an ordinary man, a surgeon and the father of a family, who suddenly changes his life dramatically; he goes on a sea voyage, first as a ship's doctor, and then "the captain of several ships." G. appears both as a character, a “traveler”, and as a narrator, whose presence Read More ......
- Holmes Sherlock (Mr. Holmes) is a character in a cycle of detective stories and stories, the prototype of which was Joseph Bell, a teacher at the Medical College in Edinburgh, who had extraordinary powers of observation and the ability to understand everyday situations using the deductive method, which surprised his students with one Read More .. ....
- Valjean Jean is a repentant convict. A poor man and an orphan, in 1796, still a teenager, he was arrested for petty theft and, thanks to the cruel judicial system of his time, spent nineteen years in hard labor. Released in 1815, he experiences a spiritual upheaval Read More ......
- Behemoth is one of Woland's henchmen, appearing in the form of a huge black cat. In the Bible, the hippopotamus is given as an example of the incomprehensibility of divine creation; at the same time, Behemoth is one of the traditional names for a demon, a minion of Satan. B. in Bulgakov's novel comically combines Read More ......
- Tarantiev Mikhey Andreevich - Oblomov's countryman. Where he came from and how he got into the confidence of Ilya Ilyich is unknown. T. appears on the very first pages of the novel - “a man of about forty, belonging to a large breed, tall, voluminous in the shoulders and Read More ......