Civilization Sequence 205
Odysseus: The Explorative Mind
September 15, 2014
Samira Khoury
[email protected]
AUB
2014-2015
Introduction:
Basic assumptions of working hypothesis
1.
*
“POETS are the interpreters of the GODS”.
**
“ART is the true interpreter. If we talk about art, we are trying to interpret the interpreter: yet,
even so, we profit greatly thereby.” (Goethe).
2.
The Odyssey is such a work of art: a symbol of human experience. Odysseus has become a paradigm (an
archetypical figure, a symbol) for the breakthrough of the explorative mind.
Translation (s) … Honestly / Deception ( ‫(امانة وخيانة‬
3.
I.CONTEXT/CONTENT: (pro-memoria)
1.
The TROJAN WAR (Homer’s Iliad)… Aphrodite = love
-
2.
3.
“The Famous DEEDS of MEN” (ody. VIII, 492)
The HOME-COMING (=NOSTOI) … Athena = Mind, intelligence.
-
“ The Achaians’ bitter home-coming” (I, 325-7)
-
Agamemnon. (I, 30-41, XI, 387ff, XXIV, 186-222).
-
Menelaos. (IV), Nestor (III)
-
Odysseus …
The WANDERINGS Menelaos. ODYSSEUS.
Travellers’ tales, seamen’s adventures: e.g.
4.
-
II.
The GODS (“ Mirror-effect”)
Man recognizes and represents himself in “his gods”: self-evaluation and self-elevation. The
Homeric gods are “divinized” human beings rather than ‘anthropomorphized’ gods.
“All men need the gods” (III, 48) … “Tell me muse”…
“Moral Values and Responsibility, e.g. recklessness (=hybris).
moderation, lawfulness, justice (=dike). What is given (=moira), lot of man=spare (‫نصيب‬/‫(حظ‬.
Transcendent / Transcendental…
(Remoteness / Nearness)…
“ODYSSEUS, son of Laertes, seed of Zeus”:
1.
2.
3.
4.
The Odyssean question: “Who are you? Where do you come from?”
His name: Odysseus=”the distasteful”, “child of wrath”, (XIX, 405FF),
given to him by Autolykos, “his mother’s noble father, who surpassed all men in thievery and
the art of oath” (XIX, 395). (His pre-Homeric name was Olysseus=Ulysses) = (Perhaps of
Phoenicians / Canaanite origin = ‫(عوليس‬.
His epithets: (=attributes, adjectives)
“man of many ways”, “many designs”, “resourceful”, “god-like”, “shinning”, “sacker of
cities”, “much-enduring”, “long-suffering”, “patient-hearted”,”blameless”, (etc.).
The three main aspects (distinguishing qualities) of Odysseus:
a) The fighting man: “I shall shoot at another mark, one that no other man yet has struck”
(XXII, 5-7).
b) The suffering man: “I shall endure” (V,222), “wretched beyond all the other” (V, 105)
because his share (=Moira) was bad: :dys-moros” (I,49).
c) The explorative mind: “I shall experience”, “using the mind to every advantage”. (IX,
174: XIII, 255).
The hero of the “wooden Horse” (VIII, 492ff).
“No one of the Achaians labored as much as Odysseus toiled and achieved” (IV, 106/7).
CONCLUSION: Author Odyssey?
Tiresias’ prophecy: “…after you have killed these suitors… then you must… go on a journey until you come
where there are men living who know nothing of the sea, and who eat food that is not mixed with salt…”,
(XI, 119 ff), which Odysseus tells Penelope on their first night together after twenty years. saying:
“… there is unmeasured labour left for the future. Both difficult and great, and all of it I must accomplish.”
(XXIII, 249-250).