An epic hero’s journey home
Homer
 Guess the answer to these facts!
True/False?
 He was born about 850 B.C.
 He was blind.
 He lived in the same place all of his life.
 He wrote down all of his poetry and
passed it on for others to read.
 There are theories that Homer was
actually a woman.
 Very little is known about the epic poet,
Homer (Homeros, in Greek)
 He was an Asiatic Greek, probably born in
Smyrna (an ancient city of Ionia, on the
western coast of Asia Minor) around 850
B.C.
 It is widely believed that he was blind and a
nomad, traveling from place to place.
 Homer did not present his poetry in written
form. He and others recited it from
memory.
 There is one theory that his poems were
actually created by a group of poets.
 There are also some who believe Homer was
actually a woman.
 Homer’s works were unique for their time
because they were actually recorded.
 Almost 3000 years ago, people who lived in
the area of the world now known as Greece
told stories of a great war.
 Homer gathered these stories together and
told them as one unified epic.
 His stories are called The Iliad and The
Odyssey. (In Greek, Ilias and Odysseia).
 These real battles would have taken place as
early as 1200 B.C.
 Homer’s first epic
 Tells the story of the ten year war fought on the
plains outside the city of Troy. The ruins of Troy
can still be seen in western Turkey.
 The Trojan War was fought between the people
of Troy and an alliance of Greek kings.
 The cause of the war was sexual jealousy: The
world’s most beautiful woman, Helen,
abandoned her husband, Menelaus, a Greek
king, and ran off with Paris, a prince of Troy.
 The story is set in the 10th and final year of
the Trojan War.
 The Greek kings banded together under the
leadership of Agamemnon, the brother of
Menelaus.
 They sailed 1000 ships across the Aegean Sea
and encircled the city of Troy.
 The Greeks eventually were victorious.
 They reduced Troy to ruins and butchered
the inhabitants, except for those they kept
as slaves and took back to Greece.
 The Greeks did lose their greatest warrior,
Achilles, in the last year of the war.
 When Agamemnon, the leader of the Greek
forces, came home from Troy, he was
murdered by his unfaithful wife!
 Odysseus is the Greek war hero who is
the subject of The Odyssey.
 He is known as much for his brain as
his brawn.
 In Homer’s day, heroes were thought of
as a special class of aristocrats,
somewhere between gods and human
beings.
 He is lost in a world of difficult choices.
 He was a great soldier in the war, but
his war record is not of interest to the
monsters he must face during his
journey home to Ithaca.
 Before the war, Odysseus was married
to the beautiful and faithful, Penelope.
They have one son, Telemachus.
 Telemachus was a toddler when Odysseus
was called to war by Agamemnon and
Menelaus against Troy. However, Odysseus
did not want to go to war, and he tried draftdodging. He was, however, finally forced to
go to war.
 Once in Troy, Odysseus performed
extremely well as a soldier and commander.
 Odysseus came up with a plan to get inside the walls of
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Troy since the war had been fought outside the walls for ten
years.
Odysseus’ plan was to build a massive wooden-horse and
hide a few Greek soldiers inside it.
After the horse was built, the Greeks pushed it up to the
gates of Troy and withdrew their armies so it looked like
they abandoned their camp.
The Trojans thought the Greeks had given up and the horse
was a peace offering, so they brought the horse into their
city.
That night, the Greeks hiding inside the horse came out
and let the whole Greek army into Troy to begin the battle
to win the war.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbiR6IMf5KQ
 Written sometime during the 7th or 8th century
B.C.
 Tells the story of the travels of the Greek hero,
Odysseus, as he makes his way home to Ithaca
after his army defeats the Trojans in the Trojan
War.
 The story begins with his son, Telemachus, who is
now 20 years old.
 There have been many rude, powerful men
swarming about his home pressuring his mother
to marry one of them.
 While this is happening, Odysseus is
stranded on an island trying to find a
way back to his family and home.
 It has been 10 years since Odysseus
sailed from Troy, and 20 years since he
left Ithaca to fight in Troy.
 While Telemachus is searching for his
father, Odysseus is searching for a way
out of his “mid-life crisis.”
 Odysseus makes his journey with the help of
his guardian goddess, Athena. During his 10
year journey, he must face:
 Violent storms, enslavement by a sea
nymph, witches, a Cyclops, blood-thirsty
Sirens, and the mysterious underworld.
 When he finally returns home, he must
rid his house of the suitors who have been
terrorizing his wife and son during his
absence.
 Ancient Greeks are always concerned about
the relationship between humans and gods.
The Gods controlled all things.
 Gods did not normally appear to mortals,
and when they did, it was to punish them.
 Ancient Greeks feared their Gods and felt
they had to be appeased and showered with
gifts even if the humans were not aware of
having done anything wrong.
 Zeus
 Apollo
 Hera
 Hephaestus
 Poseidon
 Hades
 Aphrodite
 Demeter
 Athena
 Dionysus
 Artemis
 Ares
 Hermes
 Persephone
 An extended narrative poem recounting
actions, travels, adventures, and heroic
episodes involving a hero who embodies the
values of his civilization.
 The Greeks, for centuries, used The Iliad
and The Odyssey to teach Greek virtues.
 The Odyssey is the model for the epic of the
long journey.
 A physically impressive hero/protagonist of
national or historical importance
 A vast setting involving much of the known
physical world and sometimes the land of
the dead
 Action such as a quest or journey taken in
search of something of value
 Evidence of supernatural forces at work
 Glorification of the hero at the end
 Rooted in a specific culture and society
 A request for help from a muse or other deity.
 The story beginning in medias res (in the middle
of things).
 The use of patronymics (calling a son by his
father’s name).
 Long, formal speeches by important characters.
 A journey to the underworld.
 The use of the number 3.
 Previous episodes in the story are later recounted.
1.
2.
Separation
The ordinary world
Call to adventure
Initiation
Refusal to the call (reluctant hero)
Mentor
Crossing the first threshold
Tests, allies and enemies
Approach the innermost cave
Supreme ordeal
Reward
3. Return
The road back
Resurrection
Return with the prize
 Matching characters/Gods/Goddesses to descriptions
 Part I: The Wanderings-events from the stories, i.e. The
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Cyclops, The Lotus Eaters, Calypso, The Sirens, Scylla and
Charybdis, The Witch Circe, The Cattle of the Sun God
Characteristics of an epic hero-Odysseus’ actions
Part II: Coming Home-events from the stories, i.e. The
Meeting of Father and Son, The Test of the Great Bow,
Death at the Palace, Odysseus and Penelope
Themes within The Odyssey
Greek values of hospitality, loyalty, deference for the Gods
Short Answer question-paragraph response: dramatic irony
in Part II, The Meeting of Father and Son