A Guide to the Odyssey: A Commentary on the English Translation of Robert Fitzgerald (22 page)

815–17
It is standard, not tasteless, to remind a god of the sacrifices given in his or her honor when making a request for aid.

818
and make the killers go astray:
Penélopê does not ask Athena to destroy the suitors, even if that were richly deserved, only to foil their attempt on Telémakhos’ life.

827
Antínoös’ caution is well founded but too late.

844–45
A brief but powerful simile. At times Penélopê may seem weak, but Homer shows her great strength by choosing a lion to figure her.

850
great Ikários’ other daughter:
Penélopê’s sister.

854
strap-slit:
Comparable to our modern “keyhole.” While the Homeric door had a bolt on the inside and a handle (I.497), there was no knob that could be turned to latch the door. Instead, to bolt the door from the outside one pulled on the “strap” or string referred to here, which ran through the slit from the outside and was connected to the bolt on the inside (I.498). To gain access from the outside, one used the equivalent of a key (although more like a hook), again through the slit.

867–69
My lord, my lion heart
…: Note that these lines repeat 775–77, as in the Greek [814–16 and 724–26]. There are many such instances in the Homeric poems; these “repetitions” have bothered critics since Hellenistic times, and some were no doubt additions well after the poem had been written down, but repetitions themselves were obviously not regarded as blemishes by Homer or his audience. The singing bard likely did not think in terms of repeating so-and-so many lines but rather, responding to a similar or identical situation, fit formulae from his repertory together with the result that the new lines were identical.

883ff
. Wise Penélopê even asleep does not miss a golden opportunity for divine wisdom and quickly asks news of Odysseus. Homer’s narrative economy, however, requires that she be kept in the dark, even though Meneláos, Telémakhos, and the audience know that he is alive. By presenting her request and the dream image’s refusal to respond, obviously obeying Athena’s command (or if that seems to grant the phantom too much autonomy, then having no specific instructions to speak on this and being nothing more than an embodiment of those instructions), Homer heightens the pathos of Penélopê’s situation; it is against the backdrop of her continued forced ignorance, the mortal condition par excellence, that Homer will, at the opening of the following book, present first the council of the gods at which Athena wins Odysseus’ release from Kalypso and then finally bring Odysseus himself “on stage” at last.

894–900
Penélopê awoke, in better heart
…: The actual closing of the book is not, however, dark. Penélopê, even if all her questions are not answered, awakes from the dream happy, for she is reassured that Telémakhos at least will be safe, her greater and more immediate concern. This same certainty renders the final lines almost humorous: the suitors sail and lie in wait for Telémakhos. The audience, however, from an almost Olympian perspective, knows they are engaged in a vain pursuit.

4ff
. A second “council of the gods.” This episode takes up the unfinished business of the corresponding scene in
Book I
, where Athena asked Zeus to send Hermês to order Kalypso to release Odysseus. Athena herself went off on her errand to Telémakhos before waiting to see that Zeus did what she asked (I.122; see also I.42ff., above). Since Homeric narration would present simultaneous actions sequentially as a matter of course, there is no inherent reason why the poet would need to reconvene the gods to have Hermês head off for Ogýgia. Hainsworth, following Page, observes sensibly:
“The Odyssey
proper calls for some sort of introduction, and an audience (or a poet… if we think of him as an oral composer) needs it after having been compelled to divert attention for so long to a sub-plot. The second council provides that introduction … and reminds the audience again that the destiny of everyone in the poem is guided by Olympus” (HWH I.252). There are a number of councils in
The Iliad
—of the gods at I.533 (a contentious session), VIII. 1, XXIV.31, and of military
commanders (II.53, IX.89), not to mention other meetings and assemblies. The scene here conforms to an ancient pattern of divine council where a goddess initiates a complaint, supplicating the other gods or the chief god. For example, Ishtar takes her complaints against Gilgamesh before her father, Anu (Tablet VI; see
The Epic of Gilgamesh
, Maureen Gallery Kovacs, trans. [Stanford, 1985], pp. 53–54). Likewise, in the Ugaritic
Epic of Aqhat
, the goddess Anat, angered by the hero’s refusal to yield her his bow, complains to El (see Cyrus H. Gordon,
Ugarit
and Minoan Crete
[New York, 1966], pp. 120–39, esp. 128).

4
master of heaven:
For Zeus’ own assertion that “his power is greatest,” see
Iliad
VIII. 17–27. (See also I.44, above.)

9–14
O Father Zeus
…: The opening of Athena’s speech is striking, no less because it happens to repeat Mentor’s upbraiding of the suitors (at II.241–45). (The Greek is an exact repetition [II.230–34 and IV.8–12]). In its present context it suggests a link between the justice of kings and the justice of Zeus. Athena seems to imply that if Zeus wishes kings to act with justice, he should act justly and restore a just king to power. See also Penélopê’s outburst (IV. 740ff.), contrasting Odysseus’ fairness with all-too-common abuse of power. (The abnormally high degree of repetitions of verses or half verses from elsewhere in the poem concentrated in lines 9–22 has aroused critics’ suspicions that this is late patchwork, but that is another matter; see I.42 and V.4ff., above.)

16
the nymph:
Nymphs are secondary goddesses, fully divine but lesser than and subject to the Olympians. Both Kalypso and Kirkê are called nymphs. Homer has Athena name Kalypso here [14]: for Greeks, her name resonates with the common verb “to hide,” “to conceal” [
kaluptô
]. Kalypso has, as it were, kept Odysseus in hiding these seven years.

17–19
Note that Homer tells us that Odysseus has lost his ships and his companions before we find out what disasters befell him.

26–27
As in lines 17–19, there is no question whether or not Odysseus will return home and avenge himself on the suitors.
Suspense in such a matter would have been impossible, for even Homer’s first audience would have been familiar with the broad outlines of Odysseus’ homecoming, his
nostos
. It was a pleasure for them to hear the familiar story again, and their interest would have been in the particular way Homer organized the scenes. The skill he exhibited at every level—the nuances of his plot, description, and characterization, his language and musical performance—would have been the basis of their pleasure.

31ff
. Dispatching Hermês, Zeus follows the suggestion Athena made at I.108–12 [and, apart from the adjustment of one verb form, lines 30–31, reproduce I.86–87].

31
favorite son:
There is no basis for Hermês being called Zeus’ “favorite.” This is an overtranslation of the Greek
huion philon
[28], which means “dear son” at most, but probably no more than “his son.” For Greeks it went without saying that Hermês was
philos
precisely because he was a member of Zeus’ family.

44
his share of plunder:
It was standard and expected that the victors of a war would take away the goods of the vanquished; moreover, the leaders were responsible for properly apportioning shares of the booty according to the soldiers’ status and contributions to the war effort. It may be noteworthy that Odysseus’ riches are in the end not booty but indirect gifts from the gods, and they differ further from, say, Agamémnon’s portion in not including human chattel. We should probably be wary of concluding that this should be seen as a criticism of booty taking. Odysseus, again in marked contrast to Agamémnon, was already noted as fastidious in not taking captives for personal sexual use.

50
ambrosial:
This can refer to anything of the gods, which is by definition “immortal”—the meaning of the word “ambrosial.” The consumable ambrosia is just one among many ambrosial items.

64ff
.
Fitzgerald
’s rich and more than usually “poetic” diction here gives an inkling of Homer’s lush and enchanting sounds. The entire scene-setting description was clearly an opportunity for the
bard to show what he could do. As one small instance of Homer’s precision and attention to detail, note that he describes the cedar as “easily split” [
eukeatoio
, 60], applying a word that appears only once in the entire
Odyssey
or
Iliad
[so-called
hapax legomenon]. 79–81
So enchanting is the place that even the immortal gods delight in gazing upon it. Note how Homer uses this sentiment to conclude the set piece and to turn our attention back to Hermês so that both we and the poet can go on to the next segment.

83
recognized him:
The Greek has the more interesting “did not not know him” [77–78], a type of double negative likely then and ever after a feature of epic and all ornate diction. (For two of the many examples throughout the poem, see “found out” at 133, below—in the Greek, Zeus “was not unknowing” [127–28]—and “tear on tear brimming his eyes” at 158–59, below—“not then were his eyes dry of tears” [151–52].)

92ff
. There is a playfulness, even an archness about Kalypso’s opening formalities: “why have you come, honored and dear to me as you are?” Homer has her say [87–88]. Her tone is not quite matched by Hermês’ more heavy-handed attempts to be diplomatic in an awkward situation. But then, she has so much more to lose, as she knows from the very beginning of the interview.

103–4
Hermês implies that as a goddess she ought to know (“in courtesy” could be rendered “for you ask” [98]).

108
where gods have beef and honors from mankind:
For the Greeks, it was in no way out of character for Hermês or any of the gods to express the interest they took in offerings made to them. Both their insisting on being honored and the almost sensual pleasure they took from it made them more divine, not less.

114
For more on this “wrong,” see the crime of Lokrian Aias (IV.533, above).

117
and current washed him here:
Hermês may be implying
something like “the actions of the gods brought him here, the gods can take him away.”

120–21
His destiny
…: The power of Hermês’ final words and the ineluctability of the command are greater in Greek as his last two lines [114–15] repeat the final two lines of Zeus’ instructions to him [41–42] with only minor adjustments at the beginning of the first; a good example of the value of repetition.

124–35
The gods are often outraged by and jealous of each other’s prerogatives. Here Kalypso casts her anger directly at the male gods, whom she accuses of upholding the perennial “double standard”: women are prohibited from doing what is permitted men, in this case, to have mortal lovers. The double standard existed in Greek society and was fiercely upheld in public, particularly later, during the Classical period in Athens, at least among the citizen elite. Being immortal, errant goddesses are not themselves punished; it is their mortal lovers who are attacked, and Kalypso gives several instances. It is interesting to note that the actual topic Kalypso believes is the cause of the gods’ jealousy is never discussed in the councils to which Homer makes us party, and, moreover, that it is Athena who presses to have Kalypso release Odysseus. Whatever the divine battle of the sexes, though, Athena has an odd place and is traditionally masculinized or at least defeminized: she is a battle goddess; she is fiercely virginal, thus not participating in the role of either consort of a male or mother; and, most significant, as the child of a father only, she has no female forebear (compare with
tritogeneia
, in III.411, above). For a much later and more famous instance of her “taking the male side,” see Aeschylus’
Eumenides
, where, in the judicial battle between the Erinyes (representing the ghost of Klytaimnéstra against her murderous son, Orestês) and Orestês (representing his father, Agamémnon, against his murderous wife), Athena’s deciding vote acquits Orestês. (Kalypso does note, without comment, Artemis’ role in destroying Orion, Dawn’s male lover.)
“Sexual politics” was a hot topic in ancient Greece, if not precisely in modern terms. It is significant that Homer has Kalypso make the charge; equally significant, and perhaps typically, he has Hermês ignore it completely in his response.

125
when we choose to lie with men
…: Fitzgerald has left out one important qualifier in Homer: “to lie
openly” [amphadiên
, in emphatic position as the first word of 120]. Kalypso’s seven-year liaison with Odysseus is certainly quite public, at least among the gods. This is not a tryst or discreet affair but a case in which an immortal takes a mortal “consort” [
akoitên
, 120]. An important detail, at least in Kalypso’s view, but not one on which to build a coherent picture of Olympian morality.