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Blame For The Death Of Odysseus In Homer's Odyssey

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In the novel The Odyssey by Homer, the great Odysseus retells the stories of his adventures after many years of travel and destruction, and through self-reflexive moments he is able to convey his regret over their deaths. Although Odysseus blames himself, he did not realize how he could blame himself for the loss of his men until he began retelling the story. One example in which Odysseus realizes it was his fault, is when he retells the death of his youngest crew mate and comrade, Elpenor. While Odysseus and his crew were enjoying themselves at Circe’s island and getting ready to leave, young Elepnor had wandered onto the roof and fell off, killing himself immediately. “There was one called Elpenor, the youngest of the party, not much of a …show more content…

Odysseus believes he is blame for the deaths of his crew, so he wants to honor his men in multiple ways. For example, telling the story to the king and to an audience. “In answer to the king… For the list of woes which the gods in heaven have sent me is a long one.I am Odysseus, Laertes’ son.”(Homer l. 1-19). By telling his story to an audience and the king, Odysseus was guaranteeing that his men would be honored by being remembered. By telling the story, other people would spread it along with his comrades’ names, and since Odysseus was so famous, the story would spread almost everybody. Not only did Odysseus make up for his mistakes by making sure his comrades’ names would be remembered, but he also described his crew with characteristics with positive connotations. “The other I gave to the noble Eurylochus.”(Homer l. 207). By calling Eurylochus “noble”, Odysseus would make certain to have Eurylochus remembered as the great comrade he was, not for his bad decisions. Odysseus also described a number of his crew mates’ with other positive characteristics. Therefore, Odysseus realizes he made many mistakes while leading his crew through self reflexive moments when retelling his story, but he attempted to redeem himself by helping his comrades t be remembered and for them to be remembered with positive

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