Trickery And Irony In Homer's Odyssey

Homer, was a great bard who travels from villages telling many villagers his famous epic. The Odyssey of Homer, Homer’s epic creates a theme around Dolos:Trickery. Trickery can be used to escape from life threatening situations. He uses irony, when Odysseus, is trying to escape the one-eyed cyclops Polyphemus by using “the trick of nobody”. He then foreshadows how Odysseus’s homecoming will be, using the sirens voices as a symbolic message. Finally, he develops the character our hero of this epic, Odysseus. Homer illustrates using character, symbolism and irony to reiterate that legerdemain or trickery isn’t always used for bad.

The Odyssey illustrates the necessity to use deception to get out of life threatening situations. Polyphemus, is eating Odysseus’s companions. Odysseus quickly devises a trick, to escape Polyphemus. This is called “The trick of Nobody”. Odysseus, tell the cyclops,“Nobody is my name. My father and mother call me Nobody as do all others who are my companions”(146). Odysseus then intoxicates and blind the cyclops. Polyphemus cries out “Nobody is killing me by force or treachery”(147). Odysseus escapes Polyphemus and continues on his way. He tricks Polyphemus into believing his name is nobody, which is ironic because when Odysseus finally arrives back to Ithaka

Throughout most of the book, Odysseus has been telling story after story. But every time he would tell it one minor detail would change. When he arrives to Ithaka he tells Eumaios “I announce that my origin is from Crete...I am a son of a rich man”(215). Odysseus lies throughout the whole story to protect himself and his family from the suitors that await him in Ithaka. However Odysseus seems to lie so effortlessly and without any hesitation. Which makes the reader question has Odysseus been telling the truth the whole time or has he just been lying his face off? Are we, able to trust him as a reliable