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Archetype In The Odyssey Essay

1202 Words5 Pages

Rhyanna Bristow

Mr. Rowsey

English 1, Period 2

10 March 2023

The Odyssey Essay

We are greedy. Humans have an innate desire for things they cannot have. As a result of this, we are often overcome with feelings of temptation, a strong desire to do or have something. Both Odysseus and his crew encounter numerous circumstances in Homer's "The Odyssey" in which temptation ultimately prevails. For example, when Odysseus has an affair with the Goddess Lady Circe or when his crew opens Aeolus’s Bag of Winds. One major theme in “The Odyssey” is the consequences of temptation and how that ultimately impacted Odysseus’ and his crews' journey back to Ithaca and the events of the Hero’s Journey. The Hero’s Journey also played a major part in shaping how the characters behaved as well as the result of the narritave.

The theme of the consequences of temptation is established throughout the story through the actions of Odysseus' crew, which ultimately resulted in their …show more content…

For example, one archetype that is represented throughout all stages of the Odyssey is the hero archetype, which is played by Odysseus himself. Other archetypes that represent major parts of the Hero’s Journey include the mentor archetype which is represented by the Goddess Athena, and she is introduced in stage 4 of the Hero’s Journey, meeting the mentor/supernatural aid and stage 6 tests, allies, and enemies which are represented by the cyclopes, the sirens, Charybdis, Scylla, King Aeolus, etc. As we can see every single archetype in this narrative correlates with crucial pieces of the hero’s journey. Therefore, if Hero’s Journey wasn’t there to organize the story and the archetypes weren’t present to differentiate each character the narrative would not be as clean and engaging. Both pieces are very important when it comes to shaping this story and the characters within

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