Calypso In The Odyssey

The book Summer of the Mariposas by Guadalupe Garcia McCall offers many parallels to the Grecian epic poem The Odyssey by Homer. One of the parallels between the two works, perhaps one of the most clear-cut, is between the character of Calypso, from The Odyssey, and the character Cecilia of Summer of the Mariposas, arguing that perhaps this ancient character inspired McCall to model a character of hers after one of Homer’s. Cecilia echoes Calypso in many ways, their detrimental actions toward the protagonist of each literary work nearly mirroring one another. The two characters are held in similar situations, their motives for their actions towards the protagonists in the correlating works stem from similar places, and the escape and assistance

The mention of these higher powers suggests that she is being punished, perhaps by the Aztec gods and goddesses. If it is true that Cecilia was being punished for wrongdoings by a legion of gods and heavenly persons, her situation is almost exactly the same as Calypso’s. In the same statement that reveals she is a prisoner of heavenly powers, she refers to her home as an island, a direct parallel with Calypso’s story. “I am to dwell on this island in the desert for the rest of time. ” (McCall, 155). Her “island”, reminiscent of Calypso’s island Ogygia, is her home, the word ‘island’ being used metaphorically, indicating that her house is the “island” and that she is trapped on in the “sea” of the desert that surrounds it. When the two characters, Calypso and Cecilia, first welcome the protagonists who are to be their captives, they appear as a saving grace. Odysseus, the lone survivor of a shipwreck, is saved from the unforgiving sea by Calypso and her island, “Calypso welcomed the exhausted Greek hero, Odysseus, who was drifted for nine days in the open sea after losing his ship and his army to the monsters of Italy and Sicily when coming back home from Troy.”(“Calypso

Her island was in complete solitude, and so Odysseus was tempting for her, a companion for someone eternally alone. This was not mere selfishness, there is a sympathetic element to her story of one-sided, unrequited love, “…his rugged good looks and noble character soon affected the lonely goddess and she fell in love.” (Stewart). According to this source, Calypso was truly in love with Odysseus and though that love was consummated, the pair of them having two, and from some sources three, children, it was not truly returned. Odysseus was accepting of his fate of being hers, but did not return the love she so freely gave him, “He resigned himself to the fact that there was no escape from the island but he still constantly longed for his wife and son.” (Stewart). This source shows that he was truly loyal to his wife, loving towards his son, but did not, even over the course of seven years, develop any romantic feelings towards Calypso. “But Odysseus didn’t accept her generosity – he was dreaming about going back to his Ithaca and his wife.” (“Calypso and Odysseus”). It can be inferred from this that Calypso was merely alone, and desired a companion. She, as a woman in the patriarchal Homeric times, was believed to be in need of a husband, and so this solitary confinement may have driven her to lonely madness. Similarly, Cecilia was secluded from the outside world, with all the