An epic hero is someone who achieves great things and is admired for bravery and humility. In the epic poem The Odyssey written by Homer, the main character, Odysseus, is an epic hero. The characteristics the Odysseus posses to make him an epic her includes bravery, cleverness and determination.
Bravery is having courage through tough times. This is a trait that Odysseus possesses. He shows bravery in many chapters of The Odyssey. One example of his bravery is when Odysseus saved his crew from the sirens. If they hear the sirens song, they would be enchanted and then crash the ship. “Soften some beeswax and stop your shipmates ears so none can ear, none of the crew, but if you are bent on hearing, have them tie you hand and foot in the swift
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Odysseus showed cleverness throughout the books. He got Polyphemus drunk and told him that his name was “nobody”. “Nobody- that's my name. Nobody-” (Homer 223). He says this because when someone asks Polyphemus who is hurting him he will say “nobody”. When he reaches back home, he uses his intelligence to kill the suitors. He says that he will put the dead suitors in the hall where nobody will be. He throws a party so that everyone will think that the commotion at the palace was just a party, but really he is killing the suitors. “Odysseus, master of tactics, answered briskly, ‘I and the prince will keep these brazen suitors crammed in the hall, for all their battle-fury’”(Homer 444). In this passage, he is referred to as the master of tactics. When he goes to see his father, he plays a trick on him to see if he remembers him. “I once played host to a man in my own country” (Homer 476). In this passage, the man he is referring to is himself. He pretends to be somebody who had Odysseus stay at his house a while ago. He talks to is father like he knows Odysseus. He does this to see if his father still remembers him after twenty years. Overall, Odysseus uses his intelligence for the