Examples Of Loyalty In The Odyssey

Jonas Fisk

Mrs. May

English I Honors

15 March 2023 The Odyssey: Legacy or Loyalty

In the ancient system of Feudalism, dukes, lords, knights, vassals, and serfs all had to display loyalty to the king or else the kingdom would crumble. Loyalty is made through connections. No connection is stronger than familial bonds. Odysseus, a mythological Greek hero, displays his familial bonds throughout his journey at sea. He is away from his family, and is ultimately held captive on an island by the goddess Calypso for seven grueling years. Once he is freed from the island, he must face further trials at home, where his wife and child reside. Throughout his epic poem, The Odyssey, Homer deliberately conveys that Odysseus returns home due to familial

Initially, Homer exemplifies Odysseus’ loyalty to his family and home through his decision to leave the paradise of Calypso’s island to return to his family. After seven years of being stuck on the island, Odysseus’ mental health is in decline over the absence of his family, “[Odysseus] sat apart, as a thousand times before, and racked his own heart, groaning, with eyes wet scanning the bare horizon of the sea.” (Homer 282-284). A passionate reaction containing strength to this degree exemplifies the emotional strain Odysseus has experienced over the desire to be reunited with his home and family. The choice to add the phrase “racked heart” is a great indicator of his true motivation. If he was returning home to become a hero, his emotions would have no real bearing over his reaction, and he would instead be motivated by pride and a need to preserve his legacy. Additionally, visual imagery is utilized in Odysseus’ scanning of the ocean with his wet, teary eyes. In doing this, he is looking for his home or a method to escape the prison he is confined

Again, Odysseus has an overwhelming emotional reaction regarding his family, this time after returning home. Odysseus, after twenty years away from them, is blissfully reunited with his family. When he spots his son, now a grown man, they have a long-awaited reunion, “Telemachus began to weep. Salt tears rose from the wells of longing in both men, and cries burst from both as keen and fluttering as those of a great taloned hawk, whose nestlings farmers take before they fly,” (Homer 1061-1064). At this moment, Odysseus embraces his son, and their emotions are so overwhelming that they are compared using a Homeric simile to a hawk's cry at the loss of its nestling. Odysseus is a war-hardened man, having been away at war for a decade and at sea for another, and such a reaction from the man displays his true intentions for his return. In the excerpt, “longing” is used to depict the emotional state of both men. Even with his experience in battle, Odysseus’ emotional shell is shattered by the overwhelming happiness of the reunion of him and his son. This emotional reaction is a strong indicator of Odysseus’ return home out of loyalty to his family because of the ability to feel so strongly for them. Homer's use of his trademark Homeric simile further solidifies the volume and intensity of the tears, and thus, the volume and intensity of the