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Treatment Of Women In The Odyssey

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In the poem The Odyssey by Homer the author tells us the story of Odysseus's goal to return to his homeland Ithaca, where he will defeat the rude uncontrollable suitors who are camping in his palace and his main goal is to reunite with his loyal wife Penelope and son Telemachus.
In Ancient Greece and in the odyssey men were expected to be masculine and warriors were women were obedient and looked down on. Throughout the story Men are able to entertain and socialize outside of their home and go to work but women stay at home and do housework. From this background information we can infer that The Odyssey by Homer shows that men are valued more due to the fact that men have more sexual freedom then women and are respected more when they have …show more content…

Circe tells Odysseus “ let's go to bed together, mount my bed and mix in the magic work of love- we’ll breed deep trust between us.’ ( 10, 240, 370-372) and of course Odysseus agrees only when Circe swears she won’t do any harm. When Odysseus returns home to Ithaca Odysseus mentions none of his affairs to his loyal wife who had no affairs while he was gone because she assumed Odydsseyus was still alive but instead sentences …show more content…

Calypso is an immortal goddess who holds Odysseus prisoner due to the fact that she loves him and wants to be with him forever. Doing so she sleeps with Odysseus without his consent but thinks it’s ok because every god does it to mortels. “ Hard - hearted you are , you gods! You unrivaled lords of jealousy – scandalized when goddesses sleep with mortals, openly, even when one has made the man her husband” (5,156,130-134). Calypso's speech shows the double standard in the odyssey, when gods sleep with mortals without there consent which in this generation would be called rape in there eyes it doesn’t matter or it’s normalized and nobody says anything about it because there gods but when goddesses sleep with mortals with or without there consent there looked down on and told to stop. During Odysseus's journey he falls in love with multiple goddesses including calypso and Circe. Odysseus falls for their trance and ends up staying more than one year with the goddesses instead of continuing his journey to get back to Ithaca. But back in Ithaca Penelope is faced with suitors who want to marry her because they believe that Odysseus is dead

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In the epic poem, The Odyssey, by Homer, there are many female characters who play the role of a villain. Calypso, Scylla, Charybdis, and the sirens are among the women with the largest, negative impacts on Odysseus’ journey home. Though some women, such as Athena, Eurycleia, and Penelope, are loyal to Odysseus throughout the poem. With such a wide range of female characters, they all contribute different things throughout the book, whether the impact of their actions is negative or positive. Regardless of the outcomes, Homer has quite a modern view of female representation in his poem.

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