Odysseus in America-We Get it Already Shay!

So when I first read the first chapters of this book, Odysseus in America by Jonathen Shay, I felt totally opposed to it. Not for personal reasons or anything like that but, I felt it was so stupid. It was such an obvious comparison. What I mean is that when we were told the basic synopsis of what this book was about–and even from just seeing the full title of the book–I knew what the book was about. Comparing the Odyssey and Odysseus’s homecoming to Vietnam veterans homecoming is a good one. But a connection that I could make if I was studying the Vietnam war at the same time of reading the Odyssey. I respect Shay’s work and realize that the book is a lot more in depth and detailed than I could possibly know about Vietnam vets, but I honestly feel like I could’ve writtent this book. It’s an essay of Shay’s comparisons to Nam vets and Odysseus. He throws in the occasional quote here and there, and makes very interesting points, but it’s not something that someone with some background in his field couldn’t write. It’s an interesting book, but such an obvious comparison that I could’ve written it, and it goes on for too long. Why do we need to read a 250 page account of his ideas and comparisons (some not so good ones either)? I get his point within the first few chapters.

Further into the book now, I don’t hate it as much, but still feel some contempt for this guys writing it and getting an award and praise. Like I said, I or anyone else in the class could’ve written this. It’s just some guys long-ass (excuse the language) essay that was turned into a book.

Ok now that that’s out of the way…..

I almost like this book, if it wasn’t for the facts I stated above. Truthfully what’s keeping me engaged are the stories he tells of his patients and other Nam vets he hear about. Those stories are more interesting. I understand what he’s getting at though throughout the book. It was interesting when he talked about how on job applications the army puts down “infrantry gunner” for a guy applying to a grocery store or something. It’s just so…..sad? Ironic? that these guys come back from war, and that’s what they are good at, and you want them to stack cans of frozen corn on aisle 2? What gives? Shay makes a good point (and I think this is his thesis) that vets needed (and in the future need) to be re-integrated into society in a better fashion instead of being expected to assimilate right away.

One thing I really disagreed on with him though was his opinion of Odysseus blaming his men for eating the cattle of the sun god in chapter five, the Cyclops: the Flight from Boredom. I think he misinterprets this line, at least in my opinion. He seems to like to take shots at Odysseus at every chance he can get, which I don’t really understand why. But the passage he quotes from is in the future of the book, and his men did decide not to listen to him when he said to not eat the sun gods cattle. They didn’t listen and were punished for it. But I thoguht this chapter was very interesting to see that the vets were restless and couldn’t contain themselves. They needed adventure or something to take out thier skills and aggression on. He conncect the points here very well.

I think that shay makes some very provocative and interesting insights into vets and Odysseus that one wouldn’t necessarily think of, but sometimes I think he falls short of a point he’s making, and throws in a quote to really try and argue his point. In the case with women in the Odyssey as being subjective under mens power and relating it to real world women and prostitutes in Vietnam. I could slightly see his points that he tries to correlate between the book and the war vets, but I felt like it fell short. I feel like he needed to include a chapter on each main book of the Odyssey, and he couldn’t come up with anything real on women so he tries to make an argument, but it’s a weak one that didnt get across to me. Maybe this is just me though. I also felt like his Sirens comparison very weak indeed. He compares the sirens songs to crack cocaine out of nowhere after talking about comparing it to the truths of the atrocities and actions that Vietnam vets carried out (or think they carried out). His sirens argument was weak, I didn’t really see how it connected to army vets. Shay tries to bring it back to the idea of memory and memory alterations/loss, but I just don’t really see it. It just seems that Shay makes connection for the sake of connecting.

I can’t stand reading this sometimes, but then I feel like maybe I am being biased becasue of my earlier opinions of the book and I should keep giving it a chance. But these random comparions of whirlpools to emotions and crack cocain and the sirens song just make me frustrated. We’ll ahve to see where the book goes from here. It’s a good book (I think) but I’m having a hard time reading it. I feel like I see through all of Shay’s witty comparisons and clever use of quotes.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories-Kahani/inahaK

So in the last section of this book 10-12. Quite a lot happens. Too much almost…

I believe it was a good, ending, it was what you were expecting sort of. It was the ending anyone expecting a happy one would expect. But on the other hand, as we’ve seen throughout this book, Rushdie has flipped the classic “fairy-tale” on its head, so we woudn’t expect a happy ending necessarily.

Final Battle(s)

OK, so these climactic battles were somewhat diaapointing in that they were anti-climactic. They ended abruptly, and without much struggle or loss. But I guess one could say this is what Rushdie does in this book, stops short of your expectatons. When Haourn and Iff meet Khattam-Shud  (his shadow really) , he is described as looking like all the other chupwalas and being “a skinny, scrawny, measly, weaselly, snivelling clerical type, exactly like all the others” (p. 153).  Khattam-Shud is extemely uninpressive. He even talks with a low boring voice and then goes on to explain all his plans and describes what machine does what. And when Haroun calls his unremarkable apperance, Khattam-Shud grows into a giant beast with 101 swords and then shrinks back down to normal size and tells them that stories show off too, but this is inefficient. There’s no point to it though. This reminds me of Hard Times and the Richter reading we looked at on it. Hard Times was all about the uslelesness of imagination and entertainment. It showed no monetary value like money. Khattam-Shud sees stories as having no purpose in life, they only distract and waste energy/time.

After Khattam-Shud displays everything for them, Haroun and the gang suddenly spring into action and everything unfolds in about a page or two. It’s strange for everything to end so abruptly, but maybe Rushdie is saying that we don’t have to have these long drawn-out stories on such grand scales to get emotion and points across. His book is short and aimed at children, so it shows them that every book does not have to be like the Odyssey or Lord of the Rings. I think it also maybe shows which side Rushdie is on when it comes to free speech, imagination, and literature. They win so quickly, becuase its no question that free-speech is a good thing. He builds up these ridiculous characters and land where people sow their lips shut to prove their devotion to silence, and it all comes crumbling down in a matter of a few minutes (pages). I think he’s showing that political entities and people have built up these elaborate schemes and methods of shutting people up, and that it seems impoosing and impossible to overcome for a bunch of story tellers and poets. Yet these political factions or people of silence are hollow and fall under good stories and imagination and free speech.

The Miracle

The miracle that Haroun wishes for is amazing in the book. Some could say it feels like a cop-out; an easy way for Rushdie to suddenly alter the state of the books battles and quickly bring them to an end. But I think it was a good thing, I liked it in fact. I think in one regard, anyone sees immediatley the notion of Nature versus machinery (which is also evident in Hard Times and India-the large industrial factories that the poor work in to make a living they scrape by on). The sun comes out, and shines down on everything, and makes everything better. It’s classic nature v. machinery. But also that Haroun was able to overpower the machines back in the P2C2E building in Gup City, and that he was able to control something so big as the moon they were on. It’s like Deus ex Machina. Something so powerful outside the story that comes in and saves everyone and everything, yet its from inside the story. Haroun summons the she Sun, and the planet to turn. The important thing to pay attention to here is the ability/control that Haroun has over the story and the solar system (almost). His wish is beyond the scope of the normal. Also that he was so imaginative, most people in his situation would’ve wished for guns/weapons, or to dissapear, or for Khattam-Shud to die, or the whole boat to dissapear; but when he made his wish, I was not expecting the wholr planet to turn and face the sun. It’s so imaginative and outside the box.

Another thing I thought was important was when the two forces were about to fight in the Northern domain of the Chups. Rashid is worried for the Pages and the fores of Gup, especially because before the battle instead of preparing and lining up, the pages are all arguing and discussing what to do. But then “Rashid saw, to his great surprise, that the Chupwalas were quite unable to resist the Guppees. The Pages of Gup, now that they had taked through everything so fully, fought hard, remained united, supported each other when required to do so, and in general looked like a force with a common purpose.” (p. 184-5).  This part mostly reminded me of the Lord of the Rings, when the Elm trees or whatever they’re called, talked and talked and talked for days about what to do to help and defeat Saruman at his tower. Finally they band together when it sems it will be too late, and arrive at Saruman’s tower and wipe it out. Again nature versus machinery and evil. Beow the tower are these cave/mines where the orcs and armor are produced, and the Ents (their we go, the name of the talking, walking trees: Ents).  And in the Ents defeating them we see that they were united and undefeatable, and they also destroyed machinery and factories, with water as well, which quenched the fires of “hell” ( the caves underneath Saruman’s tower). This yet again goes back to Hard Times and Dickinson and his notion of factories where small children working as evil and hell holes. But back to Haroun’s story. In this novel it was important to mention the banding of the pages together for two reasons: 1) The notion of the pages actually communicationg and throwing around ideas and converging plans together to make a strategy that they all agreed upon which made them unstoppable, and 2) the Pages worked together supporting each other, like in a real book, a good one, every page defends and holds up the entire book. The pages hold up the story and pull it together.

The Mirroring Moons

Finally when they arrive home after all is solved on Kahani, Harouna and Rashid find there town completely pouring with rain. And it seems that people are happy, they are skipping about and dancing through the streets. Haroun wonders what could make everyone so happy and jolly (especially in the rain which people usually hate). An old man comes along and tells Haroun not to have such a long face, becuase its raining, and then a policeman, tells them that if there’s anything to b happy about at all its that they remembered the name of the city: Kahani. ?!?!!! WHAT??!!?!

Does this mean that the whole time it was a dream or were they on Kahani the whole time. But I think that what this means is that they were on the other planet of Kahani (moon actually), but the fact that the two mirror each other in many repsects is important. Mr.Singupta = Khattam-Shud, Butt the Hoopoe=Butt the Mail driver, etc. Also things in general like stories and the way things were on Kahani are backwards or upside down commpared to the real world. But notice that when Haroun and Rashid get back it’s pouring rain, and Haroun describes the air of the city feeling as though a miracle had occured, and the fact that the town was also Kahani add up to the miracle of the sun coming out on the moon Kahani. Haroun had to visit the moon Kahani to see things in a different light. Things aren’t as bad as they seem, and there is more to life and people that meets the eye. The miracle on the moon Kahani was the sun coming up, the miracle on earth Kahani was that it started raining, pouring rain. It means that for the miracle to occur or for Haroun to see the light in things isnt dependant really on the type of weather (like the bright, hot sun which most people associate with happiness and goodness), but just the fact that there is a miracle and to see the difference and light in everything. Haroun had to make the journey to see that. He had to see everything flipped on its head, to see them the right way. The fact that it’s raining (which people associate with sadness) doesn’t matter, it still feels good.

This book was very good. I highly recomend. Thanks for the good book Professor Ramachandran.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories-Beyond the Twilight Strip

Ok, so this story is picking up pace now and moving into the climax of the story. I think one of the things that Rushdie does in this book is to constantly add new sights and sounds to the story. This keeps the reader intrigued because you constantly run into new characters/ creatures/ places. I can sort of look at this as a gimmick to entice the readers so they dont get bored, but I wouldn’t stand behind that statement all the way. I’m just putting it out there. I still like the book, and I enjoy “seeing” new people and things on the book.  I think that another thing Rushdie tries to convey in this story (among all the other things he conveys) is the sense of imagination. When reading a book, you tend to picture the characters and the way the settings look, so that you are “seeing” the events unravel in the book. You see the book as a movie. Rushdie’s earlier play on imagination and believing what you see is connected to this notion of “seeing” the story.

Next, the shadow warrior and his…shadow. I fid this part of the book really cool too. The warrior fights with his own shadow, and the two can act independantly, but never be seperate. The warrior and the shadow are ying and yang, opposites yet insepperable. One balances the other and visa versa. Horoun comments on the shadow warrior and shadows fighting as such: “No matter what tricks his shadow played, the warrior was its equal. And as they fought each other, standing toe to toe, Haroun began to think of their combat as a dance of great beauty and grace, a dance danced in perfect silence, because the music was playing inside the dancer’s heads.” (p.124). This explanation of the fight as a dance that was silent yet graceful reminds me of a book I read in my Japanese History class last semester. The book was “In Praise of Shadows” by  Jun’ichirō Tanizaki, a Japanese author who wrote about the aesthetics of Japanese taste in architecture, and the encroaching western cultural imperialism. He writes in one section particularly about light and shadow in terms of east and west. He comments on how the West paint walls white, and constantly seek brighter and brighter lights to get all the shadows out of rooms. But the japanese paint the wood with dark laquer and dont mind the shadows. he tells the reader that the Japanese embrace shadows. He cites another experience of going to a restaurant and their being electric lamps now, when there weren’t before. He requests a candle instead of the lamp, and immediatley notices the shadows the candle casts and he feels at home in the darkness. That reminded me of the shadow warrior and its shadow in the novel becuase they coulndt be one without the other, but also because Haroun compares the cities of Gup and Chup and says that they are opposites, and they would probably get along without even knowing it.

After Prof. Ramachandran told us in class about the comparison betwee the Philip Pullman books (His Dark Materials trilogy) I saw the connection between the shadows and the daemons on Pullmans books. This is very interesting and I’m surprised I didnt see it. Thanks for pointing it out Professor! It was funny that you mentioned it in class, becuase just the night before I had somehow remembered the books and was trying to describe them to my roommate. I was actually having trouble remembering them as well, even though I just read them over this summer past. But the basic plot is eventually moved to destroying God I think? And to tear away deamons from humans, which is essentially tearing souls away from the body. Then when reading about Khattam-Shud and how he succesfully split himself from his shadow, it reminded me of Ms. Coulter who in the novel is sometimes seen without her deamon. She (and Lord Asriel I think?) have somehow gained the ability to be extremely far from their deamons which is very hard to do. In Haroun and the Sea of Stories, Khattam-Shud has done the same thing. He has broken away from his other half and can be in two places at once.

It was also cool in this section how when they get caught by the Chupwals they see the ocean of stories all poisoned and rotting away. Iff comments on how thesea re the oldest stories and how they were neglected and that’s why their in a lot of trouble now. He says that they forgot their roots. So I guess that Rushdie is also saying the oldest texts are still important to us today because they are our roots, and without them we dont know who we are. Not only that, but we have to treat them properly and not abandom them to time and dust on library shelves.

The notion that shadows are always fuzzy, and not sharp and defined like real things was another thing I thoguht was cool that Haourn said when explaining how the black flagship looked. Because if you think about it, its very true. And the fact that Khattam-Shud’s shadow tals is very funny because it is contradictory. I think that this again a comment on religious/political leaders who say to ban one thing but do it themselves or make exceptions. Rushdie is really sayoing alot in this book, just Philip Pullman said in his books which were catered to young readers but actually worked on another higher level to talk about the Bible and religion.

The Death of an Author?-I Don’t Think So

The Richter reading we read in association with this book was very interesting. Roland Barthes’ “The Death of the Author” is about how we analyze books and literature only according to what we know about the author. We only critisize or examine books from what we ascertain about the author. I think this is an imortant and interesting point to make and I understand it. But I feel like I disagree with it. Barthes makes the argument that if we didnt know the author or anything about them, we as readers grow and get the real feel of the book. “…we know that to give writing its future, it is necessary to overthrow the myth: the birth of the reader must be at the cost of the death of the Author”. This is his most effective sentence (and last one) of the essay, but I think that it’ s important to know the context of some literature, otherwise no one could ever make heads or tails of what some poems/books/novels mean. Yes the knowledge helps us understand the book better, but writers and readers are still challenged trying to ascertain what the book is about. It doesn’t just come down to the author and their history/life. A good reader or writer is able to convey things through the text that dont always have to be a reflection of their life. Our life is reflected in books, and that’s how they come together. Without life literature would not be possible in all the capacities it is, and life woud not survve without literature. The two are inextricabley connected.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories-Distant Lands

This next section we read (ch.4-6) was very interesting in many ways. The conversations between Haroun and Iff (the Genie with a blue beard, purple onion hat, and puffy auberginey pants) are very interesting. The first conversation between the two is very funny but also enlightening. The subject of only beliveing what we hear about or see with out eyes. It turns the concept of “seeing to believe” on its head. Iff says to Haroun “… a Disconnector Thief who will not trust in what he can’t see. How much have you seen, eh, little Thieflet? Africa, have you seen it? No? Then is it truly there? And submarines? Huh?” (p.63). I think this point is really important. because it once again works on different levels of the readers age/ability. You can see how this can be true, just because you know of Africa, does it exist if you have’nt seen it. This could be applied to any notion of believing only in what people tell you about. But I think that you can also apply this notion of believing what you hear to religion and politics. Can you believe what religious leaders/texts and political figures say? This even goes bakc to the politico that Harouns father Rashid agees to work for. The politico has 100 gaurds surrounding him, and needs a story teller to convince people to trust him.

Butt the Hoopoe is a strannge contraption/creature. It looks like a bird but is actually a machine. It also has the same name as Butt the mail delvery truck driver. I see this as sort of a similiar thing to the Odyssey. Some characters had to be repeated to symbolize their use in the story. In this story Butt is a person who transports people at very high speeds. I’m not quite sure what this means yet for the story. I don’t think this story is meant to copy or reproduce qualities found in the Odyssey, but just that after reading them I see similarities in other literature. But the sense of mechanical things in the story also has been altered. Rushdie likes to flip sense and notions of what makes sense in this world on their heads. Haroun describes the bird hoopoe as being very tempramental, when machines are supposed to be logical and make sense. The notion of how science works in the book is flipped on itds head. The moon of Kahani is so fast and moves around so much that it cant be detected by Earthlings. I think speed is important because speed is uncontrollabel. Speed is also something valued in modern day society, actually, in society all through history. Humans have always tried to find ways to do things faster and be more productive. Iff tells Hroun this to explain why Hoopoe is so fast and Kahani is fast as well. “And what do we prize in a brainy felllow?-Is it not his Quickness of Thought?”. This is true, we idolize speed in society and the use of it in the imaginary land shows that they are able to enhance or master speed in Kahani. I think this goes to the argument that imagination is important as well. On this imaginary world of Kahani speed is so incredible that they can hide an entire moon from the people on Earth.

The Sea of Stories is also another amazing thing to have in the story. The whole ocean is made up of stories andthey all flow into one another and freely. Not only that but the Plentimaw fish swim in he ocean and eat/breathe the stories and then put them out again in new ways so that the stories combine into new types of stories. Just this whole section speaks so much to literature and society and other aspects of the book. The ocean being one giant story that is fluid and have the abilty to take new forms is a new look on how stories could be. Maybe Rushdie is commenting on how stories should be able or that the ocean is a metaphor for the literature scoiety. The socitey of writers and readers eat and survive on stories and after consuming them we as a society spit out new stories and come up with fresh new ideas. The Pleantimaw fish also alwyas travel in pairs and have to complete each others sentences. This can be compared to Rashids wife leaving him, and thus his inablity to tell stories or even complete sentences.

Then the incident when Haroun enters a fairytale like story gone awry is a very funny account and surprise to the ussual fariytale formula. The story starts out as usual, but then Haroun turns into the monsters hes been killing and the princess in the tower doesnt want him then. She cuts off one of his legs and he falls and wakes up. The first thing I thought of as interesting in this story was that Haroun turned into what he was killing and thought of as the threat, but in the end became what he was destroying/fighting. Maybe this is foreshadowing for the future when they fight the “enemy” of the novel (the Chupwalas).

Alot of the characters repeat in this story as I said earlier with Butt the transporter. You can see multiple characters reflected in one main character. We can see Rashid, his father in King Chattergy, “The King attempted to speak, but words failed him,  and shaking his head unhappily he stepped back” (p. 90). Rashid had the same experience when he tried to speak at a Politicos rally and all he could say was “ark”.

Haroun and the Sea of Stories

The book “Haroun and the Sea of Stories” is so far so good. It keeps you interested. The first things i’m noticing are the similarities between this book and various books that I’ve read form childhood. Yet this book is not just a childrens book. It also has some deeper things going on that make it interesting for an adult to read.

The rhyming and play on words is very interesting so far. “The Shah of Blah” for exaple. I can already see some similarities to Odysseus in this book through Rashid and his son Haroun. The father who is a storyteller and famous (in both good and bad ways as his two titles tell us: the ocean of notions and the shah of blah. He also has a son that he has to raise and Haroun obviously grow up. Another thing that reminded me of the Odyssesy is that his wife runs away with Mr.Singupta, which is what causes Rashids voice to falter and his ability to tell stories to go away. His wife being taken away is the start of the adventure, just as in the Odyssesy (well really the Iliad) Helen started the Troajn War which led to Odysseus’s fate.

Its also funny how Haroun started out as being skeptical of his fathers stories and not until he begins to experience the fantastical does he see that there is magic in the world as in the case of the lake that repsonds to the peoples emotions on the boat. Haroun is learning th trade of telling stories and I think will eventually take over his dads role as town storyteller. The next generation is taking over. We see even more of this role reversal when they switch beds and the father ends up sleeping in the turtle bed, and the sun sleeps in a peacock bed. But as hes about to fall asleep he meets a genie who has a rediculous outfit on. But I can already see whats going to happen so far, in regards to Haroun and his father. The rest of the characters have yet to be truly defined. Either slowly Haroun will give the confidence back into his father to tell stories and they can tell them together eventually or Rashid will tell Haroun that he has grown up so much and to take over the storytelling business.

The essay, by Martha C. Nussbaum, entitled “The Literary Imagination” was perfect for this book. I just recently read Hard  Times for another english class, and so I am even more able to identify with this essay and understand its full meanings. In Hard Times imagination and “fancying” are prohibeted by Mr.Gradgrind and his friens/partner Mr. Bounderby. They are practical men, men of knowledge, men of learning. They believe that eveything has to have value and purpose. Unitarianism. When Gradgrinds own children go to the circus to see what it is like, Gradgrind repremands them for even looking in on that fanciful useless stuff. In “Haroun and the Sea of Stories”, Mr.Singupta is represntative of this kind of thinking. The notion that fantasy is a waste of space and time. You have to be practical or else the world would swallow you up and spit you back out. Yet from Hard Times we can see the implications of banning imagination on his own children. They grow up to be emotionless and not feel. They dont know how to express emotion or connect with other human beings because they were taught to be wholly practical. In Harouns tale we see the notion of a land where silence is induced by Khatam-Shud.

I can’t wait to see where this story takes off from here!

Can We Believe a Madman?

In the end of the book we finally see Odysseus exact revenge upon the suitors (although the revenge isn’t as played up as it was in the original text). This scene is very brutal and bloody, but something in it quite different occurs that threw me off. I had to read this passage over again. After killing all the suitors and the hall is covered in blood from wall to wall, Odysseus suddenly loses his mind. This is very,  very different from the scene in the Odyssey by Homer. Odysseus suddenly sees and hears the Trojan war in his house. After killing the suitors,  Telemachus comments on the silence, but Odysseus says “When I look at them I hear armour and chaos” (p.150). Then a little later he says “Now why has the tide dragged this log into my house?…The spitting image of Ajax. The same hooked nose” (p.152). Odysseus begins to see Antinous, one of the suitors, as his old friend and fellow warrior Ajax. Then he sees all the dead suitors rise up as dead warriors from the Trojan War. Only Penelope speaking to him brings him slowly out of his “shell-shock”. Slowly through talking to him Penelope calms Odysseus down and he see that he’s home and not on the shores of Troy anymore.

This is a very important part in the play. It carries both an old and a new theme within it. We see the effect of war and psychology now being examined as it would be in real life. Once again Walcott gives a modern feeling to the Odyssey. Any person would surely have some type of shock or after effect psyhologically from war, and Walcott explores this in Odysseus. Another theme explored here is old, it connects this play to the original poem. The relationship of Odysseus and Penelope is once again tested one last time, and only Odysseus’ partner can talk him back into sanity. Just as in the original text Penelope and Odysseus have an exclusive relationship that treats the two as equals in intellect. This last scene displays their relationship again, while also exploring the more modern knowledge of what war does to ones mind.

Women in Walcott’s Play Have Power!?

While reading Walcotts interpretation of the Odyssey another discernible difference is in the women of the play. Penelope is much more pwerful and in charge at home while Odysseus is away. Nausicaa is also an empowered and much more sexual woman.

The first instance we see of Penelope changing from her timid self of the orignal Odyssey is at home 10 years after the opening scene of the play. She give orders to those around her. A quick aside is that she is also surrounded by women in this scene. Walcott gives us a glance into the women world. We see that women in the play have their own affairs and things going on. They have their own storyline on the side with Odysseus. But back to Penelope…She shouts and gives orders, and even uses her sexual appeal to her advantage with the suitors in the house. She is very commanding and forceful rather than shut away and sad like in the original Odyssey.

Then Nausicaa comes. When Odysseus comes to the island of the Phoeonakians, his encounter with Nausicaa is almost completely different from Homers account of it. Nausicaa is much more upfront and brash. She is much more sexified in this play. She is even smarter than the older Nausicaa from the Odyssey. She goes tit-for-tat with Odysseus and even tells him not to start that poetry garbage. “That’s how all the overtures start. With Poetry.” Odysseus-”What Poetry?”, Nausicaa-”You know, ‘O Nymph’, and all that business.”

This is a nod to Homers Odyssey and it is also trying to break free from the old notion of what the Odyssey is about. Mocking the poetry of Homer. It makes the play more contemporary and modern. It’s almost saying that poetry is not the way one picks up girls these days. She even goes on to say that isnt he going to compliment her on her features? And aren’t you going to touch my knees? She wants Odysseus so bad that its strange. Where as in the original Odyssey she was much more quiet and “proper”. She too, stands for the changed direction of women in the play. Women are more feminist in this play and are wrapped up in their own world as well as mens.

The New Take on the Odyssey

When reading the first 50 pages or so of the Odyssey, Derek Walcott’s version, in drama form you notice many similarities and differences. You immediatley notice the difference in where the story of our main hero starts. It starts on the shores of Troy after the great war. The next difference you can see is in the actual characters themselves. Odysseus is more greedy and selfish it seems. Throughout the play you see a greedier Odysseus. It almost seems as if Walcott took the many different interpretations that people had and made this play based on his beliefs of the original text. For example we discussed whether Odysseus was really trying to get home or postpone his homecoming (and for what reason?) for further glory and renown. But you couldv’e also argued that Odysseus was trying to get home but the situations which he is constantly thrown into randomly control whether he gets home or not and how fast. Here it seems that Walcott has chosen the darker side of Odysseus. That is my main point about Odysseus in this play. He’s darker, grittier, and more realistic in a sense. Who do you know that doesn’t want treasure and glory so that he/she is remembered for all time?

We see Odysseus’s first greed in the matter of the Shield left behind by Achilles. Ajax and Odysseus argue over who the rightful heir to the piece of equipment is. Ultimately its given to Odysseus, and in turn Ajax curses that Odysseus takes ten years to return home with it. The play starts out here for the obvious reason that it has to be set up with some context and background becasue it’s a play. Sometimes the book seems hindered by the fact that it is only meant to be a play becasue of all the intricate detail left behind in the novel. It was enjoyable (most of the time) to read the words of Homer and close read them to see all the possible meanings there. Here everything is straight forward and cuts to the point. Every character is given as they are meant to be, without any more wondering what their deal is.

Another difference you notice is in the language of the play. This is in terms of the characters and the general layout of how the play is laid out  and read aoud. Certiain characters have accents while others do not. It seems much more modern in its sense of audience and the time contraints upon it. As I said before you miss the sublteties of the original text in this play, just as an avid Harry Potter reader will always be dissapointed with some aspect missed or not gone over enough in the movie. When reading Harry Potter it feels like everything is important, every character and conversation is key, but the movie adaptation has to cut this down to allow for moderate run time. In the play this takes away from the play, yet Walcott has also included his own subtle hints at the original text and he uses other literary techniques to make the play smart on a different (more modern?) level. The similarities between the play and tha book are in the clever writing by Walcott and Homer, and also in the main plot points of the story.

Father and Son

In these 3 books which we have just read (16-18) Telemakhos and Odysseus finally reunite but not before many long winded speechs and subtle games that they play through words. The first thing that stood out to me here was Telemakhos’s reuniting with the Swinehereder who treats him as a son as it says in the text. Its funny to see Odysseus sitting there in the form of an old, decrepit beggar, while this swineherder is like a father to Telemakhos. And it’s funny that Telemakhos didnt find his father abroad, he found him at home. He found what he was searching for in his own himeland.

I thought it was funny too when Telemakhos says on line 104 on p. 292 “Not even a hero could”; this is Telemakhos speaking about how strong the suitors are and even doubting that a hero could save his house. Then Odysseus decides to test Telemakhos and get him angered somewhat, just as Athena keeps slowly angering Odysseus, to take action against the suitors. His first words to the “stranger” are of pity but Odysseus also asks him, why dont you do something about this already? I would not sit here and let this be done to my home and mother. In one way he is trying to get Telemakhos ready to fight, but is also testing him as this is his own son who he has never really met before. He wamst to see what kind of a man has he turned out to be. This is remeniscent of Odysseus’ encounter with Athena upon waking in Ithaka. They are kind of testing eachother and playing a battle of wits or testing their relationship. Because after Odysseus chides his son for not taking action Telemakhos replies that his father left him when he was too young and people took advantage of that and took over the house somewhat.

Then when Athena tells Odysseus it’s time to unveil himself to Telemakhos she says to Odyssseus “I shall not be far distant then, for I/myself desire battle.”(p.295 line 199-200). Athena is known for her wisdom and skill at weaving, not really for warfare. But here she is angered so musch by the suitors and really trying to get Odysseus mad. She is being somewhat selfish. She wants a fight with all the suitors.

Further down then, Odysseus being revealed to Telemakhos tells his son not to bow befeore him because he his not a god. But he is also saying not to bow to the gods in such a way. I think he is saying this, especially because although the gods have had a role in what has happened to Odysseus so far in the story, it was only Odysseus who could rely on himself in his hardest of times.