Into the Underworld

HUM 2051: Civilization IFall 2009

Dr. PerdigaoSeptember 4-14, 2009

Storylines• Storytellers• Book IV: Agamemnon’s story told by Menelaus, Odysseus’s

own story retold—models of memory, storytelling within the epic

• Demodocus• “It goes against my grain to repeat a tale told once, and told

so clearly” (355). At the end of Book XII, it returns to bard’s story—from Odysseus as storyteller from bard’s accounts, back to Calypso and homecoming

• Weavers• Penelope, Calypso, Circe• Circe weaving at loom—enchanting web (like web of deceit in

Agamemnon) (320)

Centering the Journey• Circe (Book X)• Aeaea• Hermes’ guidance

• Aeolus• Bag of Wind

• Laestrygoians, Antiphates

• Eurylochus tries to report what happens to crew (320-321), then cautious about staying; Odysseus impervious to Circe’s charms: “You have a mind in you no magic can enchant!” (322, 365)

• Guides to/in the underworld• Circe, Tiresias• Circe tells him what he’ll undergo next, descent into the

underworld (326)

• Elpenor (329-330)• Burial—sign of courtesy and propriety (Clytaemnestra does not

show Agamamenon); “remember me” (330, 78)

Deconstructing the Descent

• From Elpenor’s death to the underworld

• Book XI: Descent into underworld—hero tires in task and is at moment of exhaustion

• Figurative death in descent

• Consults wisdom figures, Tiresias, family members

• As a result of confrontation with wisdom figures, goes through rebirth in return with new strength, to go back to the quest

• Pattern of whole poem in Divine Comedy

Cast of Characters in the Underworld• Tiresias• Odysseus’s mother Anticleia• Women: wives of heroes

• Agamemnon (338-340)• Achilles (340-342)• Ajax (342)

• Tityus• Tantalus• Sisyphus• Heracles, as ghost

• Desires to see first golden age—Theseus, Jason and the Argonauts

Framing the Hero

• Joseph Campbell’s The Hero with One Thousand Faces as story of ritual death, rebirth:

separation: initiation: return

• Rites of passage— “monomyth”

• “A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are there encountered and a decisive victory is won. The hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man.” (30)

Stages of Descent

• I. Departure: call to adventure, refusal of the call, supernatural aid

• II. Initiation: round of trials, meeting with the goddess, woman as temptress

• III. Return: refusal of the return, the magic flight, crossing of return threshold, master of two worlds, freedom to live

Framing the Narrative• Sirens• Version of Pandora story, excess, control , like

Sirens—desire to hear (curiosity) but control applied—also in Book X with the sack of wind, then story of flood with six nights, seventh day of rest

• As bards themselves, enchanting with story (349)• Narrating The Iliad?

• Clashing Rocks, Scylla and Charybdis • Six-headed monster, whirlpool • “between a rock and a hard place” (354)

• Helios• Sun cattle—hospitality, respect (reverses Sirens

episode with his control)

Narrative Strands• Book XIII—“Ithaca at Last”• Ithaca now unfamiliar: “Man of misery, whose land have I

lit on now? / What are they here—violent, savage, lawless? / or friendly to strangers, god-fearing men?” (360)

• Punishment to Phaeacians

• Athena: “We’re both old hands at the arts of intrigue” (362)

• “Clearly I might have died the same ignoble death / as Agamemnon, bled white in my own house too, / if you had never revealed this to me now, / goddess, point by point. / Come, weave us a scheme so I can pay them back!” (364)

• Eumaeus

• Eurycleia

Narrative Strands• “What good can come of grief?” (328)

• House in ruins: Order

• Meeting with Achilles, offered choice between short, glorious life or long life—here switches opinion (340, 553)

• The whole warrior code that informed The Iliad is called into question

• Odysseus: Agamemnon—underworld, parallels• Caution about reentry, subtlety, cunning• Difference between murder and survival

• Courtesy and hospitality—way people respond to strangers (courtesy/discourtesy)

• “civilization”

• Telling of story: Demodocus, Odysseus, Sirens

Dualisms, Dichotomies, Binaries (coming undone)

• Order/disorder• Courtesy/discourtesy (who respects strangers:

gods: humans—all rites, rituals between worlds)• Restraint/rage• Civilized/barbaric• Father/son• Odysseus/Agamemnon

Patterns and Parallels

• Agamemnon/Odysseus parallel: Elpenor (rites to bodies); suitors (no propriety in house)

• Agamemnon appears at end to praise Penelope’s loyalty in a revision of that story and shift from tragedy: comedy (ends with physical union, marriage)

• Final symbol—bed—pillar at center of house; olive tree (Greek culture, that center)

• Book XXIV—deus ex machina: Athena appears, resolves all conflict, example of gods’ intervention that we did not see in The Iliad (visible here); now a call for peace

Deus ex Endings

• Telemachus as version of father—parallel to Orestes (454, L117; 455, 144). Odysseus shakes head, sign that Telemachus is able to perform like father, assertion Telemachus is almost grown

• “Purify” house, purging and cleansing

• Poem ends with sexual reunion—common pattern—establishment of order at home (western literary tradition)

• Retelling of entire Odyssey (story within the story) (481, L355)

• Last book—“Peace”—reunion with Father, impossibility for Priam