Discussion Questions

Zeus says that men suffer beyond their share through their own folly, and shortly afterward Telemachus tells his mother that Zeus gives each man his lot. Which of the two views will the rest of the poem confirm?

The first time Telemachus asserts his own power, he orders his mother to be silent in front of the suitors. Is this a sign that he has grown up, or that he does not yet know against whom to use his strength?

Telemachus says that no one knows his own origin by himself. What does it take for someone to know whose son he is, and what does the journey Athena proposes to him have to do with that?

Mentor accuses the people of Ithaca, and not the suitors, of letting the house of Odysseus be devoured. Whom does the poem consider more responsible: the one who abuses power, or the one who sees it abused and keeps silent?

We know the ruse of the loom through Antinous's mouth, he who wants to see Penelope married. What changes in the episode if we imagine the same story told by Penelope?

Telemachus refuses to drive out his mother before the assembly, but leaves without her knowledge. Do these two attitudes fit together? What does each one protect?

Telemachus went to Pylos to learn about his father and returns with no news at all. What, then, does he gain from the visit to Nestor?

Nestor tells of two returns from Troy: that of the Achaeans, who quarrel and split apart, and that of Orestes, who comes home and takes revenge. What lesson does Nestor draw from each for Telemachus?

Peisistratus welcomes the strangers before knowing who they are, and Nestor will not let Odysseus's son sleep on the ship. What does the hospitality of Pylos say about Telemachus's house in Ithaca?

Menelaus, Helen, and Proteus each tell how a man returned, or failed to return, from Troy. What does Telemachus hear in these stories that is useful for his situation in Ithaca, and what can he not use?

Antinous's ambush repeats Aegisthus's: twenty men, a ship, a feast nearby. What does the poem gain by making the reader recall Agamemnon's death while following the plan against Telemachus?

Helen attributes to Aphrodite the blindness that led her to Troy, and in Menelaus's house she appears as wife and hostess, who controls the spirit of the table. What does the scene suggest about how the couple lives with that past?

Odysseus concedes that Penelope is inferior to Calypso in appearance and stature, and yet he refuses immortality. What in the text explains his choice, and what does the text leave unexplained?

Zeus sends word that Odysseus will return without escort of gods or men, and soon after Ino and Athena help him at sea. Do these aids contradict Zeus's order, or do they fulfill it?

Odysseus asks Calypso for the oath by the Styx before he boards the raft. What does this demand say about the trust between the two after their life together on the island?

Odysseus asks the people who live there whether they are proud and unjust or hospitable. Nausicaa answers that every stranger comes from Zeus, but the maids flee from the naked man and she herself fears gossip. Is the Phaeacians' hospitality a sure rule, or a rule that depends on the courage of the one who applies it?

Odysseus chooses to beg from afar and then praises the girl, and the narrator calls his speech calculated. When is the care not to impose a kindness, and when is it calculation? Does the text force us to choose one of the two readings?

Nausicaa wishes for a husband like the stranger and, in the same speech, fears being seen with him. What holds her back, desire or care for her name, and what does this say about the girl's place among the Phaeacians?

Athena says the Phaeacians do not tolerate strangers, Nausicaa had said every stranger comes from Zeus, and the court leaves the suppliant among the ashes until an elder speaks. Is the Phaeacians' hospitality a matter of nature or of rite, and does what the arrival must receive depend on someone performing the rite?

Odysseus answers each question only with what suits him: he denies being a god, tells of Ogygia without giving its name, and says he did not want to follow Nausicaa. What is the difference between withholding what one tells and lying?

Alcinous offers his daughter to a man whose name he does not know, because he thinks as the king does. What makes someone worthy of entering a family? Compare with what Odysseus said to Nausicaa about the house in which husband and wife think in agreement.

Odysseus hides his weeping and hides his name, and only Demodocus's song makes him appear. What does the story of a man, sung by another, say about him that he cannot say himself?

Euryalus judges Odysseus by his appearance, and Odysseus answers with a theory about appearance and speech. Who else in the poem is seen from outside and understood only after speaking?

Alcinous says that no one is without a name and demands the guest's, after having given him an escort, a banquet, and gifts. What right does the host have to ask for the name, and what does the guest risk in saying it?

Odysseus says that he did not obey his companions in the cave, in order to see the owner and receive guest-gifts, and that obeying would have been "far more advantageous." How much curiosity and how much calculation is in this refusal, and what does it mean that he says it himself to the Phaeacians?

The name Nobody saves Odysseus, and the true name shouted from the sea condemns him. Why does he not resist giving his name, and what does Polyphemus do with it that "Nobody" did not allow?

Odysseus tells Polyphemus that Zeus punished him, and later Zeus refuses his sacrifice. What does the poem seem to say about who can invoke the justice of hospitality?

Odysseus says that he and his companions were lost "through our own folly," and later Eurylochus says the men of the Cyclops's cave died through Odysseus's folly. The poem sets the two sentences side by side. Which of them better describes what happened at Aeolus's and in the cave?

Circe turns men into swine and leaves their minds intact. What changes for one who knows what he is and cannot act? Compare with what the lotus does in the previous book.

Odysseus and the companions spend a year in Circe's house, and it is the crew that reminds him to leave. What does that year show about the force of return as Odysseus's motive?

Anticleia says she died of longing, and Laertes is wasting away in the countryside. What weight does this news carry for Odysseus's plan to return to Ithaca without announcing himself?

Agamemnon advises Odysseus to hide part of what he knows about Penelope, and in the next line says she is prudent. Do these two warnings contradict each other, or are they the same advice?

Achilles prefers to serve another rather than rule among the dead, but leaves glad on hearing about his son. What value does the book propose here as something that endures after death?

Circe orders that Odysseus be bound if he wants to hear the Sirens, and that the comrades tighten the cords if he asks to be released. Why does the poem let Odysseus listen, when it would have been enough to pass by with wax in everyone's ears, and what does the scene show about what he wants to know?

Odysseus hides the danger of Scylla from the men and warns them of the risk at the island of the Sun. In what way are the two decisions alike, and why does the second, even with a warning, end worse?

The proem says the comrades died through their own folly, and Eurylochus argues for a quick death over a slow hunger. Who decides at the island of the Sun: hunger, the absence of the leader, who sleeps, sent to sleep by the gods, or the men who swore the oath? Each answer changes whom the poem holds responsible.

Odysseus arrives asleep, escorted, and laden with gifts, and this is what irritates Poseidon. What would change in the return if he had arrived awake and with nothing, and what does the poem gain from this arrival?

Athena says that Odysseus will not stop deceiving even at home, and that is precisely why she does not abandon him. Is his cunning a virtue, a habit, or a limit? Does the answer change what is expected of him before Penelope?

Odysseus wants to test his wife before learning her condition, and Athena tells him that Penelope weeps nights and days. If he believed this, would the disguise still be necessary? What does the disguise protect, and what does it cost?

Eumaeus welcomes the guest "out of fear of Zeus and out of pity," without believing him. Does hospitality depend on believing what the guest says, or does it hold its worth precisely because it does not depend on that?

Odysseus says he hates the one who lies out of yielding to poverty, and he lies to carry out a plan. Does the distinction he draws between the two kinds of lies hold up, or does the book invite the reader to see irony in the distinction?

Eumaeus says the master will not return, and at the time of the sacrifice he prays that he will. Is it a rite without hope, or a hope he will not confess? Which reading fits the rest of the book better?

Menelaus says that detaining a guest and driving him away are equal evils. How does Telemachus apply this rule in the requests he makes to Menelaus and to Peisistratus?

Athena says that a woman forgets her first husband when she marries again. Does the book confirm this, or does it only use the idea? Why would the goddess say this to Telemachus?

Eumaeus and Odysseus say they take delight in remembered sorrows. What changes when the sorrow told is that of a slave kidnapped as a child, and the listener is his master, without the slave knowing?

Telemachus accepts his father only after Odysseus explains the change as the work of Athena. What, in that explanation, convinces more than the bare claim that he is the father?

Odysseus orders the secret kept even from Penelope and Laertes. What risks does the book show in this rule, and what does it cost those who are left out?

Amphinomus postpones Telemachus's death by consulting the gods, and Penelope appeals to Zeus of the suppliants. To what extent does the poem treat the justice of the gods as a real check on the suitors?

Eumaeus says that Zeus takes away half the excellence of one who falls into slavery, and he himself, a slave, remains faithful. Does the maxim describe Eumaeus, or is he the exception it fails to explain?

Argos recognizes Odysseus and dies; Eumaeus, who hosted him for three nights, does not recognize him. What does the poem do with this difference between the recognition by the dog and the recognition by the men?

Athena tells Odysseus to ask who is just and who is lawless, and warns that she will save no one. If the result of the test is already decided, what is it for, from the reader's point of view?

Odysseus wants to kill Irus and chooses to strike lightly because he does not want to be noticed by the Achaeans. What does this calculation say about what the disguise demands of him, and what does it cost?

Odysseus warns Amphinomus that the house will not be settled without blood, and Athena holds him in his seat. If the warning does not change his fate, why does the poem put it in the hero's mouth?

The narrator says Penelope draws gifts from the suitors while her mind thinks something else. What does the reader know of her plan after this sentence, and what does the poem leave unsaid?

Odysseus lies to Penelope with true details and hides his tears with eyes of horn or iron. What cost does a lie made of truths carry, for him and for her?

Penelope hears the dream of the husband's return, answers with the doubt of the two gates, and soon announces the contest of the bow. Does she already suspect who the guest is, or does she decide without knowing? What does the text support?

The name Odysseus is born of Autolycus's quarrel with many, and the scar comes from a hunt meant to receive gifts. What does this origin say about the hero who returns home for a settling of accounts?

In this book Odysseus thinks of killing the maids who lie with the suitors, and Telemachus speaks of them as women dragged about by the suitors. Who sees better what these women are, and what does the poem do with the two views?

The omen Odysseus asked of Zeus comes through the mouth of the weakest of the maids, not through a seer. Why does the poem give the voice of the sign to her, and what does that say about who sustains the house?

Athena promises Odysseus that he will take the oxen of fifty companies, but she does not say where he will flee after killing the suitors. What does his question reveal about what he fears, and why does she answer his strength and not his question?

Eurymachus fears that a beggar will string the bow with ease, and that is exactly what happens, in the same words. What does the poem gain by returning the suitors' mockery at the moment of the feat?

Penelope insists that the guest receive the bow, and Telemachus sends his mother upstairs, saying the bow is men's business. Who governs the house in this scene, and what does each speech reveal about the relationship between the two?

In the middle of the book the poem pauses to tell how Iphitus was killed at Heracles's table. What does that story teach about the bow and about hospitality, at the moment when the suitors violate Odysseus's table?

Odysseus refuses the compensation that Eurymachus offers and, in the same book, spares Phemius and Medon. What criterion does the text give for each of these decisions, and is it the same?

Telemachus trades the sword for the rope and gives the reason. What does this decision show about him, and what changes in the book because the narrator tells it with a simile of birds caught in a net?

Odysseus attributes the death of the suitors to the fate of the gods and to their deeds, and at the same time he is the one who killed them. How do these two things fit in the same speech?

Penelope only accepts Odysseus after the sign of the bed, and not after the scar that Eurycleia offered. What does the bed prove that the scar does not?

To explain the delay, Penelope cites Helen, who would not have gone with a foreigner had she known she would be taken back. What does this example say about her fear, and what does it say about Helen?

The false wedding protects Odysseus and costs Penelope her good name in the eyes of those who hear from outside. Does the poem note this cost? Where?

Achilles tells Agamemnon that it would have been better to die at Troy, with tomb and fame; Agamemnon answers that Achilles's fame was not lost, but his own was lost on the return. Which of the two deaths does the book present as the better, and what place does Penelope have in this reckoning?

Odysseus tests his father with a lie before revealing himself, and the old man throws dust on his own head. What does Odysseus gain from this test, what does it cost Laertes, and why do the orchard trees convince as much as the scar?

The civil war in Ithaca stops by order of Athena and Zeus, who commands that the death of the sons and brothers be "forgotten." Does a peace imposed from above settle the debt of the families, or does it only postpone the vengeance?