This Is The Last Time I Wrote A Post About This - Tumblr Posts

Hi! Aaron here, if you don´t know me I´m a just a silly guy here on tumblr.🖐

But I have seen so many posts that Odysseus is a womanizer, incel or whatever; usually is from people that had a tenuous understanding of The Odyssey and when talked to are so kind and really interested in that. Nobody is born with knowledge of everything and I respect that (I don´t know everything either)

And I usually reply with long posts so nothing I say is forgotten, but what get´s me on my nerves is after having a civilized and kind conversation with the op´s the next comment usually is something like: yeah Odysseus SUCKS!! or Odysseus is a pos (regarding his fidelity and love to Penelope), skipping over the fact that:

First, I try to talk about the Homeric version (canon) not other retellings (Madelleine Miller´s Circe comes up so many times, I´m not saying I hate her book, I have a love-hate relation with that book for other reasons)

Second, op said they were wronged or had a skewed perception of the matter and changes the post (usually) and alter the tags to say sorry or something.

Third, I´m usually not the only one who shares information regarding the topic, there´s so much people more knowledgeable than me in that matter and mythology in general (YOU HAVE MY UPMOST RESPECT AND PLEASE IF I´M WRONG CORRECT ME!!)

And so many people become upset when other says, read the reblogs and see, they become offended and so on.....

What I´m try to say please let the poor man alone, he had enough of that. He is a pos, but not in that matter, he´s a pathological liar, there´s no denying that.

But if you need proof that Odysseus was forced into sleeping with Circe and Calypso, here it is:

Circe´s case

I apologize before hand as my book is in Spanish and because of that has a tendency of calling Odysseus Ulises (Spanish translation of the latin Ulixes)

translation:

...and I hugged her knees, supplicant and the goddess heard my voice.

And with winged words I said:

-Oh Circe! keep up the promise you have to send me to my home, as my soul compels me, and my comrades pound my cherished heart sobbing around me when I´m not with you.

That´s how i spoke and the noble goddess answered my act

-Divine son of Laertes, cunning Odysseus, stay no more in palace against your will...

The knee hugging was the utmost vulnerable action an Homeric character could do, Priam hugged Achilles knees imploring Achilles to let him have the body of Hector (his son), it is shown when a character is in such poor situation, they´re begging for mercy, not casually.

This is a snippet of the end of Chant VIII, in this chant he narrates everything of what happened in Aiaia (Circe´s island) There are more fragments where is reiterated that his there against his will and is not happy there.

Calypso´s case

This so heart-breaking T T

V Chant

“Said so the powerfull Argophontes (Hermes), he rosed, and the venerable nymph (Calypso) after hearing Zeus’s orders went where the magnificent Odysseus was.

She found him in the shore, with never ending tears that never dried as his sweet life was being consumed by grief, longing for the Returning (Nostoi), as the nymph wasn’t kind to him. Although at night he slept with her in the concave cave, with whom (Calypso) she longed; the day was spent alone, crying and sitting at the shore, his heart ravaged in tears, screams and pains, contemplating the untameable sea with bitter cries.”

And this is his answer after Calypso says he is going to be freed

Said so, the pacient and divine Odysseus, shacking, answered with these winged words.

-Surely you have another thought, nymph, different of my part when you send to cross the sea on a raft the immense waters of the sea, terrible and scary, that even the symmetrical boats helped by Zeus´s breath would crossed those scathed. I will not go to the raft, as you wish, if you don´t vow to the gods that you are not plotting my demise before hand.