# 1.1 The Odyssey: a first encounter

You may be wondering how, if the Odyssey is such a long poem which forms part of an even longer story, everything is going to fit into a 6-hour course! Don’t worry, you are not going to be expected to get to grips with the entire text. Instead you’ll gain an overview of the story before focusing in on a key episode – the reunion of Odysseus with his wife Penelope – as a way of thinking about some of the poem’s characters, poetic techniques and important themes.

To get you started, the plot of the Odyssey has been condensed into an animation which is less than three minutes long. Your first activity involves watching this animation to get an overview of the story which this poem tells.

## Activity 1

Allow around 20 minutes for this activity

Watch the short animation, ‘Troy Story II’, which gives a brief overview of the plot of the Odyssey.

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Transcript

Watch the whole animation once without taking notes. Then replay it and fill in the table below with a few notes summarising the role of each of the characters listed.

Aim to write a sentence or two, or a couple of bullet points, for each.

##

Character name | Brief description
--- | ---
Odysseus | (A text entry box would appear here, but your browser does not support it.)
Penelope | (A text entry box would appear here, but your browser does not support it.)
Telemachus | (A text entry box would appear here, but your browser does not support it.)
Athena | (A text entry box would appear here, but your browser does not support it.)
Poseidon | (A text entry box would appear here, but your browser does not support it.)

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### Discussion

Your completed table might look something like this:

##

Character name | Brief description
Odysseus | King of Ithaca, who spends ten years journeying home after the war at Troy. His journey is delayed by various supernatural characters and a long stay on the island of Ogygia with the nymph Calypso.
Penelope | Wife of Odysseus, who waits faithfully for him in his 20-year absence despite being pestered by 108 suitors who want to marry her.
Telemachus | Son of Odysseus and Penelope. In the poem he travels in search of news of his father while Odysseus is on his way home, and he helps his father to kill the suitors of Penelope.
Athena | Daughter of Zeus; the goddess who supports Odysseus, including by disguising him as a beggar when he first returns to Ithaca.
Poseidon | Sea god who tries to stop Odysseus from returning home (he is angry because Odysseus blinded the Cyclops, Poseidon’s son).

You probably noticed when watching the animation that there is a much larger cast of characters – both human and divine – in the poem than those who you were asked to look out for in Activity 1. These include the suitors back on Ithaca, and the Phaeacians who help Odysseus on the final leg of his journey, as well as the various monstrous or supernatural figures who intercept him. Epic poetry really does do everything on a grand scale – whether in terms of the length of the text and the timescales of the stories involved, the larger than life characters and the exploits they undertake, or the sheer number of people involved. In the next section you’ll think about a particular character type – the hero.

OpenLearn - Exploring Homer’s Odyssey
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