A Guide to the Odyssey: A Commentary on the English Translation of Robert Fitzgerald (45 page)

222
your boy’s a bearded man:
For the specific meaning of this, see 336–37.

235–48
Homer manages to give Odysseus credit for warning Amphínomos, yet, by staging the intervention of Athena, have him die with the other suitors. In the same way, Homer has Penélopê modestly refuse to be beautified (225–29), yet, through the intervention of Athena be “endowed … with immortal grace” (241).

252–58
Death as an escape from “heart-ache” is Penélopê’s fondest wish, or at least one of them. It wouldn’t be thought macabre, simply realistic. This utterance could have aroused in listeners the thought of another plot line, that Penélopê might die of grief while, unbeknownst to her, her husband was in the house.

265–67
that instant weakness …:
Homer is direct (and I daresay accurate) about the powerful physical effect desire can have on those who don’t suppress their lust.

268–69
But speaking for …:
The suitors can see that Penélopê and Telémakhos are having a discussion, but they cannot hear the words (see also 304–5).

270–94
Telémakhos, what has come over you?:
See 70–78, above.

306–13
Eurýmakhos called out to her:
Eurýmakhos is always the first with honeyed words.

315–48
Eurýmakhos, my qualities
…: This is one of the most moving, and at the same time craftiest, of speeches. First, Penélopê rejects the compliment to her beauty, saying that it departed with Odysseus (315–18). She wishes for his return, for that alone would give her joy; until that time, only grief is her lot (319–21). Then she recalls Odysseus’ parting words to her (322–24) and cites them (325–37), although we can imagine she chooses them selectively. They are touching indeed (as is the traditional gesture she describes in line 323). Note in particular the portion of Odysseus’ injunctions with which she ends her quotation, thus giving it prominence: “Wait for the beard to darken our boy’s cheek; / then marry whom you will, and move away” (336–37). Lest the suitors miss the point of this, she says it straight out, although with as much reluctance as she can muster: “the time has come for me to remarry, as even my absent husband told me” (338–41). That it is her husband’s command, so she says, removes any criticism of her. If this was what Odysseus had told her, he would indeed have felt the urgency to get back to Ithaka.

The final lines (342–48) are all based on the assumption that Penélopê has at last, in principle, accepted her suitors, although she never says this explicitly: she simply upbraids them for being bad suitors, and, in particular, for living off her house instead of bringing her gifts. The coyness and feigned wounded pride of “a gentlewoman / daughter of a rich house, if they are rivals,” 344–45, are really delicious. All is brilliantly calculated for the suitors, her audience.

Or is the stranger the real audience for this performance? Could she have an inkling, an intuition who it is?

330
decisive when a battle hangs in doubt:
Or “in battle, the great leveller”: the meaning of the Greek [264] is disputed.

351
she intended none:
If this (i.e., no marriage) is understood
as belonging to Odysseus’ train of thought, we must ask how he knows what is going on in Penélopê’s mind. On the one hand, this may be one of those instances where a main character is made to share in the narrator’s omniscience. On the other hand, Odysseus, however, is the only man who can judge the truth, and therefore the meaning, of the speech, including words attributed to him, which she has just delivered (325–37). He may know that she is fooling the suitors and hatching a plot. I prefer this approach to simply claiming that he could intuit the meaning of his like-minded wife, however plausible that may seem.

356–58
Antínoös is not one to leave the condition unspoken, which, in ways the audience can appreciate, Penélopê will be able to fulfill: she will take the best man for her lord—he is present in the person of Odysseus—and then the unsuccessful suitors will go … elsewhere. (Where exactly they go we’ll see at XXIV.1–228.)

359–73
Pleased at this answer …:
Penélopê’s speech brings something back into the household coffers from which so much has flowed for so many years. Odysseus appreciates the cleverness of this as well (see 349). Nor is this concern with revenue unepic: we recall the care with which he stashed the treasure he received from the Phaiákians (XIII.454–66): one cannot be a gift-and hospitality-giving lord with nothing in the storehouse.

383–423
Odysseus offers (although at first in a peremptory tone more befitting their master) to take over the task of tending the torches so that the serving maids can withdraw to attend their mistress, which would be more fitting. The response he receives shows both Odysseus and Homer’s audience the depths to which some of the women have sunk. They sense (423) the truth of his dire threat (418–20), for that is what he will order Telémakhos to do (XXII.493–94), although Telémakhos will devise his own punishment (XXII.513ff.).

391–92
offer light / to everyone:
Frequently taken to be a metaphoric or symbolic reference to the victory and release he will
soon bring to the house—but the light he will offer to some of the maids will expose their treachery.

394
patient man:
polytlêmôn
[319], “much-suffering.” As a
poly-
epithet for Odysseus, it fits into the system established in the first verse of the epic [
polytropon
, I.1].

397
Melántho is Melánthios’ sister, and, from the sauciness of her response, we see that they share much more than their father, Dólios.

427–514
They, for their part, could not now be still
…: The second of three occasions on which an encounter between the disguised Odysseus and the suitors climaxes in a projectile being hurled at the disguised hero. A comparison of the salient differences (for a summary, see XVII.605–12, above) highlights what characterizes this particular instance, namely, that Eurýmakhos in this case provokes the attack, that this time Telémakhos raises a protest, and that the suitors, while first laying the blame on Odysseus, are in the end forced to accept Telémakhos’ criticism. By no means does this exhaust the possibilities for contrasts: for example, this is the only one of the parallel episodes in which Athena’s governing intention is thematized (427–29).

434–37
hear what my heart would have me say …:
Eurýmakhos attributes his sudden urge to his
“thumos
in his breast” [
thumos eni stêthessi
, 352]. We know, of course, that Athena put this thought there (see 427–514, immediately above, and 200ff., also above). His blindness, even of his own motivation, is underscored in the next two lines, the irony of which emerges from a more literal rendering: “not without a god does this man come into Odysseus’ hall” [
ouk atheei hod’ anêr Odusêïon es domen hikei
, 353]. Truer words were never spoke, for Athena is indeed with him.

441
raider of cities:
A good example of the thematization of a contextually inappropriate epithet. The point is that, unbeknownst to Eurýmakhos, the bald fellow to whom he jokingly offers farm labor is the fierce and famous fighter the epithet so
accurately describes, as Eurýmakhos will discover to his woe in
Book XXII
.

443
to work:
Neither Odysseus nor any member of his family has any aversion to working the land. This was widely considered proper and even healthy, in contrast to the work of traders and merchants, so clearly despised by the Phaiákian Seareach (VIII. 170–74, see VIII. 167–73, above). Eurýmakhos expresses comparable contempt for work Greeks would have regarded in no way dishonorable in itself by using the verb
thêteuemen
[357], “to be a
thete,”
that is, a day laborer or hired hand, not simply an agriculturalist. This is yet another sign of the suitors’ arrogance and debauchery. (See IV.689, above, where
thetes
comes disparagingly from Antinoös’ mouth.)

449–75
Oh no …:
Eurýmakhos, revealing more about his own attitudes than about any beggar, assumes that this “beggar” would refuse his offer of work (449–50). In his response, Odysseus at least pretends to be prepared to take him up on it, but he changes the terms of the offer: the case he describes would have him working not for wages but in a competition with Eurýmakhos (453–54), a competition which Odysseus skillfully moves from scything (456–58) and plowing (459–63) to a “competition in arms” (464ff.) that readily suggests he would be a direct threat to Eurýmakhos. Just like Odysseus (473–75)! This last section foreshadows Books XXI and XXII, which will involve a “competition in arms” (archery) that rapidly develops into Odysseus’ attack on his competitors. There the doors will be closed.

487–97
“Ai!” they said …:
The suitors take Eurýmakhos’ side here, stung equally, we can presume, by the beggar’s words (470–75), which, while addressed to Eurýmakhos, apply to them all. We know that Athena is about to sway their consciousness too (see also 428–29). Indeed, Telémakhos pronounces more truth than even he realizes when he says, “some god / is goading you” (496–97).

498–99
I mean when you are moved to …:
Telémakhos is
not ready to assert full control and pulls back from a direct order, though with evident bitterness. (“Struck by his blithe manner” in line 500 is the translator’s modernizing variant on Homer’s simple formula “so he spoke” [410].)

502–13
but now the son of Nísos …:
Once again, the counsel of Amphínomos, the “good” suitor, wins the others over. Ironically, it also makes the further plotting of Odysseus and Telémakhos possible—and that will lead to the destruction of all suitors, Amphínomos included.

509–10
let my own herald wet our cups once more …:
The proverbial “one for the road.”

1–17
At XVI.333–56, Odysseus gave Telémakhos a full set of instructions about removing the arms from the hall, saying first (XVI. 334–36) that at Athena’s signal to him he would nod to Telémakhos to indicate that the time had come. In fact, here at the opening of
Book XIX
, he gives an only slightly abbreviated edition of these instructions. If we are inclined to regard this unexpected repetition as an inconsistency, we could claim that in
Book XVI
Odysseus wisely set things up for a situation in which he didn’t expect he would have the opportunity to speak openly to Telémakhos. But as it turned out, he now has such an opportunity. Without dismissing that argument, it seems more sensible and more in tune with Homeric aesthetics to see the virtual repetition—not in this case a variation—as the marker of a new episode or movement. No wonder that early editors marked this as the start of a new book, especially since the previous book had ended with a reference to going to bed (see also I.491, above).

1
by Athena’s side:
Athena’s presence is incontrovertible at line
44, and, in the discussion between father and son which then ensues (47–63), the role of the gods is thematized. But in line 1, the Greek is less specific: Odysseus is plotting death for the suitors “with Athena” [
sun Aihênêi
, 2], a formulation so transparent that it could suggest Athena’s visible presence or, at the other end of the scale, inspire later allegorizers to see Athena as a mere manifestation of Odysseus’ own intelligence—a pale concept compared with Homer’s vision.

4–17
On the characteristic craftiness of Odysseus, priming Telémakhos at this point with multiple plausible (if false) justifications for his actions—“just in case”—and for the capping proverb, see XVI.339–52 and 350–51, respectively, above.

20–27
He called Eurýkleia …:
In sharp contrast to the other maids, some of whom are traitors, Eurýkleia is the one member of the household proper who is trusted; indeed, she is suffered to learn some facts before even Penélopê does. Nevertheless, in lines 23–26 Telémakhos gives her the substance of the first lie that Odysseus had suggested Telémakhos palm off on the suitors if they called his actions into question.

31–39
Telémakhos shows that he too can improvise.

44–51
This marks a new stage in the degree to which Athena permits her presence to be noticeable to Telémakhos.

53–54
Be still
…: Odysseus continues his instruction of Telémakhos in the ways of the gods and the proper manner for mortals to interact with them. See also XVI.308–19, above.

62–63
while in the great hall …:
These two lines repeat the first two lines of the book exactly [1–2 = 51–52]. This is the classic closure for a “ring” (see IX.41–43 and XV.314, above), marking this as a self-contained, but not therefore necessarily dispensable, compositional building block.