Narrative focal point Odysseus Essay
& # 8217 ; Odyssey Essay, Research PaperTelemachus & # 8217 ; OdysseyThe Odyssey, though named for the great warrior and narrative focal point Odysseus, can non be soley regarded as a individual adult male & # 8217 ; s journey. The growing in mind, adulthood, and strength the Odysseus undergoes is reflected clearly in his boy, Telemachus. In the first books, other characters continue to handle him much as a kid, and in many respects, Telemachus still acts like one. The first few books illustrate the relationship between Telemachus and his male parent, a male parent he has hardly known. When Odysseus left his married woman and kid, Telemachus was still an baby. For his privation of a male parent, Athena acts as a wise man to him ; peculiarly when she gives him the bravery to journey from his place in hunt of his male parent.
Had he non the bravery here, he could non hold stood against the suers & # 8217 ; volitions in the concluding books.Telemachus & # 8217 ; s emotional growing is cardinal to the paralleling plot lines. When Menelaus mentions his male parent, the immature Telemachus interruptions down in cryings, bewraying his immatureness. However, the pride he feels go forthing Sparta intimations at the bravery he shows in later books, helping Odysseus against the suers.Odysseus faces a similar state of affairs. He, like Telemachus, worries about his household? Penelope in peculiar? and land, perchance triggered by Proteus & # 8217 ; reference of Agamemnon, who was killed by his ain married woman. The titular hero of this heroic poem love affair laments his looking destiny and the deceases of his crew, but continues with the bravery and hope of making place.
It seems that Odysseus learns little, unlike Telemachus, but non by any mistake of his ain, I think. He may merely be the prototype of Grecian criterions, clever and baronial as he frequently is, and really has small room to turn.For Telemachus, the ends he sets reflect the adulthood he additions: to make a degree of maturity and to stand by his male parent & # 8217 ; s side, to protect his household and land, and most significantly, to be respected as a adult male.
At the narrative & # 8217 ; s onset, Telemachus can bee seen as an inactive immature prince. When the challenges rise, nevertheless, Telemachus himself rises to run into them. He challenges the suers with his divinely-inspired bravery, and, though non wholly effectual, he surprised them a great trade with his authorization? as he did with his ain female parent in ulterior books.
Telemachus doubtless additions a new consciousness, non merely about his male parent, but besides about the land, his female parent, and the function he needed to play. By the terminal of his long emotional journey, Telemachus realizes what it takes to be a adult male ; a effort which could non hold been possible without his adventures to Pylos and Sparta.The cardinal minute, the point at which Telemachus exceeds even his ain outlooks if non dreams, comes when Penelope offers the challenge of Odysseus & # 8217 ; bow. Each of the suers attempts and fails, but Telemachus makes the same command for his birthright ; he could hold strung the bow, but for his male parent & # 8217 ; s signal non to. Had Telemachus succeeded, he would hold been to the full grown, but at the clemency of the vindictive suers. Odysseus & # 8217 ; disclosure catches them off-guard plenty to do his assault. Telemachus, we can safely presume, will someday presume his male parent & # 8217 ; s topographic point as hero and male monarch of Ithaca, because he undergoes parallel ordeals and is a lucifer in strength and bravery.
The Odyssey creates a analogue for readers, between Odysseus and Telemachus, male parent and boy. Telemachus learns the function of his male parent, the male monarch of Ithaca, in order to follow in his footfalls. The two are compared in the verse form from every facet, Telemachus at place frequently moving as a distant foil for Odysseus. However, in analysing The Odyssey, one may besides assume that Homer had non intended for the Telemachus to be every bit great a hero as his male parent had. This may be due to the fact that he ne’er fought in the Trojan War ( his scene, unlike his male parent & # 8217 ; s, is a clip of peace ) ; but more notably, although he has matured, Telemachus ne’er has the chance to larn through adversity, like his male parent.
