Unit 5
   English 201: 
  Masterpieces of Western Literature
.Unit 5 Reading Course Reading Entry Page
Introduction Background .Explication Questions Review

Review:

You met new characters.  You should be able to define who they are & what they represent:

You discovered euphemisms for familiar deities: You learned something about Homer's notion of utopia & why it must remain an unactualized ideal.  Nonetheless, the notion of utopia was elaborated by Plato in his longest work, The Republic & became a literary genre in Western literature, with variations on dystopia (such as in Dante's Inferno).  Dystopian literature also derives from Homer's Iliad as well as various monsters encountered in the ODY (e.g., Polyphemos).

We saw another illustration of the Greek paradox that, if trouble isn't itself a good thing, it strangely challenges us to perform feats & deeds that we would otherwise never attempt; & in so doing, we create an identity.  OD spurns Kalypso's maternal care that promised to keep him ever young & vital (we usually see this as very desirable, but it also implies remaining a dependent child) & grant his every wish (divine sex), except the one wish that OD so desparately hopes for: the freedom to be his own person.

In addition to the exotic elements of Phaiakian culture, we acknowledged the principle necessary to nurture a polis: tolerance for diversity.

We saw OD, not simply being tolerant, but genuinely charmed by & empathetic to girls.  One might expect a warrior (AK & PAT, e.g.) to take an interest in boys who will follow in their father's footsteps.  Or for a man to have a sexual interest in young women.  There is no evidence that this is the motive for OD's interest in, e.g., Nausikaa.  Not only is OD sincere when he says that she is as innocent as Artemis, a close reading of the exchange between OD & Arete concerning Nausikaa, confirms that OD is entirely respectful.  Nausikaa herself volunteered:
6.303    I myself should hold it shame
            for any girl to flout her own dear parents,
            taking up with a man, before her marriage

Notice also, the metaphor used to describe the victory at Troy:
9.537    the town sacked by Akhaians
            . . .raping the steep city

This song causes:
9.545    bright molten tears [to] run down his [OD] cheeks
            weeping the way a wife mourns for her lord
            on the lost field where he has gone down fighting

This is the end of unit 5.  Next week you will continue to study-read The Odyssey.  I know that this is a lot of work.  I hope you enjoy Homer.  Part of the pay off for all your work will be the ability to recognize that many contemporary Western values & even aphorisms ("not to everyone will the gods appear" 16.170; "the hour has come to cook their lorships' mutton" 21.451) can be traced back almost 3,000 years.  Americans, especially, are committed to progress & almost anything new & different.  Are you surprised to find out how conservative we are?  How little we Westerners have changed since the time of Homer?  

This sounds like a good Chat question to ask in our last unit on Homer.  See you next week.