Odysseus - an Epic Hero

An Epic hero

Epic heroes are characters in an old poem or story that people can

relate to for admire. In the epic poem The Odyssey by Homer,

Odysseus is that epic hero. Odysseus faced many difficult situations as

an epic hero, and made some bad decisions as an ordinary man,

both which show his strengths and weaknesses.

One part of the poem that shows how Odysseus is an epic hero was when

he sharpened an olive tree and jabbed it in Polyphemus’s

lonely one eye, so him and his men can escape. “Now by the gods, I

drove my big hand spike/ deep in the embers charring it again/

and cheered my men along with the battle talk/ to keep their courage

up: No man quitting now.” [Book 9 lines 282-285] This quote

illustrates how Odysseus jabbed the olive tree in Polyphemus’s eye. The

thought of home, and him and his men free made him blind

Polyphemus.

The term ordinary man relates to making mistakes, which was what

Odysseus did in book 10. Odysseus’s temptation’s made him

make a mistake and cheat on his wife Penelope for Circe. “We two/ shall

mingle and make love upon out bed. / So mutual trust may

come of play and love.”[Book 10 lines 66-68] That quote represents

Circe’s proposal to Odysseus to sleep with her, and which he