What Is Manliness? How Is It Shown in the Journey of Odysseus and in the Tragedy of Achilles and Hector?

Question no. 1

What is manliness? How is it shown in the journey of Odysseus and in the tragedy of Achilles and Hector?

When talking about manliness, the very first thing that comes into my mind is being powerful. Powerful in a positive sense but when power being abused, thus manliness can be subjected to negativity. Powerful, where one possesses an enormous amount of strength, full of courage, confident with his ability and own attributes of being a true man, man of virtue. Connoting manliness as being powerful, we can relate it to being a good and respected leader wherein he is independent, strong and has no room for weakness in his heart. He wanted to develop not just his own personality but also ego of others. Shows consideration for others. An assured leader and logical thinker. We live in a world that is full of challenges and competitions and we are all fixated in achieving perfection, we all aim for victory and excellence. Thus, manliness is also about never ending courage. The brave heart one possesses. In the softer side, manliness is about being humble, patient, supportive and helpful. A man, who is good, knows what is right from wrong. A man by virtue, who do good not for the sake of being good, but doing well because that is what he wants. He is morally upright in the eyes of the others yet doesn’t exalt himself.

Looking at the other side of the moon, manliness can also be subjected to negativity. When we are being so much attached in aiming excellence, sometimes we unconsciously do bad deeds. Sometimes we do harm to others not knowing that we also harm ourselves. When we are in between different competitions, we try to think of ways on cheating just to ace and win something. We should bear in mind that excellence is not just about triumph and victory. It is also about the accomplishment of overcoming fear and failure. It is about trying something which is better than to do nothing at all. It is winning something without the greediness in our hearts. Another thing is about a man’s confidence. Too much of this will lose its true notion. When one is over confident, he is to think that he is superior to any other, that he is dominant. Thus, one would not seek approval of others since he knew in himself that he prevails, therefore he is always right. Just like Odysseus. He doesn’t want his orders being ignored at once and unattended by his crew. He gets angry easily and out of temper sometimes.

How is manliness shown in the journey of Odysseus? Odysseus is a wise, witty, powerful leader. He knew the right things to do and showed the attributes of a true leader, being a supportive