Odyssey Case

Odyssey

"A boy can learn a lot from a dog: obedience, loyalty, and the importance of turning around three times before lying down." Robert Benchley said this quote. This compares with the loyalty that happens in the novel.In the novel, The Odyssey, by Homer, there are three characters that show faithfulness and show loyalty to Odysseus throughout his journey home and those characters are Penelope, Telemachus, and Athena. These three characters will remain faithful and loyal to Odysseus throughout his journey home even though he has been missing for 20 years.

Penelope's faithfulness and loyalty is key in the book. Penelope is Odysseus faithful wife and her role in the novel is to not re-marry to one of the suitors because she has faith that Odysseus is still alive and will some day come home to IthacaShe says, " On her loom in her house she set up a great web and began weaving a large and delicate piece of work. She said to us: my lords, my suitors, now that noble Odysseus is dead, restrain your ardour, do not urge on this marriage till I have done this work, so that the threads I have spun may not be altogether wasted. It is a shroud for Lord Laertes... So by day she used to weave at the great web, but every night had torches set beside it and undid the work. For three years she took us in by this trick,"(Homer 20 Line 95-106). This quote is important because it tells the reader that she is still in love with Odysseus even though he's been gone for 20 years; she's stayed loyal to him. She unweaves the Shroud at nighttime and then works on it during the day, which allows her to buy some time with the suitors. Penelope being loyal and faithful affected the success Odysseus achieves in returning home and calming his rightful place as head of the state of Ithaca because she did not marry one of the suitors because she had faith he one day would return to her. This is how Penelope was loyal and faithful to Odysseus.

Telamachus is a very loyal character in the book. Telamachus is the son of Odysseus and his job is to go on a journey to try to find information on where his father has been. Mentes, a friend of Odysseus, gives Telemachus the courage to stand up to his mother's suitors and to go on adventures to try to find information about where Odysseus is. "Mother, he said, why grudge our loyal bard the right to entertain us as the spirit moves him? Surely it is not the poets who are responsible for what happens, but Zeus himself, who deals with each of us toilers on earth as he sees fit? We cannot blame Phemius if he chooses to sing of the Danaan's tragic fate for it is always the latest song that an audience applauds the most. You must be brave and nerve yourself to listen, for Odysseus is not the only who has never returned form Troy. Troy was the end of much another man. So go to your quarters and attend your own work, the loom and the spindle,