Allen W. McLean is an author of speculative fiction, poetry and reviews.
He was born and raised in the Canadian suburbs of Brampton Ontario, and identifies as non-binary.
His wife April produces music and art as Electric Armchair; at her behest, Allen began sharing poetry on his book reviews and releases for the HaikuPrajna Collection, a library of his study notes for readers who will never consume the stories just as much as they are for those who have or want to.
Obsessed with forming stories since playing pretend as a child, his fiction today focuses on transcending one’s hindrances, with ideas from metaphysics, theology, yoga, mindfulness, meditation, and is inspired by sci-fi, comics and manga.
Allen has released over a dozen books, and his Bite-sized Insights have been collected online, in print and in public libraries around the Toronto area.
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Hello reader,
. Pre Script. I am so bad at shouting out these events.
We are at the Brampton Summer Artist Market at the Springdale branch of Brampton Library, Bramalea Road north of Sandalwood, on Sunday July 19 from 10:30am to 4PM! Bringing new charms, zines, books, stickers and art! Thank you for hosting us!
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. Date read . 20240819 . 20241208
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The Odyssey, by Homer, is by far one of my favorite books.
Although, I have been sitting on this review for almost two years now. So, instead of condensing this into a traditional HaikuPrajna review, I just did an edit to parse the study notes into a collection of ideas sorted by the twenty and three “Books” in the story of Odysseus.
I have a nice big physical tome at home that I have been leafing through while writing this haiku and pseudo-essay; I know this is read in curriculum some places around the world, but there is a reason Homer’s Odyssey is a timeless classic, it really is just that good.
Unable to recommend it enough, especially now that the Christopher Nolan adaptation is out.
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.Intro.
. “Odyssey”, “Odusseia”, “a series of adventurous journeys usually marked by many changes of fortune.”, “the story of Odysseus”
. The Introduction explains the context which Homer and the Odyssey reside, why it is structured the way it is, and its importance in literature, linguistics and history.
. While there is an outline of the Odyssey, from its inception it was meant to be a free flowing movement that is different in every performance. The Odyssey was more likely a serial of stories that were perfected orally, before being written, which was new at the time of Homer.
. Homer's poetry was transmitted by memory as songs, a history and culture preserved, by being shared.
. Crash course on the history of the alphabet. Homer and the heroes of literature were illiterate themselves, where the language was formed to tell the story. The writing came later.
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. Book One . “Athena Inspires The Prince”
. Odysseus’s men eating Sungod’s cattle is symbolic of men going against the will of the Gods, which is what Zeus says is causing their misfortune rather than the Gods causing their suffering. The problem of evil, explained at the dawn of written history.
. Gods warning men about their fates, like something already written but can be avoided by following the gods’ advice.
. Athena explicitly plotting the upcoming course of events while talking to Zeus is an example of the pantheon forming and executing their will.
. Calypso had kept Odysseus from returning home after Troy when most had succeeded in doing so.
. From One-liners to entire series of chapters, myths serve as inspiration for countless other epics.
. Poseidon being the one who curses Odysseus reveals the power ranking of the gods; Poseidon's will in this instance is greater than the other Olympians alone, so Zeus gets them together to help bring Odysseus home to Ithaca.
. Cool seeing Homeric characters and weapons, as kinds of status symbols, outside of the war depicted in the Iliad and Aeneid.
. Athena’s sandals, crossing the entire world in an instant. Practical explanations for the Gods being omnipresent, able to be anywhere because they are everywhere. Establishing the Gods as personifications of the forces of nature perceived by heroes who live close to or are in touch with nature.
. Preservation of the culture and customs of the times. Characters make most of their items and equipment, or were given to them by named heroes with their own tales.
. Telemachus asking a disguised Athena about his father's whereabouts is indicative of how communal civilization was at the time. Asking individuals for their stories, using Who What When Where Why, about their journey and the stories of their ship and its crew.
. Telemachus, son of the most unlucky mortal; unable to tell who birthed you, having to accept stories, with Death being a better fate, where his father being lost at sea was robbing Telemachus and Ithaca of an end to Odysseus’s story.
. Suitors from neighboring kingdoms and locals, inhospitable guests draining hosts dry. Xenia and hospitality, the suitors going against the will of the Gods, Penelope and Telemachus upkeeping it through stratagem.
. Athena gave Telemachus two different courses of fate, foreshadowing Odysseus's return, telling his son to kill the suitors himself if his father is dead. Telemachus recognizing the god in disguise as those he knows, following Athena's will.
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. Book Two . Telemachus Sets Sail
. Xenia, hospitality.
. The upholding of cultural customs; if Penelope's father gave her away to another man her position would be different, but the suitors were abusing her situation and hospitality in order to wait for her decision.
. Penelope’s weaving and unweaving her father's burial shroud as her deception, to stay in line with the will of the Gods. The suitors forced her to finish it, flat out refusing to leave until she returned to her father to have him marry her off again. These men literally acknowledge that Penelope is on a god-set path, just for them to defy the will of the gods by courting her anyway--denying omens meant to protect them, in order to issue threats at Telemachus and his party.
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. Book Three . King Nestor Remembers
. I often thought sacrifices to be wasteful, but these epics describe sacrifices as feasts, with the bones of the offering as what were offered to the gods.
. Characters remembering the Iliad, Trojan war stories. Ajax the lesser inciting Athena’s wrath through the rape of Cassandra, the prophet daughter of Troy's King Priam as well as Hector’s sister, in Athena's temple no less, is what caused the Achaean suffering. Nestor, among a host of other ships, left half of their comrades behind to sail home, Odysseus’s crew being among those who stayed.
. Lots of names and locations. It is fun to begin recognizing some names and locations, tying together a larger narrative composed of various ancient myths.
. Gods as personifications of forces of nature, intangible concepts, yet among the peoples, like modern superheroes; Athena straight up transforming from Mentor to an eagle in front of Telemachus and Nestor’s party.
. Nestor offered Telemachus his sons’ help, but also warned him of being too far from home for too long, another allusion to the psychological turmoil from Troy.
. An epic format that has been the inspiration of so many stories after it; to show a lineage’s youngest on a quest to find his father, who is then shown on his own quest back home, then showing their elder among them when reunited for the final battle to reclaim their kingdom.
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. Book Four . The King and Queen of Sparta
. Humble in the face of gods, with ego among men.
. Odysseus and Telemachus and Penelope being renowned over the kingdoms. Helen recounted Odysseus’s disguises during Troy, foreshadowing his return’s.
. Helen and Menelaus after the Iliad. Recounting her side of the Trojan story as that of a wife returning to her home after having been lured by the gods away from her husband.
. Sacrifice to the gods remaining important today, but in different ways. Sacrifice and suffering is necessary, but circumventing an otherwise certain fate can be done in other forms, in example with sacrificing one’s desires for a greater good. This symbolism is seen in Odysseus and Telemachus, in that they both lust for an epic adventure, a story, which when they do sacrifice the dream, meaning to be brought to an end, then they would get to return home.
. Boasting about beating the sea gods, when they should have been thanked for safe passage.
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. Book Five . Odysseus —Nymph and Shipwreck
.20240925
. Insight into the complex spiritual systems that characters have or share with society.
. Athena reminded by Zeus that the current misfortunes were the wills of gods, that Athena had chosen Ithaca’s present fate which she now desires to set straight, revealing that man’s desires are either accepted or denied by the gods.
. Divine retribution and justification; Odysseus being forced into infidelity is okay because, like Helen, Odysseus was accepting the will of the gods in order to avoid scorning the gods. Some things can be forgiven if explained that they were done in accordance with one's spirituality; thus the importance of one's day to day morality being kept intact. For example, for the pious epic hero, if one’s ethics or morality prevents them from harming others then they would avoid attempting to fight back an assailant, or if one is able to defend themselves then they would avoid fighting unless threatened, or if a god sent one on a crusade then they would avoid leaving an enemy alive, etc. Being drugged seemed to be another justificator, too, where one's will is taken away from them without their volition. It was the willful-act that could be equated to breaking one's moral code.
. Odysseus’s morality and ethics being unaffected by his suffering, using his own perceived unluckiness as the answer, where he was willing and able to endure whatever the will of gods fated him to, displaying a kind of fearful-yet-spitefilled reverence instead of an open defiance and an unwillingness to obey the powers that be. “Man of misery.”
. Giant killer, gods sleeping with mortals, proto-biblical, perhaps the flood was about the Olympians or even the Titans.
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. Book Six . The Princess and the Stranger
. Phaeacians. An esoteric rabbit hole.
. Gods able to inspire, or take over a mortal’s will, in addition to disguising oneself as them.
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. Book Seven . Phaeacia’s Halls and Gardens
. Immortal Guard Dogs, boys made of gold. Year round staggered harvests. Hermes worship. Phaeacian ships able to reach Euboea in one day on the edge of the world to visit Tityus the son of Mother Earth.
. Alcinous proclaimed his people to be as close kin to the gods as Giants and the Cyclops, that the gods sat with them undisguised, until recent, where now they come in disguise.
. Odysseus and hunger, belly like a begging dog. Reassuring that he is mortal and alike to the worst of sufferers.
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. Book Eight . A Day For Songs And Contests
. Ships that know their crews’ intents, needs no oars or steersmen, “wings of the wind they cross the sea’s huge gulfs, shrouded in mist and cloud--no fear in the world of foundering, fatal shipwreck.”
. Olympics, sport for fun, keep in shape.
. Phaeacian bard knowing stories of Odysseus and Troy.
. Odysseus asked to tell his hosts his name, where he's from, his parents, land and city, and the towns he's visited, why he weeps at the songs of Troy.
. “Surely no man in the world is nameless, all told. Born high, born low, as soon as he sees the light his parents always name him, once he’s born.”
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. Book Nine . In the One-Eyed Giant’s Cave
. “Odysseus, the great teller of tales, launched out on his story:”
. Lotus eaters, being prevented from returning home.
. Odysseus now being the last of his crew, the only one in Phaecia.
. Cyclopes as a hermit, unconcerned with neighbours, only laws are themselves, the opposite of Homeric era justice. A “ruthless brute” just for not replying to Odysseus.
. Odysseus and company taking refuge in the Cyclops’s cave, the Argive culture of xenia leading the company to take the food they found, allowing the Cyclops to trap them. Eater of Humans, direct son of Poseidon, acknowledges the gods only as equals.
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. Book Ten . The Bewitching Queen of Aeaea
. Bag of winds, and the crew's mutiny by opening it, sending them off course, as metaphor? A clever story to keep Odysseus innocent. King Aeolus saying it is proof the gods hate Odysseus, who overcame the mutiny instead of having deserters.
. Lands of god descendant, man-eating Giants. Lost all but his own ship here, half of the remaining turned to swine by Circe.
. Character dialogue matching prior narrative gives Odysseus a conversational tone.
. Hermes told Odysseus the only way to save his men was to bed Circe, giving him a counter drug. Eurylochus warning at first, then a second time, the crew’s disbelief in Odysseus.
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. Book Eleven . The Kingdom of the Dead
. Sent to Persephone with prayer instructions by Circe. Needing to fend off the dead until talking to Tiresias, Theban prophet, letting him drink the blood libations. Odysseus then met a crewmate who had just died, saw his mother who was alive when leaving for Troy and who died in grief waiting for her son to return, and his father Laertes presently suffering the same fate, sleeping among the crops on his private farm.
. Making promises to the dead, proper burials, threatening to steer him further from his goal; is less than Odysseus and co going to Hades [dying] and returning, and more about him overcoming the grief of loss; ‘One rule there is,’ the famous seer explained, ‘and simple for me to say and you to learn. Any one of the ghosts you let approach the blood will speak the truth to you. Anyone you refuse will turn and fade away.’
. Warning Odysseus to leave the cattle of Helios alone, also prophesying Odysseus’s death after having returned home, meaning Odysseus knew he would return if he just persevered.
. Odysseus forcing the chaotic mob of the dead to speak one by one, giving order. Odysseus unable to tell all for everyone's living children, but able to for those he fought alongside with.
. Troy warriors, myths like Sisyphus. Heracles’s ghost among the dead versus “the man himself” who is among the gods. These heroes and myths all knowing Odysseus. Fleeing because the dead all want to share their suffering with Odysseus, fearing a Gorgon head could be coming next, all vying for the ability to alter the mortal world again.
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. Book Twelve . The Cattle of the Sun
. Circe’s warnings for sirens and other terrors, such as “Brute Force”, the mother of Scylla, another example of immortals as personifications of immaterial concepts.
. Told to leave Helios’s cattle alone. Odysseus brooding over Circe cramping his style.
. Odysseus was forced back to Calypso after losing his crew. Events happening in two different places, Circe and Calypso sleeping with him, Scylla and Charybdis, two different mythical civilizations Aeolia and Phaeacia. All potential distractions from his return to Ithaca, presented with two evils, and choosing the middle way.
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. Book Thirteen . Ithaca At Last
. Poseidon punishing Phaeacians for their hospitality of Odysseus, Atlantis myth. Athena commending him for his trickery, ego and storytelling.
. “... all the trials you must suffer in your palace... Endure them all. You must. You have no choice. ... No, in silence you must bear a world of pain, subject yourself to the cruel abuse of men.”
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. Book Fourteen . The Loyal Swineherd
. Lying being condemned by all, including Odysseus himself, however Athena praised Odysseus for his trickery and storytelling; Odysseus being capable of transcending lying into a useful weapon. Penelope also led the suitors on, doing what was necessary to survive and appease the gods. Irony that Odysseus tells the truth in the middle of his made up story, and is called a liar for the truth about himself.
. Poseidon was upset with Odysseus for defying the gods, being god-like, while Athena praised his self-centred ego. Gods being incapable of lying, or otherwise their lies are for the good and harbour a hidden truth.
. Tricks, figuring out ways of using the rules to one’s advantage, rather than disregarding the rules to do what one wishes.
. Book Fifteen . The Prince Sets Sail for Home
. “...catch my drift... Thanks to Hermes the guide, who gives all work of our hands the grace and fame that it deserves, no one alive can match me at household chores...”
. Relaying hardships to peers, finding joy in one's suffering, turning it into a good story.
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. Book Sixten . Father and Son
. Similes used to convey exposition; “As a father, brimming with love, welcomes home his darling only son in a warm embrace--what pain he’s borne for him and him alone!--home now, in the tenth year from far abroad, so the loyal swineherd hugged the beaming prince, he clung for dear life, covering him with kisses, yes, like one escaped from death. Eumaeus wept and sobbed, his words flew from the heart:”
. Eurymachus telling Penelope to stop worrying about the other suitors killing Telemachus, because he would do it himself, seeing himself as being reared by Odysseus.
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. Book Seventeen . Stranger at the Gates
. Suitors and citizens being prone to being bullies, rude to beggars and other herdsmen; Melanthius kicking Odysseus, keeps his mind in full control instead of lashing back. A fable, careful who you attack for they could be your master in a disguise.
. Argos was a good doggo.
. One losing their virtue and moral fibre by being enslaved, in that they lose the zeal to perform their duties, even after being liberated; “Slaves, with their lords no longer there to crack the whip, lose all zest to perform their duties well. Zeus, the Old Thunderer, robs a man of half his virtue the day the yoke clamps down around his neck.” I take this to be decidedly anti-slavery, in that rather than suggesting the whip always be present, the whip is what steals one’s virtue, which is difficult if not impossible to reclaim.
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. Book Eighteen . The Beggar-King of Ithaca
. Odysseus laying out one of the suitors, being given a sausage in reward, then further condemning and warning Amphinomus of what he will do next to the suitors.
. Odysseus’s warning contain lines on innate human suffering, being blind to one's future suffering until too late, when one must bear them and steel one's heart. The need for laws to avoid this blindness and accept what the gods grant them.
. An unwitting Penelope luring in all the suitors with her revelation that her son is of age now and that she must, per her husband's request, find another man to marry. Suitors now bearing gifts to her, when they had been eating for free.
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. Book Nineteen . Penelope and Her Guest
. Characters like Penelope and Telemachus willing to relate everything back to their anguish over Odysseus. Penelope, “Odysseus. There was a man, or was he all a dream?”
. Odysseus, “man of pain”, “agent and victim both” inflicting and suffering.
. Instances of gore, descriptive violence, reminiscent of other mythology, Iliad, Beowulf, and more contemporary pieces of media like Moby Dick or Bloodborne.
. The story of the scar that Eurycleia recognizes Odysseus with completed his character’s history, detailing his naming and an exploit during his youth.
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. Book Twenty . Portents Gather
. Odysseus witnessing the maids of his house running off to sleep with the suitors of his wife
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. Book Twenty-One Odysseus Strings His Bow
. Moral wisdom from the suitors, facing death when failing to accomplish one's temptations, “Still, better be dead than live on here, never winning the prize that tempts us all--forever in pursuit, burning with expectation every day.”
. Odysseus testing the swine and cow herds, themes of Xenia, a human example of the concept of “beggar is a deity in disguise”. For the herdsmen, even if they believe that it is their returned king, they need to also trust that he is capable of fighting off the army of suitors, or be okay with dying in arms beside him.
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. Book Twenty-Two . Slaughter in the Hall
. Is framed just like any other classic tragedy, with Odysseus and the suitors having their chances to monologue to one another.
. Suitors having taken advantage of another's hospitality, Odysseus had righteous fury to enact justice and claim divine retribution.
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Book Twenty-Three . The Great Rooted Bed
. Penelope seeing Odysseus for the first time in years as a symbol recurrent in heroic couples ever since.
. Him standing in silence and waiting, and her testing to see if he was an illusion or the real Odysseus.
. Odysseus having fashioned his bed out of an olive tree he built his bedroom around.
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Thank you for reading,
Until next time!
Allen W. McLean
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These poems will be collected in future editions of the HaikuPrajna Collection.
