Odysseus Is Not a Hero Term Paper

How irrational it is of Odysseus to say to the Cyclops after several men have been eaten, " You ought to be ashamed of yourself; how can you expect people to come see you any more if you treat them in this way?' (Book IX) the Cyclops obviously does not want people to visit him!

Another fault that makes Odysseus an anti-hero and therefore a bad king is how stubbornly prideful he is. An example of this behavior is when he is escaping the island of the Cyclops and decides to jeer at him from the sea and boast by telling him his true name. Odysseus tells that even his men "begged and prayed of me to hold my tongue." (Book IX) Had Odysseus not further taunted the Cyclops, the monster would not have learned Odysseus's real name (and his father's name, and his birthplace!) and therefore called down the wrath of gods upon the ships. Another stubborn behavior of Odysseus is that he refuses to let anyone else steer the ship because he is the captain. Because of this, when they are approaching land, they wind up off course again because he falls asleep at the wheel. "We got so close in that we could see the stubble fires burning, and I, being then dead beat, fell into a light sleep, for I had never let the rudder out of my own hands." (Book X)

Odysseus yet again shows his stubborn pride when he challenges Circe's advice that Scylla cannot be beaten, and asks how he might defeat her rather than simply escape. "So stubborn! Scylla's no mortal, no fighting her, no defense" (275)

Odysseus is also far too selfish to be heroic. When his companions were brutally smashed to death by the Cyclops, his thought was not one of mourning but of scheming " some way of taking my revenge and covering myself with glory." (Book IX) He is also selfish because he was keeping all of the riches of the travels for himself, and not sharing them with his crew, even though they had traveled as far and worked as hard, if not harder, than Odysseus himself. In Book X, this comes back to haunt Odysseus when his men realize how unfair that is and accidentally open the sack of Poseidon's wind, causing the ships to go far off course. "What fine prizes he is taking home from Troy, while we, who have traveled just as far as he has, come back with hands as empty as we set out with," think his.....