CLASSICS 1B03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Eurycleia, Odysseus
31 Aug 2016
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The final acts of brutality: meleanthius: mutilated, slave girls: telemachus calls the shots. Death by sword is considered a faster death than a hanging. With the killing of the girls, telemachus is asserting his own dominance in the household. Penelope"s test: the bed; tells the nurse to move his bed into the hall. Lets his feelings get the better of him and he tells penelope that the bed cannot be moved in the hall because the bed is a part of the house. Athena prolongs the night so that they can fully reconnect. They tell each other their stories over the past 20 years. Dramatic irony: we the audience have more understanding than the actual characters. Achilles and agamemnon contrast with odysseus (world of the dead vs the world of the living) Odysseus and laertes: the old man is deliberately distant from the palace. Odysseus deceives his own father in the beginning. Three generations together at last (laertes, odysseus, telemachus)
