July 18th, 2014
Questions and answers for Sage Creek “The Oddessey” Summer Reading Assignment.
Background:
1. What is the Trojan War?
A: The Trojan war was a war waged on the greek city of troy by the Achaeans.(link)
2. What is known about the Author, Homer?
A: Little is known about the author, including whether he actually existed or not.(link)
Book One:
1. Which Goddess is Homer asking for inspiration at the beginning of the book?
A: The Muse.
2. What is an epic?
A: A long narrative about a serious or worthy subject.(link)
3. What is Olympus?
A: A Mountain/home for the Gods.Mount Olympus in Macedonia, northern Greece, the home of the twelve gods of Olympus in Greek mythology
4. Who is Telmachus?
A: Odysseus’s son.(link 1)
Quote: “My mother certainly says I am Odysseus’ son; but for myself I cannot tell. It’s a wise child that knows its own father.” (Telemachus to Athena as the Taphian stranger. Homer, Odyssey 1.215).
5. Who is Odysseus and what has happened to him?
A: Odysseus is a Greek, who goes to fight for his wife’s sister in the trojan war, but encounters hardships on his way back, leaading to the assumtion of his death.(link)
6. What is happening to Penelope during Odysseus’ absence?
A: She is being pressured by suitors to remarry.
Book Two:
1. Who is the council that Telemachus calls?
A: Inspired by Athena, Telemachus calls a council of all the men of Ithaca. He asks them how they can stand idly by and allow his mother’s hospitality to be abused. Antinous, one of the ringleaders of the suitors, brazenly puts the blame on Penelope, for not choosing one of them as husband.
2. Who is Antinous?
A: The “head of the pack” of the suitors.
3. Who is Eurycleia?
A: Eurycleia is well informed about palace intrigues and serves as confidante to her masters. She keeps Telemachus’s journey secret from Penelope, and she later keeps Odysseus’s identity a secret after she recognizes a scar on his leg.
4. What sort of trickery has Penelope been using against her suitors?
A: She weaves a mourning shroud for odysseus, but unravels her progress every night.
5. What sign indicated doom for the suitors?
A: Two eagles entwined in flight show a sign from zeus.
6. What does Telemachus do at the end of Book Two?
A: Telemachus further tries to assert his authority when he demands that the suitors leave his estate. But since Telemachus is, in his own words (61-2), “a weakling knowing nothing of valor,” the suitors refuse. Telemachus then announces his intention to visit Sparta and Pylos in search of news about his father. This first journey away from home is an important part of the figurative journey from boyhood to manhood.
Book Three:
1. What is Pylos?
A: An ancient Greek town. (link)
2. Who are Agamemnon and Menelaus?
A: They fought alongside odysseus at the battle of Troy.
3. Who is Orestes? (link)
A: Orestes (mythology) In Greek mythology, Orestes (English pronunciation: /ɒˈrɛstiːz/; Greek: Ὀρέστης [oˈrestɛːs]) was the son of Clytemnestra and Agamemnon. He is the subject of several Ancient Greek plays and of various myths connected with his madness and purification, which retain obscure threads of much older ones.
4. What is a sacrifice to the Greeks?
5. What does Nestor tell Telemachus about his father?
Book Four:
1. Write a brief summary of what happens in this book. (25 words or more)
2. What sort of “hospitality” does King Menelaus offer Telemachus and Nestor’s son?
3. What is ambrosia
A: A food of the Gods believed to give immense strength.
4. Who is Tantalus?
5. What story does Queen Helen tell Telemachus?
Book Five:
1. What sort of “magic” is related to Hermes’ sandals?
A: Flying
2. What is the River Styx?
A: A river in hades believed to grant those who cross successfully great strength.
3. Who is Orion?
4. Who is Leucothea?
5. How does Odysseus escape Calypso?
Book Six:
1. What does Nausicaa mean by “home”?
2. Who are the Paheacians?
3. Who is Nausicaa?
A: The kings daughter.
4. What Goddess helps Odysseus and what does she do?
5. How does Nausicaa help Odysseus?
Book Seven:
1. Who is the queen?
2. Who is Alcinous?
3. How did Odysseus get into the banquet?
4. What did the king and queen do for Odysseus?
Book Eight:
1. Who Demodocus?
2. Who is Achilles?
A: A greek warrior who was known for his famous weakness his “achilles heel”.
3. What does it mean by “Odysseus cried into his mantle”?
4. How does Odysseus set a “course”?
5. How do the queen and king try to entertain Odysseus?
6. What happens with each attempt?
Book Nine:
1. What is Ismarus?
2. What are Cicones?
3. What is the “land” of the Lotus-eaters?
A: An island of people who give sailors a special food that makes them forget their course.
4. What is Cyclopes?
5. What was the name of the Cyclops that Odysseus and men run into?
6. What does the Cyclops first do to Odysseus’ men?
7. How does Odysseus and his men escape the Cyclops?
Book Ten:
1. Who is Aeolus?
2. What happens to Odysseus on the island of Aeolus?
3. What is Laestrygonians?
4. What happened to Odysseus on the island of Laestrygonians?
5. Who is Circe?
6. What happened to Odysseus’ men on the island of Circle?
7. What is the “land of Death” ?
8. Who is Tiresias?
Book Eleven:
1. What is the “Ocean’s stream”?
2. What are the “shades”?
3. What does Tiresias tell Odysseus?
Book Twelve:
1. Who are the Sirens?
A: Beautiful creatures who tempt sailors to death with their singing.
2. What is Charybdis?
3. What is Scylla?
A: A multi-headed monster thats eats some of odysseus’s sailors.
4. What happens to Odysseus’ men?
5. Where does Odysseus end up?
Book Thirteen:
1. After the tale, where is Odysseus sent?
2. What does the Goddess Athena do to Odysseus?
Book Fourteen:
1. Who is Eumaeus?
2. How does he help Odysseus?
Book Fifteen:
1. How does Athena help Telemachus about Eumaeus?
Book Sixteen:
1. What major event happens in this book?
Book Seventeen:
1. Who is Melanthius?
2. Who is Argos?
3. Who is Antinous?
A: The main Suitor who is trying to win Penelope’s hand in marriage.
4. What happens to Odysseus in this book?
Book Eighteen:
1. Who is Irus?
2. What does he do to Odysseus?
Book Nineteen:
1. Who is Penelope?
2. Who is Eurycleia?
3. What is Mount Parnassus?
4. How is Odysseus recognized and what does he do?
Book Twenty:
1. Who is the exiled murderer?
2. What does the prophet tell the suitors and how do the suitors react?
Book Twenty-one:
1. What does Penelope bring before the suitors?
2. What is the task that Penelope has placed for the suitors?
3. What does Odysseus do?
Book Twenty-two:
1. What are the “shields and spears”?
2. What happens to the suitors, the housemaids, and the goatherder?
Book Twenty-three:
1. What happens to the mansion?
2. What does Odysseus order after that?
3. What does Penelope do?
Book Twenty-four:
1. Who is Laertes?
2. What happens to the suitors?
3. What happens to Antinous’ father?