Women and Deception in Homers Odyssey Essay -- Homer, Odyssey Essays

Women and Deception in the Odyssey As Agamemnon tells Odysseus, Let it be a warning even to you. Indulge a wo spell never, and never tell her all you know. Some things a man may tell, some he should cover up (Book XI 199). This is non news to Odysseus, who treats all women with caution ever since he was betrayed by his married woman Helen, who acted in a way that defiled all womankind. Agamemnon did not have it off to this realization all by himself, however his statement represents the common eyeshot that existed throughout all ancient Greece. Even before Odysseus speaks with Agamemnon, he exhibits a similar attitude in his many encounters with women during his long journey home. any major egg-producing(prenominal) character that Odysseus comes across uses deception in maven form or another to get the better of him. This being the case, Odysseus fights burn up with fire, using his own cunning deception against the evils of womankind. The first wily female that Odysseus bat tles wits with is the goddess Kalypso. She is a very deceitful woman, indeed. Kalypso has somehow managed to hide from the gods for 7 years an unnatural and disrespectable accomplishment. She has been having a secret affair with Odysseus, a mortal, who has been held cloaked on her island for the... ... Helene Foley, Penelope as Moral Agent, in Beth Cohen, ed., The Distaff posture (Oxford 1995), pp. 93-115. The Odyssey, History, and Women, by A. J. Graham, pp. 3-16, and Jennifer Neils, Les Femmes Fatales Skylla and the Sirens in Greek Art, pp. 175-84. Lillian Doherty, Siren Songs Gender, Audiences, and Narrators in the Odyssey (Ann Arbor 1995), esp. chapter 1. bloody shame Lefkowitz, Seduction and Rape in Greek Myth, 17-37. Marilyn Arthur Katz, Penelopes Renown Meaning and indefinity in the Odyssey (Princeton 1991). Nancy Felson-Rubin, Regarding Penelope From Courtship to Poetics (Princeton 1994).