The Odyssey: Conflict and Theme, Part 4 Answers

Read the excerpt from Part 2 of The Odyssey.(Odysseus):'We would entreat you, great Sir, have a carefor the gods' courtesy; Zeus will avenge the unoffending guest.'He answered thisfrom his brute chest, unmoved.(Cyclops):'You are a ninny,or else you come from the other end of nowhere,telling me, mind the gods! We Cyclopes care not a whistle for your thundering Zeus.'

Read the excerpt from Part 1 of The Odyssey.Now Zeus the lord of cloud roused in the northA storm against the ships, and driving veils of squall moved down like night on land and sea. The bows went plunging at the gust; sails cracked and lashed out strips in the big wind.We saw death in that fury, dropped the yards, unshipped the oars, and pulled for the nearest lee: then two long days and nights we lay offshore.

What theme is Homer presenting when Odysseus’s men forget about going home after eating the lotus in Part 1 of The Odyssey?

Read the excerpt from Part 4 of The Odyssey.There, as the whirlpool drank the tide, a billow tossed me, and I sprang for the great fig tree,catching on like a bat under a bough.Nowhere had I to stand, no way of climbing,the root and bole being far below, and far above my head the branches and their leaves, massed, overshadowing Charybdis pool.

Read the excerpt from Part 1 of The Odyssey.My men were mutinous,fools, on stores of wine. Sheep after sheep they butchered by the surf, and shambling cattle,feasting,—while fugitives went inland, running to call to arms the main force of Cicones. This was an army, trained to fight on horseback or, where the ground required, on foot. They came with dawn over that terrain like the leavesand blades of spring.

Read the excerpt from Part 2 of The Odyssey.his chores being all dispatched, he caught another brace of men to make his breakfast, and whisked away his great door slab to let his sheep go through—but he, behind,reset the stone as one would cap a quiver.

Read the excerpt from Part 1 of The Odyssey.And this new grief we bore with us to sea: our precious lives we had, but not our friends. No ship made sail next day until some shipmatehad raised a cry, three times, for each poor ghost unfleshed by the Cicones on that field.

Read the excerpt from Part 2 of The Odyssey.‘Why nottake these cheeses, get them stowed, come back,throw open all the pens, and make a run for it?We'll drive the kids and lambs aboard. We sayput out again on good salt water!'Ah,how sound that was! Yet I refused. I wished to see the caveman, what he had to offer—no pretty sight, it turned out, for my friends.

What theme is Homer presenting when Odysseus has his men tie him so that he will ignore the call of the Sirens in Part 3 of The Odyssey?

Read the excerpt from Part 4 of The Odyssey.and on our starboard beam Charybdis, dire gorge of the salt seatide. By heaven! when shevomited, all the sea was like a cauldronseething over intense fire, when the mixturesuddenly heaves and rises.