Odyssey Famous Quotes | Five Scenes with Odysseus, Athena, and Achilles from the Original Text

The Odyssey contains lines that are still quoted even after three thousand years. In this article, I checked Samuel Butler's complete public-domain English translation (classics.mit.edu) directly and present, exactly as in the original text, who said what and in which scene.

Let me note upfront that the paraphrased explanations are not sentences copied from published translations but loose renderings of the meaning. If you want to read the actual translator's sentences as they are, I'll point you to the complete translation near the end of the article.

Book 1, the Opening Lines Appealing to the Muse

The poem begins with the poet asking the Muse to tell the story. "Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy." In other words, it is a request to tell the story of the ingenious hero who was forced to wander far and wide after bringing Troy down (paraphrase).

In the same book, the gods hold a council, and the goddess Athena asks her father Zeus to help Odysseus. "it is for Ulysses that my heart bleeds, when I think of his sufferings in that lonely sea-girt island, far away, poor man, from all his friends." It is a plea that her heart aches when she thinks of Odysseus suffering alone on that remote island (paraphrase).

These two lines set the direction of the poem. The hero has already been wandering for a long time, and at least one of the gods decides to step in to bring him home.

Book 9, the Trick of the Name "Nobody" and Its Price

Trapped in the Cyclops Polyphemus's cave, Odysseus plans to get the giant drunk, put him to sleep, stab out his eye, and escape. Before that, when Polyphemus asks his name, he answers like this: "my name is Noman; this is what my father and mother and my friends have always called me." He lies that his name is "Nobody" (paraphrase).

Just as planned, Polyphemus, his eye stabbed, cries out in pain to the other Cyclopes, but what he shouts is this: "Noman is killing me by fraud! Noman is killing me by force!" It sounds as if no one is attacking him, so the other Cyclopes simply assume he is ill or suffering some affliction and go away.

The problem came next. Having safely escaped the island by ship, Odysseus cannot resist shouting out his real name. "say it was the valiant warrior Ulysses, son of Laertes, who lives in Ithaca." Hearing this, Polyphemus prays a curse to his father, the sea god Poseidon. "grant that Ulysses may never reach his home alive; or if he must get back to his friends at last, let him do so late and in sore plight after losing all his men." It is a prayer that if Odysseus is to return home at all, he should do so late, after losing all his companions and through great suffering (paraphrase). This curse follows Odysseus throughout the rest of his journey home. If you are curious about this whole episode, you can check it in original order in the Cave Episode with the Cyclops Polyphemus article.

Book 5, Offered Immortality, Yet Choosing Penelope

To Odysseus, held captive on Calypso's island, Calypso makes one final offer. "let me make you immortal, no matter how anxious you may be to see this wife of yours... yet I flatter myself that I am no whit less tall or well-looking than she is." It is the moment where she says she will make him immortal if he stays with her, and that she is no less attractive than his wife.

Odysseus's answer is short and clear. "I am quite aware that my wife Penelope is nothing like so tall or so beautiful as yourself. She is only a woman, whereas you are an immortal. Nevertheless, I want to get home, and can think of nothing else." Even knowing that Penelope falls short of the goddess, he still wants to go home (paraphrase).

Right after this conversation, Odysseus builds a raft and leaves the island, but the sea god Poseidon sends a storm and smashes the raft to pieces. The choice to give up immortality immediately leads to a drifting voyage for his very life. You can read more about who Calypso is and why she kept Odysseus captive in Who Is Calypso?

Book 11, Achilles's Answer in the Underworld

Having gone down to the underworld to meet the prophet Tiresias, Odysseus there encounters the ghost of Achilles, hero of the Trojan War. When Odysseus comforts him, saying that even in death he is honored like a king among the heroes and has no reason to grieve, Achilles answers like this.

"Say not a word in death's favour; I would rather be a paid servant in a poor man's house and be above ground than king of kings among the dead." He says not to speak well of death, and that he would rather be a poor man's hired servant above ground than a king among the dead.

Since Achilles, who chose an honorable death throughout the Trojan War, says the exact opposite in the underworld, this scene most directly reveals how different the lot of the living and the dead is. You can find a separate summary of what kind of hero Achilles was in the Achilles Myth article.

Book 23, the Story of the Bed That Decides a Reunion After Twenty Years

Even after the suitors have all been slain, Penelope cannot readily believe that the man before her is really Odysseus. So she deliberately instructs the nurse Eurycleia like this: "take his bed outside the bed chamber that he himself built. Bring the bed outside this room." It is an order to move the bed he was said to have built with his own hands out of the room.

Hearing this, Odysseus flares up. "There is no man living... who could move it from its place, for it is a marvellous curiosity which I made with my very own hands. There was a young olive growing within the precincts of the house... I built my room round this with strong walls of stone and a roof to cover them." His answer was that, having built the room around a living olive tree used as a bedpost, the bed was by its very nature something that could not be moved (paraphrase).

Because this detail was a secret known only to Odysseus and Penelope, only after hearing this answer does Penelope finally accept him as her husband. How Penelope endured those twenty years continues in the Penelope Story article.