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“Thus spoke Minerva, and Ulysses obeyed her gladly. Then Minerva assumed the form and voice of Mentor, and presently made a covenant of peace between the two contending parties.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
Book 24 Summary
In the underworld, the ghosts of Achilles, Patroclus, Antilochus, and Ajax are approached by the ghost of Agamemnon and they reminisce. Hermes leads the ghosts of the 108 suitors into the underworld and the other five are astonished to see such a large group of ghosts, and noblemen no less, come in at the same time. One of the suitors tells Agamemnon what happened to them and Agamemnon is happy for Odysseus and Penelope.
Back in the world of the living, Odysseus, Telemachus, Eumaeus the swineherd, and Philoetius the stockman, leave town and reach the farm of Laertes, Odysseus’ father. Odysseus has the other three go ahead and prepare a pig for a sacrifice while he goes to Laertes to see if he’ll recognize Odysseus.
Odysseus meets Laertes who is worn down with sorrow and wearing shabby clothing. He tells Laertes a fake story about who he is and how he knows Odysseus, but when Laertes mourns Odysseus breaks down and reveals his identity, showing proofs that he is indeed Odysseus. After their reunion, they rejoin the other three at Laertes’ house and eat a meal.
Meanwhile, the townsfolk find out all the suitors are dead. After burying them, or sending their corpses off to the islands they lived on, an assembly is called and Antinous’ father declares he wants revenge. The prophet who warned everyone that Odysseus was coming back and the suitors needed to stop their misdeeds tells everyone the suitors got what they deserved and to not pursue revenge. Half of the assembly leaves while they other half, lead by Antinous’ father, prepare to confront Odysseus.
Odysseus, Telemachus, Laertes, and all the male servants who are with them arm themselves and prepare for the mob descending on Laertes’ house. Odysseus’ group start killing men left and right in a one sided slaughter. Athena, who has come down from Olympus, shouts and tells everyone to stop fighting. The mob drop their weapons in fear and run back to town. Athena tells Odysseus to stop fighting as well and she brokers a peace between the two groups.
The Anticlimax
I wanted to get this out of the way right now before getting to the more interesting topics of Book 24.
The lines in the epigraph above? Those, dear reader, are the closing lines of the Odyssey. And they come right after a fight where the only notable detail is that Antinous’ father takes a spear to the face. Then Athena comes down, declares the battle over, and just like that the poem ends.
This is why I titled this post “Deus Ex Machina.” For anyone who doesn’t know, deus ex machina means “god from the machine.” In ancient Greek theater, the actor representing a god would be hooked up to a special machine, lowered onto the stage, and bring an abrupt resolution to the story’s conflict. The poet Euripides, whom I will be covering in the future, was notorious for doing this.
Homer either didn’t know how to finish the poem, the actual ending is missing, or there’s another poem that picks up right where the Odyssey left off. The Iliad’s endingwent through something similar, with a god magically bringing king Priam right up to Achilles to petition for Hector’s body, but the resolution was far less abrupt as it ended with Hector’s funeral. Couldn’t Homer have at least ended the Odyssey with Odysseus and the townsfolk brokering peace after some debate?
On a somewhat related note: now that I have read both the Iliad and the Odyssey more carefully than at any point in my life, my opinions on them have changed. I used to say that I liked the Odyssey more than the Iliad and found it to be a better story. As I’m writing this, my opinion of the Iliad has gone up a lot more—to the point where it stands about equal with the Odyssey. Perhaps, by the time you read these words, my opinion will have changed again and I’ll see the Iliad as the better poem?
The Truth Comes Out
While the ghost of Agamemnon is conversing with the ghost of one of the suitors, Agamemnon makes this comment:
“Do you remember how I came to your house with Menelaus, to persuade Ulysses to join us with his ships against Troy? It was a whole month ere we could resume our voyage, for we had hard work to persuade Ulysses to come with us.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
Odysseus didn’t want to fight in the Trojan War and it took Agamemnon and Menelaus a whole month to persuade him. As we now know, Odysseus was completely justified in his reluctance. Thanks to that war, he was separated from his family for twenty years!
The full story of this encounter is found in outside sources. As I understand it, Odysseus didn’t want to fight in the Trojan War. Though he was one of Helen’s suitors, he brokered a deal with her father that if he came up with a peaceful solution to who would marry Helen, Odysseus will drop his pursuit of Helen and Helen’s father would put in a good word to Penelope’s father on Odysseus’ behalf. Odysseus’ solution was this: have all the men swear an oath that whoever doesn’t marry Helen will come to the defense of the man who does marry her if someone tries to abduct her, then draw straws to see who gets to marry her. The plan works, Odysseus takes Penelope as his wife, and the rest is history.
When Helen runs away with the Trojan prince Paris, Menelaus and Agamemnon invoke this oath in order to gather an army to themselves. I don’t know if Odysseus took the oath also. On the one hand, I don’t see why he would if he dropped his bid for Helen in order to marry Penelope. On the other hand, maybe he had to swear the oath because his agreement with Helen’s father was a secret?
In any case, Menelaus and Agamemnon visit Odysseus to recruit him. Odysseus, now happily married with an infant son, doesn’t want to fight in the war. To get out of it, he feigns madness. He yokes an oxen and a mule together, plants salt in the ground like they’re seeds, and begins to plow the field. One of the men with Menelaus and Agamemnon suspects Odysseus is faking it, and to prove it he places baby Telemachus in front of the path of the plow. Odysseus is forced to steer away from Telemachus, thereby giving away that he’s not out of his mind and is forced to join the war. In the end, Odysseus gets the last laugh as he deceives the man who put Telemachus in harm’s way and gets him killed.
Nonetheless, though Odysseus didn’t want to fight in the war, he still put his all into it and became one of the most distinguished leaders of the Achaeans. As we saw in the Iliad, he rallied the troops when they wanted to go home, he went on a dangerous espionage mission with Diomedes, he fought on the front lines, and he put Agamemnon and Achilles in their place when they were getting out of line. Odysseus used the war as an opportunity to make a name for himself, develop lifelong friendships, and bring back plunder (wealth).
Perhaps this is the attitude we should all take when we are forced to do something we don’t want to do? Unless that something is unethical, if we have no choice but to do it we should give it our all. Who knows? The reward for attempting it and/or completing it may make that task worth our time after all?
Maybe we’ll earn a better reputation? Make great friends? Get richer? Learn new skills and knowledge?
Go on a grand adventure and come back a better person?
When The Adults Fail
When it’s found out all the suitors are dead and Odysseus is the one responsible for their deaths, the town elders angrily hold an assembly and declare that Odysseus needs to pay for this outrage. Antinous’ father is the most outspoken in this regard. Like father, like son.
However, their misplaced outrage is immediately challenged. Odysseus’ servant Medon (who basically served as a double agent for Penelope, gaining the trust of the suitors while reporting to her) and the bard Phemius both tell the assembly that one of the gods was fighting on Odysseus’ side.
Second, the old prophet Halitherses gives the assembly a reality check. Recall that Halitherses was the prophet back in Book 2 who warned the suitors to stop what they were doing and accurately predicted what was going to happen (Odysseus would be lost for twenty years and he would come back to Ithaca without anyone knowing about it). The suitors responded by heckling and threatening him. Now, here in Book 24, Halitherses gives the assembly a hearty “I told you so.”
“Men of Ithaca, it is all your own fault that things have turned out as they have; you would not listen to me, nor yet to Mentor, when we bade you check the folly of your sons who were doing much wrong in the wantonness of their hearts – wasting the substance and dishonouring the wife of a chieftain who they thought would not return. Now, however, let it be as I say, and do as I tell you. Do not go out against Ulysses, or you may find that you have been drawing down evil on your own heads.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
If I could sum up what Halitherses said in one sentence: the blood of your sons are on your hands.
The suitors harassed and terrorized Penelope, Telemachus, and their household for at least three years and yet their fathers and the elders of the assembly did nothing to stop them. Whether it was out of fear of doing something, putting their heads in the sand, or believing there would be no real consequences, it didn’t matter. The suitors played with fire, their fathers didn’t tell them to stop, and the suitors were burned up as a result.
Yes, the suitors were responsible for their own actions and paid the price. But, their fathers, the “adults in the room,” could have stopped them. And they didn’t. Now, they have the gall to be outraged when their sons suffer the consequences? Now, they want to unite and galvanize into action after their sons are dead? Too little, too late.
Just as it is today. Our children have suffered much because of us adults. We can stop now to keep any more suffering from happening, but we have already done damage. We stand indicted. We need to repent. We need to accept responsibility for the damage we inflicted. No scapegoats. No misplacing the blame. We are guilty—and we need to realize this before we foolishly try to take revenge on that which becomes the harbinger brought forth by our guilt and get ourselves destroyed.
Laertes
Laertes is talked about throughout the Odyssey, but it’s not until here in Book 24 that we actually meet him. When Odysseus sees him for the first time in twenty years, it becomes obvious Laertes is not doing well. He even comments:
“You take better care of your garden than of yourself. You are old, unsavoury, and very meanly clad.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
Laertes is dressed shabbily. He’s heavy with sorrow. And, as we’ve learned throughout the poem, he’s confined himself to his farm with only an old maidservant taking care of him (Book 1), lost his wife to grief and wishes for death (Book 15), and that when Telemachus went on his journey Laertes even stopped tending to his farm (Book 16).
What baffles me is that Odysseus once again pretended to be someone else and inquires about himself. It makes no sense that he would do that. What was even more notable though, was that Odysseus was able to keep his composure around Telemachus and Penelope until he properly revealed himself to them, but broke down immediately after seeing his father’s grief. For that brief moment, Odysseus stopped being a father, a husband, and the king of Ithaca, and became Laertes’ son again.
When Laertes is convinced Odysseus is who he says he is, his faith in the gods and in justice is restored.
“O father Jove, then you gods are still in Olympus after all, if the suitors have really been punished for their insolence and folly.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
When they go back to Laertes’ home and he cleans up, Laertes is restored to his former glory. Later, when some of the town elders go to get their revenge against Odysseus, Laertes watches Odysseus and Telemachus compete and he is overjoyed.
“Good heavens,” he exclaimed, “what a day I am enjoying: I do indeed rejoice at it. My son and grandson are vying with one another in the matter of valour.”
Odyssey, Book 24; Samuel Butler translation
He had to wait twenty years for this moment. It’s something he never thought he would witness in his lifetime. Laertes can now live out the rest of his years happily.
As I said when I began my journey through the Odyssey, the poem is not just about Odysseus: it’s about Telemachus, Penelope, and Laertes as well. It’s about how they overcame their own adversities and how they came back together again as a family. I will write more extensively about this in my final essay on the Odyssey because it’s worth a lot more attention that I can give in these posts.
That’s all for Book 24 of the Odyssey.
May your days be filled with grace.
-Andronikos
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Thumbnail: Odysseus Meets His Father Laertes on His Return to Ithaca by Theodoor van Thulden, 1600. Public domain.