Odysseus: The Wanderer's Curse Part 1 of 2

In this episode of Greek Mythology Retold, we explore Odysseus as a veteran shaped by twenty years of warfare, loss, survival, and wandering. From the Cicones and the Lotus-Eaters to the Cyclops and Circe, we discover Odysseus as a deeply human figure: a man caught between the glory culture of Troy and the difficult reality of homecoming.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:23):
Welcome back, murmered Ons to another episode of Greek Mythology
Retold Podcast. I hope this episode finds you and yours
in a happy and prosperous place. If this is your
first time joining us, welcome to our world where we
love Greek myths and all Trojan War related stories. I
am Janelle Rhiannon, the writer and host of this podcast

(00:45):
and author of the Homeric Chronicles and epic Fantasy centered
on the Trojan War and Odissian and post Odissian era.
This is the second episode in the Odysseus series, where
we will explore a king who has matured from young
commander to seasoned veteran, a man who has been victorious
in Troy, gained renown for his bravery and his strategy,

(01:09):
and yet on the voyage home, struggles to find not
only himself amid the ruins of war, but also his
way home. His return journey that Odysseus begins to realize
the cost of war went beyond just missing home and family,
that the price cut much deeper, in fact, all the

(01:29):
way to the bone. In the first episode, Odysseus the
Trickster King, we explored Odysseus's origins and his inherited skills
of trickery to become the king known as Wiley Odysseus,
a character we all love. You can always go back
and listen after this episode without losing continuity After this one,

(01:51):
this episode of The Wanderer's Curse is about Odysseus's long
journey home through fate, trauma, and the unraveling of his identity.
So let's jump in. By the end of the Iliad,
the United Greek Army under Agamemnon had been deployed for
a continuous ten years. Historically, armies were gone for the

(02:11):
duration of an entire war, so this is nothing new.
For example, Alexander the Great's main army left from Macedonia
in three thirty four BCE and was still in his
service in three twenty four BCE, even after the mutinies
of the Hyphasis and Opus. Roman legionaries and auxiliary soldiers

(02:32):
could serve months or years, depending on the military campaign's needs.
In modern times, like World War Two, men were deployed
for four or five years. Today troops are deployed for
six to twelve months, depending on which branch. I remember
my father being gone for about nine months at a
time while he served on the USS Guardfish in the

(02:55):
mid nineteen sixties and seventies. All this deployment time away
from families and civilian friends had me thinking about the
human cost and consequences of war. What happens to someone
who has subjected to all the deprivations and suffering that
war brings over such long periods of time, and how
does that affect their return home? Which brings me to

(03:19):
Odysseus and his long journey back to Ithaca. We retell
his story as often as we retell Achilles. We love
achilles story because he is the tragic hero, the man
who was undone by war right in front of us. Odysseus, however,
is the hero who endures and survives the hardships of
war to make it home to the loving arms of

(03:41):
his wife Penelope. We love that the Odyssey ends with
Odysseus reclaiming his family and his kingdom. But is the
man who returns to Ithaca the same man who left
years ago? I say he is much changed by witnessing
the deaths of friends and strangers in the field, often
brutally perpetrating violence on others like Delawn and the Thracians.

(04:05):
He was there when Patricklus was struck down by Hector.
He saw first hand achilles terrible grief and rage. He
was there when Achilles was struck down by Apollo in Paris.
He fought ferociously with Trojans so Ajax could carry Achilles'
body back to the camp. He saw Ajax loose his
mind and kill himself, and one by one he lost

(04:29):
his men on the way home, becoming the sole survivor
of his entire fleet of twelve ships, six hundred men.
How could Odysseus remain the man that he had been
after all of this? I don't think he could. No
one could. While contemplating all of this, I did some
reading and came across the article post Deployment Syndrome the

(04:51):
Illness of War by doctor David Cifu and Corey Blake
on brain Line. Doctor Cefu is Chairman of the Department
of Physical Medice and Rehabilitation at the Virginia Commonwealth University
School of Medicine and National Director of the Physical Medicine
and Rehabilitation Program Office for Veteran for the Veteran's Health Administration.

(05:15):
Solid sources that helped me connect some threads about Odysseus
By viewing Odysseus through the lens of a trauma survivor,
his story is not simply a man who misses his family,
but a man who returns home and eventually ruins his
family because he brings the war, the internal war with him.
That internal war manifests through violence and restlessness. He is

(05:43):
a man suffering the emotional and mental scars of a
decade of war and another decade of traumatizing events, resulting
in him becoming the sole survivor. Doctor Sifu's article speaks
of the illness of war, that soldiers suffer from a
sense that the ability to rest has been obliterated, that

(06:05):
there is no RESTful space in the mind. This is
the Odysseus that we encounter in the Odyssey and the Telegany,
which is the post odysse stories. Going back to when
Odysseus and his men left Troy, they all longed for home,
but they also couldn't stop being who they had become
during the war. The first place they stopped for resupply,

(06:28):
they devastate. They pillage the secones, killing the men and
taking their wives as war prizes. Presumably rape was in
store for some of these women and the children killed orphaned.
Odysseus did not or was not able, to stop his
men from doing any of this. Either he was not

(06:49):
well respected enough, or the violence had become second natured
to them at this point, or maybe both. I can't
help but compare Achilles and Odysseus here, because I can't
imagine a time the Mrmadants, who numbered six thousand, far
more than the Ithacans, who would dare disobey Achilles after

(07:10):
ten years of fighting alongside him. In Fitzgerald's translation nine
sixty eight to seventy one, Odysseus calls his men mutinous fools,
and at the end of a long day of fighting
for their lives quote, six benches were left empty on
every ship that evening when we pulled away from death

(07:30):
and this new grief that we bore with us to
see our precious lives we had, but not our friends
end quote. All the next day, mournful cries went up
from each ship. This is the trauma of war continuing
in The White Island chapter thirty seven, I write this
about Odysseus and the Scones, and that's just right here.

(07:51):
The White Islands by the time the sun faded, the
battle was over. They had fought for their lives for
an entire day, pushing back the unrelenting army. Six men
per ship had been lost, their bodies now lifeless on
the blood soaked sand. The survivors, battered and bloodied, stood
in silence as the attacking army retreated, leaving behind their dead.

(08:14):
The scene before them was one they knew well. It
was the mind numbing scrambled to live or die, panic
and fury fueled. Odysseus looked down at his hands, which trembled,
slick with blood, bits of flesh stuck beneath his nails.
The stench of death filled his nostrils. His lungs ached.
I thought war was behind us when we left Troy,

(08:35):
he said, His throat was raw from shouting. But we
are the war, aren't we. It follows us like a shadow.
His men said nothing. They were too tired, too broken
to argue with him. Now their boldness from wine had
been drained from them. They gathered what they could from
the wreckage of their camp. As they prepared to sail

(08:55):
once more, Odysseus surveyed the shore one last time. The
bodies of their fallen comrades lay side by side with
those of the Scones. It struck him that death was death.
No man could escape it. It did not look any
different on his men than the enemies. There had been
no time to build proper funeral pyres or give the

(09:17):
ritual rights, nor could they take the dead bodies with them.
War was leaving people and places behind. When discussing the
illness of war, doctor David Cefu and Corey Blake say
few things are as unforgiving, pitiless, ungovernable, and irrecoverable as
lead and steel loosed from a weapon. The transfigurations they

(09:41):
effect on the bodies of friends and foe alike form
a permanent backdrop to all a man's future visions. These
images are war's graffiti. They are scrawled across the veteran's mind,
defacing the silence and peace others in joy. The same
can be said of bronze tip spears, bronze blades and arrows.

(10:05):
The Iliad is full of violent descriptions of warfare visited
on the bodies of Greeks and Trojans alike. The effect
of war on human beings would not have been less
severe simply because it happened three thousand years ago. If
we accept that Homer shows us bodies broken by war,
we should also be willing to ask what war did

(10:28):
to the minds of the men who survived it. From
the work of Joanne Scurlock and Burton Anderson, who wrote
the Diagnoses in Assyrian and Babylonian Medicine in two thousand
and five, we learn that ancient Assyrian warriors suffered from
PTSD like symptoms after combat. In a BBC interview in

(10:50):
twenty fifteen, Professor Jamie Hacker Hughes, a leading clinical psychologist
who specializes in military mental health and psychological trauma, said
that post traumatic stress disorder has existed since the dawn
of civilization, tracing its roots back over three thousand years.

(11:12):
Ancient warriors tell of being haunted by the ghosts of
those they killed or dead comrades, not unlike the nightmares
and ghosts who haunt the modern veteran. To say it
was easier, or that warfare three thousand years ago was
less traumatic because humans were different, or times were different,

(11:32):
or war was more expected, or was simply a way
of life is to be dismissive of what we know
about veterans' experiences across millennia. To not see Odysseus as
a war veteran who suffers from his twenty year ordeal
of war and loss while homebound would make him less

(11:53):
than human, and the very purpose of Homer's stories is
to open a pathway into our humans. To ignore that
Odysseus suffered from war is to limit the scope of
his story and our cultural understanding of war and homecoming.
The effects of the war were a living, breathing thing

(12:15):
inside Odysseus, manifesting in a trail of violence and survival responses.
With the Scones, the cyclops suitors, and the maids, and
his eventual abandonment of Penelope and Telemachus and Ithaca itself.
We see Odysseus struggling with his identity as he sails

(12:36):
for home. The Sicone's incident shattered any illusion Odysseus may
have had about his command of his men. Not only
was Odysseus dealing with his own inner war, but so
too were each of his men. Every decision here could
be traced in some part to PTSD. They are all
far from recovering from this ordeal or the trials and

(12:58):
tribulations of the past days from doctor David Seafu and
Corey Blake. We read quote, wars, stressors, and injuries change
neurotransmitters in the brain and hormones in the blood, which
caused these neurotransmitters to be out of sync and cause sensations, feelings,
and real world difficulties. These feelings can burn so intensely

(13:21):
that they inevitably lead to a desire to avoid and
withdraw from them. This shows up as depression and substance abuse,
and continuing doctor Sefu's quote on this, many will also
go into some kind of attack mode, either towards one's
self or others. It's precisely the tendency to escape that

(13:43):
drives the symptoms of PTSD and combat stress deeper into
the body and mind. After the Secones, Odysseus faces the
Lotus eaters, they beached their ships to resupply water stores
and made lunch. He sent out three men to a
explorers and one runner. He was not going to repeat

(14:03):
the mistakes that they made with the Secones. He wanted
to know who they may be up against, take care
of business and leave safely. This time, when his men
didn't return, he went looking for them. They were under
the influence of the lotus flower, and they longed to
stay forever, browsing on the bloom, forgetful of their homeland.

(14:24):
I drove them all three whaling to the ships, tied
them down under their rowing benches, and called the rest.
And that's from the Iliad Fitzgerald's translation, nine one hundred
to line one ten. Wanting to forget what they had
been through so intensely that a drug induced haze offered
a more appealing reality. In the White Island, chapter thirty seven,

(14:48):
I wrote this. As they approached the clearing, the sounds
of pleasure were unmistakable. Thrasmides and Antifas lay tangled among
the strangers, their faces serene, as if the horrors of
war had never touched their lives. Odysseus's voice was sharp
as he gave the order grab them quickly. Paramedes exchanged

(15:10):
a glance with Elatrius. They both hesitated. They look happy.
Paramedes muttered, craning his neck to get a better glimpse
of the bodies and various states of making love. What
was the last time any of us looked like that?
He sounded, unsure, if ripping them from this was the
right decision, Elatreus chuckled darkly. That's the trick, isn't it

(15:31):
make us forget enough, and we will all wear smiles
like that. Odysseus cut them both off with a glare.
They're not themselves. If you hesitate, we'll lose them forever.
Is that what you want? Leave them behind? Do you
want to be the ones to tell their wives and
mothers you left them in a pile of naked bodies?
Fucking no, not When you put it like that, then

(15:53):
do as I command, paramedes. They surged forward. Antifas woke first,
his eyes fluttering open to see your Rylicus and paramedes
pulling him upright. He was breathless and smiling before he
realized what was happening. No, Antipys screamed, thrashing like a
snared wild dog. Let me go. I won't leave. Stop fighting,

(16:14):
Eurylicus grunted, struggling to hold him. You're coming back with us.
I won't go back, Antifus cried, his voice cracking. Tears
streamed down his face as he tried to kick himself free.
I don't want to go back to the screams or
the blood. His eyes bored into Odysseus's, his expression desperate,
Do you hear me? I can't go back to the

(16:37):
night my wife died to see the sight of my
boy's body in the rubble. The lotus. It lets me
forget it, lets me be free. Odysseus hardened himself against
Antiphys protests. This isn't real, Antiphys, your wife, your son,
They are alive. Back in Ithaca. Everyone waits for us,

(16:58):
But not if we let this fruit steal what's left
of us. They're gone, Antifas shouted, They're dead. Odysseus, what
do I have left but this beneath the naked limbs
of a man. Thrasmodes groaned as he was dragged upright
by two of the other men. Unlike Antiphys, he didn't
fight immediately. Why do you always take from us, Odysseus,

(17:21):
he asked, his voice edged with aching bitterness. You took
our peace at Ismris, you took our brothers at Troy,
and now you take this too. He shook his head vigorously,
his body slack against his captors. Leave me here, please,
I don't want to remember the faces of the men
I killed. I don't want to hear the cries in

(17:43):
my dreams. Do you understand it? Lets me sleep? It
lets me sleep. Shaking Thrasmides by the shoulders, Odysseus said,
we have a home and a life waiting for us
in Ithaca. Families who dream of us. They won't want
the shadows this fruit makes of you. They want the

(18:04):
men we vowed to be. They don't know us anymore,
Thrasmades groaned miserably, And we don't know ourselves. Elatreus paled,
leaning close to Paramedes. But if it's not the fruit
that's cursed, what if it's us? But if there's nothing
left worth going home too? Paramedes shot him a glare
but said nothing. Using all his strength to hold Antiphys steady,

(18:27):
Antifys surged one final time, breaking free for a few steps,
staggering toward the fruit bowls. Just one more, he begged,
falling to his knees in the grass, weeping, Please, just
one more. Odysseus seized him by the arm, jerking him back.
You've had enough, both of you, he turned to the others,

(18:48):
his voice ringing with iron authority. Get them to the
ship and bind them. If you have to, but we're
leaving this cursed place. No man of Ithaca will be
lost to this fucking madness. He set it for them,
but also for himself. Next is the Cyclops episode, which
is often read as a story about Odysseus's arrogance, and

(19:10):
of course that is part of it. But if we
are looking at Odysseus through the lens of a post
war trauma or post deployment syndrome, the scene becomes much
more psychologically complicated. Doctor David Sefu asks us to quote,
imagine never again being able to engage in the activity
in which you have gained the most skill, And that

(19:33):
line matters for Odysseus. For ten years at Troy, Odysseus
gained his greatest skill, his status, and pride. Through war.
He was praised for cunning and deception, his night raids,
his violence, his endurance and command. He and Diomedes could

(19:53):
slaughter sleeping Thracians in the night, wash the blood from
their bodies, and return to the Greek camp to be celebrated.
That was the world that made him powerful. That was
the world where his name meant something. So when Odysseus
enters the Cyclops cave, I don't think we should see
him only as a man being reckless or arrogant. He

(20:17):
is also a veteran reaching back toward the identity that
war gave him. This matters even more because the Cyclops
episode comes after the Secones, where his men refused to
obey him, stayed too long, and suffered for it. Odysseus
has already experienced a failure of command. His authority has

(20:39):
already been shaken. In the cave, when his men urge
him to take the food and leave, Odysseus chooses instead
to stay, test the danger, demand the guest gift, and
create the encounter. He is touching again the version of
himself who was rewarded for risk and cleverness. The tragedy

(21:02):
is that the very skills that made him heroic at
Troy now in danger the homecoming. He survives Polyphemus by
becoming nobody, but once he's safe, he can't bear to
remain nobody. He has to shout his name back into
the world. That is pride, yes, but it's also an

(21:22):
identity crisis. Odysseus can't yet stop needing or being the
man that war made him. The Circe chapter is often
flattened into a story about Odysseus being unfaithful while Penelope
waits at home. But I don't think that that is
the most interesting or fairest reading as far as the

(21:45):
epic tradition gives us. Odysseus is not presented in the
Iliad as some casual philanderer. He is shown time and
again as a husband and a father, a king and
a commander who is trying and dreams of returning to Ithaca.
When he approaches Circe, the language with her is not passive.

(22:08):
After Hermes gives him the protective herb Odysseus says, quote
his heart was high with excitement and beating hard end.
Quote That sounds like a man activated by danger, drawn
again into the kind of charged encounter where his war
honed skills matter, that courage, that cunning, that control under pressure.

(22:32):
But after he sleeps with Circe, the story doesn't show
him as being care free or satisfied. Odysseus says, quote,
no pleasure came. I huddled with my mind elsewhere oppressed.
Odysseus is physically present with Circe, but he is mentally
burdened and unable to enjoy the feast before him, and

(22:55):
the guilt he names first is not even about Penelope.
It's about his men. He tells Circe quote, a decent
man would see his company before him first end quote,
and he begs her to free his companions before he
can eat and drink. This connects directly to doctor Sefu's
discussion of post deployment suffering the guilt of failed responsibility,

(23:20):
the grief of men lost or endangered, and quote the
penetrating guilt of breaking your own moral code. Odysseus's moral
code here is his command. He can't fully surrender to
pleasure while his men remain transformed and imprisoned. But once
the men are restored, Circe's Island becomes something more dangerous

(23:42):
than simply sexual temptation. Circe's hall suspends time. She offers food, wine, bathing, sex, safety,
and peace of mind after ten years of war and wandering.
In that sense, Circe becomes another version of the Lotus.
The lotus eaters threaten homecoming by making men forget where

(24:05):
they are from. Circe threatens homecoming by giving Odysseus and
his men enough comfort to stop feeling the urgency to return.
The sex matters, but not because Odysseus is simply a philanderer.
It becomes part of a larger pattern of avoidance and
numbing and forgetting. If the lotus is the drug of forgetting,

(24:28):
Circe is the house of forgetting. Odysseus had to drag
his men away from the lotus, but on Circe's island,
it's his men who have to wake him from his trance.
They say, Captain, shake off this trance and think of home.
End quote. That is the heart of the Odyssey Home.
Odysseus hasn't stopped loving Ithaca, he hasn't stopped being Penelope's

(24:51):
husband or Telemachus's father. Before a time, he has stopped
moving toward them. Circe gives him relief, and that relief
becomes its own danger. When his men remind him of home,
Odysseus says he feels a pang, and only then does
he go to Cersey and beg her to help him
make sale. So this is not merely a story about lust.

(25:13):
It's a story about how easily a wounded man can
confuse peace with forgetting. Well, that's a wrap on part
one of Odysseus. The Wanderer's Curse. I hope you found
something valuable in the discussion about the king who took
the long way home. Part two of The Wanderer's Curse
covers Odysseus's journey into the underworld, his confinement on Calypso's Island,

(25:38):
and his long awaited return to Ithaca. As always, I
thank you for listening and supporting Greek mythology Retold podcasts.
Please give a like or rating on your podcast platform,
and feel free to reach out on social media with
any comments or questions that you might have. I love
to hear from you. And that's it for now, So

(25:59):
drink your wine and be marry. Marmadon's