Elizabeth’s Ogle’s Odyssey book

Writes Professor Jennie Rebecca Falcetta:

Although I consistently see fine visual art projects from Literary Traditions students, Elizabeth’s Ogle’s Odyssey book is unusually exquisite and painstaking.  Furthermore, she based her visual work on Emily Wilson’s new rendition of the Odyssey, the first version of the epic translated by a woman.

Elizabeth opens with an examination of the word  in the first poem’s first line, the basis of a New York Times profile of Wilson’s translation, and then proceeds with a unique visual response.

Writes Elizabeth Ogle (’20):

I came across an article in The New York Times by Wyatt Mason about the translation process of Emily Wilson, the first woman to translate The Odyssey into English. I was inspired by Wilson’s description of the word, πολύτροπον or polytropon, as quoted in the article:

The prefix poly,” Wilson said, laughing, “means ‘many’ or ‘multiple.’ Tropos means ‘turn.’ ‘Many’ or ‘multiple’ could suggest that he’s much turned, as if he is the one who has been put in the situation of having been to Troy, and back, and all around, gods and goddesses and monsters turning him off the straight course that, ideally, he’d like to be on. Or, it could be that he’s this untrustworthy kind of guy who is always going to get out of any situation by turning it to his advantage. It could be that he’s the turner.

Reading this caused me to re-examine Odysseus’ character and credibility. As I did so, I came to realize that Odysseus is neither exclusively the “turned” nor the “turner”—he is both. I chose to explore this visually in five ink-and-watercolor illustrations. The logic with which I approached, executed, and arranged these illustrations was to portray Odysseus as “turned” in the first illustration, and increasingly more “turning” in each subsequent illustration.

In the final illustration, the seemingly omniscient Athena looks on while Odysseus, lashed to the mast, feasts his ears on the Sirens’ song. I chose to show Odysseus reflected in the goddess’ eye because of the numerous epithetical references to her eyes: “sparkling-eyed Athena” (1:53), “Her eyes glinting” (1:206), “the clear-eyed goddess” (1:256), “bright-eyed Pallas” (2:422), “her eyes brightening now” (13:268), “gray eyes gleaming,” (13:325), “her glances flashing warmly” (13:375), “eyes afire” (13:412), “Gray eyes ablaze” (13:448), etc.

This epithetical trend characterizes her as omniscient—she is all-seeing, all-knowing, and all-wise. Odysseus’ decision to listen to the Sirens’ “thrilling song” (12:199) was a completely unnecessary and selfish risk at the expense of his men, who would be disordered if not lost without their captain. I took some artistic liberty in this illustration as well: Athena is not said to be present in this scene. I included her because of the exchange between Odysseus and the goddess which takes place after Odysseus finally lands on Ithaca. She chides him, “Always the same, your wary turn of mind…” (13:374). Her words are clearly sarcastic: it is evident that the all-seeing goddess has been witness to many of Odysseus’ detours, otherwise she could not have formed any opinion of him. Having witnessed his two lengthy liaisons and especially his selfish insistence upon hearing the deadly Sirens, the goddess of wisdom could not seriously call him “wary.”

The ambiguous word πολύτροπον raises an issue of which the Greek oral tradition and Homer (if he is indeed the author of the written epic) were well aware. That is, the epic deals fundamentally with the question of fate and free will: are our choices truly our own, based only upon reasoning and desire? Do we determine our own futures? To what extent are both these things influenced by our personal and generational pasts, by our genes, by the intervention of unseen deities, each with their own agenda?