HOMER
One of the most profound themes of Homer’s Odyssey is one which every man can relate to: the relationship (or lack thereof) between a son and his father. In the first few books of The Odyssey, Odysseus’s son, Telemachus, embarks on a quest to discover what has become of his father, who left to fight in the Trojan War when Telemachus was still a baby and has never returned to his wife and son. Eventually, Telemachus and Odysseus reunite and team up to defeat the arrogant and greedy suitors, who have overrun Odysseus’ estate in anticipation of marrying Penelope, Odysseus’ grieving wife. The moment of reunification between Telemachus and Odysseus is one of the most moving scenes in all of literature, as it depicts the fulfillment of a son’s lifelong desire for a relationship with his father. As Waller Newell observed in his essay, “The Crisis of Manliness,” too many boys today are like Telemachus, longing for a father who will nurture them and guide them through a hard world. Many boys from broken homes are forced at too-early an age to be their mother’s protector from oppressive men while struggling to bring themselves up in a way that their absent father would be proud of. As Waller says, each year that he tells this story to his students the room becomes quieter and quieter because more and more of them realize that they are Telemachus.
368
Sir,” said Telemachus, “as regards your question, so long as my father was here it was well with us and with the house, but the gods in their displeasure have willed it otherwise, and have hidden him away more closely than mortal man was ever yet hidden. I could have borne it better even though he were dead, if he had fallen with his men before Troy, or had died with friends around him when the days of his fighting were done; for then the Acheeans would have built a mound over his ashes, and I should myself have been heir to his renown; but now the storm-winds have spirited him away we know not whither; he is gone without leaving so much as a trace behind him, and I inherit nothing but dismay. . . .”
And Ulysses said, “I am no god, why should you take me for one? I am your father, on whose account you grieve and suffer so much at the hands of lawless men.”
As he spoke he kissed his son, and a tear fell from his cheek on to the ground, for he had restrained all tears till now. But Telemachus could not yet believe that it was his father, and said:—“You are not my father, but some god is flattering me with vain hopes that I may grieve the more hereafter; no mortal man could of himself contrive to do as you have been doing, and make yourself old and young at a moment’s notice, unless a god were with him. A second ago you were old and all in rags, and now you are like some god come down from heaven.”
Ulysses answered, “Telemachus, you ought not to be so immeasurably astonished at my being really here. There is no other Ulysses who will come hereafter. Such as I am, it is I, who after long wandering and much hardship have got home in the twentieth year to my own country. What you wonder at is the work of the redoubtable goddess Minerva, who does with me whatever she will, for she can do what she pleases. At one moment she makes me like a beggar, and the next I am a young man with good clothes on my back; it is an easy matter for the gods who live in heaven to make any man look either rich or poor.”
As he spoke he sat down, and Telemachus threw his arms about his father and wept. They were both so much moved that they cried aloud like eagles or vultures with crooked talons that have been robbed of their half fledged young by peasants. Thus piteously did they weep, and the sun would have gone down upon their mourning if Telemachus had not suddenly said, “In what ship, my dear father, did your crew bring you to Ithaca? Of what nation did they declare themselves to be—for you cannot have come by land?”
“I will tell you the truth, my son,” replied Ulysses.