The Adventures of Ulysses

“When Troy was sacked, [Ulysses] and his men captured a huge booty—gold and jewels, silks, furs—and after ten years of war, the men refused to leave any loot behind. This meant that each of his ships could carry food and water for a very few days.”

The men fight long and hard to defeat Troy. When they do, they want treasure from their enemies. This causes problems right away, when Ulysses’s men raid a coastal town in hopes of even more loot but find the town better defended than they expect.

“Ulysses saw that his ships were foundering and that he would have to empty the holds. Food could not be spared, nor water; the only thing that could go was the treasure taken from Troy. The men groaned and tore at their beards as they saw the gold and jewels and bales of fur and silk being dropped overboard. But Ulysses cast over his own share of the treasure first—and his was the largest share—so the men had to bite back their rage and keep on rowing.”

The men, having raided a coastal town and suffered a beating, find that their damaged ships are taking on seawater. To lighten the load, they must throw overboard the treasure they so carefully hoarded from their victory at Troy. This misfortune is merely a prelude to much greater disasters to come.

“As the necklaces, bracelets, rings, and brooches sank slowly, winking their jewels like drowned fires, a strange thing happened. A shoal of naiads—beautiful water nymphs—were drawn by the flash of the jewels. They dived after the bright baubles and swam alongside the ships, calling to the men, singing, tweaking the oars out of their hands, for they were sleek, mischievous creatures who loved jewels and strangers. Some of them came riding dolphins, and in the splashing silver veils of spray the men thought they saw beautiful girls with fishtails.”

The men witness what they think are fish women, who today are called mermaids. These flirting goddesses, the flashing jewelry in the warm sea, and the laughing men merely anger the sea god Poseidon, who hates it when men try to steal his nymphs. He punishes them with high winds that push them way off course.

“Ulysses awoke, choking, out of a terrible nightmare. It seemed to him that in his sleep he had seen the whole voyage laid out before him, had seen his ships sinking, his men drowning. Monsters had crowded about him, clutching, writhing. He sat up and looked about. His men lay asleep among heaped flowers.”

As Ulysses lies on the beach at Lotusland, he dreams of disasters and creatures that soon he will encounter in real life. The dream is one of many prophecies Ulysses will encounter. His future, a series of difficult adventures, awaits him and his crew.

“The far end of the cavern was too dark to see anything, but then—amazed, aghast—he saw what looked like a huge red lantern far above, coming closer. Then he saw the great shadow of a nose under it and the gleam of teeth. He realized that the lantern was a great flaming eye. Then he saw the whole giant, tall as a tree, with huge fingers reaching out of the shadows, fingers bigger than baling hooks. They closed around two sailors and hauled them screaming into the air.”

Ulysses and his men meet Polyphemus, a giant, one-eyed Cyclops who lies in wait for humans and eats them. The giant has lured the hungry men into his cave with the aroma of cooking meat; he’ll eat the men first, the goats later. But Ulysses devises a clever plan to help his men escape.

“‘Up!’ cried Ulysses. ‘Stand up like men! Do what must be done! Or you will be devoured like chickens.’”

Ulysses has tricked the giant Cyclops into drinking wine and falling asleep. He urges his men to overcome their panic and join him in a plan to escape the monster, who otherwise will eat them. This scene is one of many in which Ulysses proves his courage, his intelligence, and his ability to lead.

“‘Poor fool! Poor blinded, drunken, gluttonous fool—if anyone else asks you, it is not Nobody, but Ulysses who has done this to you.’ But he was to regret this final taunt. The gods honor courage but punish pride.”

Ulysses exhibits a fatal flaw: conceit. Despite his status as a mythic hero, Ulysses has weaknesses like any other human—or god. This conceit causes Polyphemus to pray to Poseidon, convincing the sea god to punish Ulysses’s arrogance with a long, troubling voyage.

“‘Your name?’ ‘Ulysses—of Ithaca.’ ‘Mmm—yes,’ said Aeolus. ‘I seem to recognize that name—believe I heard it on Olympus while my uncles and aunts up there were quarreling about some little skirmish they had interested themselves in. Near Troy I think it was … Yes-s-s … Were you there?’ ‘I was there,’ said Ulysses. ‘I was there for ten years, dear host, and indeed took part in some of that petty skirmishing that will be spoken of by men who love courage when this bronze wall and this island, and you and yours, have vanished under the sea and have been forgotten for a thousand years. I am Ulysses. My companions before Troy were Achilles, Menelaus, Agamemnon, mighty heroes all, and, in modesty, I was not least among them.’”

Ulysses is a proud man. He takes umbrage when the Wind God Aeolus insults him by saying that the Trojan War was a mere “skirmish.” Ulysses dares to suggest that the war he fought in will be remembered after Aeolus himself is long gone. Fortunately, Aeolus loves a good story, and Ulysses has plenty of those.

All strangeness holds danger now, and we have had our bellyful of adventure for the time. What I pray for now is a space of days without surprise or wild encounter—to have a fair wind and a calm sea and a swift voyage home. Alas, I fear it is not yet to be.”

Normally a man of adventure, Ulysses now just wants to rest and then get back home. He knows from Aeolus that he’s cursed by the gods, so his wishes for an easy voyage probably won’t be granted. Although he won’t hide from the daunting troubles he must face, Ulysses also never gives up.

“As you, beautiful sorceress, choose a form for your lovers that matches their natures and which they must wear when they are no longer men, so the Fates, with their shears, have cut out my destiny. It is danger, toil, battle, uncertainty. And, though I stop and refresh myself now and again, still must I resume my voyage, for that is my nature. And to fit my nature has fate cut the pattern of my days.”

Ulysses loves Circe and would remain with her forever on her island paradise. However, he has sworn an oath to return his men to Ithaca, where his wife awaits him. He must answer that call.

“‘Go now. Take your men aboard the ship and go. Sail up the black river toward the upper air.’ ‘But now that I am here and have come such a long and weary way to get here, may I not see some of the famous sights? May I not see Orion hunting, Minos judging? May I not dance with the heroes in the Fields of Asphodel? May I not see Tantalus thirsting, or my own grandfather, Sisyphus, rolling his eternal stone up the hill?’ ‘No,’ said Teiresias. ‘It is better that you go. You have been here too long already, I fear; too long exposed to these bone-bleaching airs. You may already be tainted with death, you and your men, making your fates too heavy for any ship to hold. Embark then. Sail up the black river. Do not look back. Remember our advice and forget our reproaches, and do not return until you are properly dead.’”

Ulysses interviews ghosts of the dead, including his mother, Achilles, and Teiresias, a blind counselor wise in death as in life. Teiresias warns Ulysses against mere sightseeing in the Land of the Dead. Ulysses takes his advice, and he and his crew quickly depart the underworld and resume the quest to reach their homeland.

“‘If this wind keeps blowing,’ said Ulysses to himself, ‘perhaps we can skirt the dangerous islands they spoke of; sail right around these Sirens and these tide-drinking, man-eating monsters and find our way home without further mishap. True, it was foretold differently, but what of that? How reliable are such prophecies, after all?’”

In a classic case of “famous last words,” Ulysses lets good sailing weather color his judgment and make him think the worst is over. Much of the worst, however, is yet to be. This is yet another example of Ulysses’s arrogance, which is arguably his most dangerous flaw.

“These rocks shepherd me; they herd this vessel as a stray sheep is herded by the shepherd’s dog, driving me toward that which the vengeful gods have ordained. So be it then. If I cannot flee, then I must dare. Heroes are made, I see, when retreat is cut off. So be it.”

Ulysses realizes he can’t outmaneuver the floating rocks or the gods’ decree that he and his men must face perils before they can see their homes again. Never one to shrink from a task, Ulysses changes course abruptly and heads into the realm of danger. This quote also gestures at the theme that heroes are made through circumstance as much as through human qualities like bravery and will.

“[A]t the head of this strait is a rocky islet where dwell two sisters called Sirens, whose voices you must not hear. Now I shall guard you against their singing, which would lure you to shipwreck, but first you must bind me to the mast. Tie me tightly, as though I were a dangerous captive. And no matter how I struggle, no matter what signals I make to you, do not release me, lest I follow their voices to destruction, taking you with me.”

One of the most famous moments in Ulysses’s life is his experience of the Siren song while tied to the mast of his ship. The song is so alluring that he’d jump overboard and swim toward the music to be eaten by the Sirens. Instead, he plugs the ears of his men, hears the song, goes crazy with desire, and tries every trick to talk the sailors into releasing him. However, they are under his strict orders not to listen to him while the ship passes through the strait, and he survives the ordeal as planned.

“Now they were passing the rock, and Ulysses could see the singers. There were two of them. They sat on a heap of white bones—the bones of shipwrecked sailors—and sang more beautifully than senses could bear. But their appearance did not match their voices, for they were shaped like birds, huge birds, larger than eagles. They had feathers instead of hair, and their hands and feet were claws. But their faces were the faces of young girls.”

Ulysses becomes the only man to hear and see the Sirens and live. Their song sounds heavenly and drives men to a madness of yearning, but instead of heaven, sailors find only the agony of dismemberment and death. The Sirens endure as a symbol for anything that seems irresistible to a person, even as that thing becomes an agent of one’s doom.

“‘We all heard the warning,’ said Eurylochus, ‘and everyone will heed it.’ ‘How can you be so sure?’ said Ulysses. ‘If this voyage has taught you nothing else, it should have proved to you that there is nothing in the world so uncertain as man’s intentions, especially his good ones.’”

Ulysses remembers the many times when his he and men abandoned their principles and fell sway to gods and monsters. The men must resist the temptation to eat one of Hyperion’s golden cattle, despite their hunger, or be forever banned from their homes. In the end, the broken promises of his men are as much to blame as Poseidon for the challenges of their ordeal.

“‘But Ithaca is my home,’ he said. ‘And Penelope is my wife.’ ‘Home is where you dwell. And wives, I am told, often change. Especially for sailors. Especially for you. And now you belong to me, because this island and everything on it is mine.’”

The demigoddess Calypso explains to Ulysses that he is her captive and new spouse. Ulysses looks back at his recent trials and decides that a beautiful, if somewhat bossy, goddess might provide a wonderful interlude. By this point, his time away from Penelope has caused Ulysses to consider what life might be like without her

“O great gods upon Olympus—thunder-wielding Zeus and wise Athene, earth-shaking Poseidon, whom I have offended, golden Apollo—hear my prayer. For ten years I fought in Troy and for ten more years have wandered the sea, been hounded from island to island, battered by storms, swallowed by tides. My ships have been wrecked, my men killed. But you have granted me life. Now, I pray you, take back the gift. Let me join my men in Tartarus. For if I cannot return home, if I have to be kept here as a prisoner of Calypso while my kingdom is looted, my son slain, and my wife stolen, then I do not wish to live. Allow me to go home, or strike me dead on the spot.”

Calypso offers Ulysses immortality if he’ll stay with her forever. He chafes, though, at the thought that his kingdom in Ithaca and his family there are being vandalized while he enjoys the company of a goddess. The gods treat him wonderfully one moment and terribly the next, but they prevent him from doing the one deed his duty demands of him: to save his family and kingdom. Unable to complete that task, he asks for death.

“The gods speak in riddles. You know that. Especially when they visit us in dreams.”

Princess Nausicaa dreams of a visit by Athene, who mysteriously tells her to wash her clothes in the river. Queen Arete tells her that she should do as Athene asks and thereby learn the meaning of the riddle. Nausicaa does so and meets Ulysses at the river, which helps Ulysses thwart Poseidon, Athene’s enemy.

“[N]ever have I seen a girl so lovely, so witty, so courteous and kind as your young daughter. Alas, it cannot be. I am too old. I have a wife I must return to, and a kingdom, and there are sore trials I must undergo before I can win again what belongs to me. So all I ask of you, great king, is a ship to take me to Ithaca, where my wife waits, my enemies wait, my destiny waits.”

Diplomatic and crafty as always, Ulysses flatters his host, extolling Princess Nausicaa’s charms, then asking for a favor. His request is granted. Yet the affection Ulysses feels for Nausicaa is more than a pose, causing the reader to wonder if it is love or mere duty that draws him back to Penelope.

“They hate [Ulysses], because they do him harm. There are more than a hundred of them—rude, brawling young princes from neighboring islands and thievish young nobles of this island. They dwell in his castle as if they had taken it after a siege and seek to marry his wife, Penelope, refusing to leave until she accepts one of them. They drink his wine, devour his stores, break up the furniture for firewood, roister all night, and sleep all day.”

After Ulysses disappears at sea, nearby ranking men take over his castle. If he is to reclaim his office, Ulysses must face them in battle. Fortunately, he most thrives when participating in feats of strength, whether in athletic games or when causing real bloodshed.

“I don’t see how we can overcome a hundred strong men, but to die fighting at your side will be a greater glory than anything a long life can bestow. Thank you, Father, for giving me this chance to share your fortune.’ ‘You are my true son,’ said Ulysses, embracing the boy tenderly. ‘The words you have just spoken make up for the twenty years of you I have missed.’”

Ulysses reunites with a son he hasn’t seen in a generation, a young man of poise, courtesy, and gallantry. Telemachus has turned out wonderfully, and there is nothing either man wants more than to fight side by side and reclaim their rightful place on the island. This quote also highlights the fact that, between the Trojan War and Ulysses’s extended sea voyage, he has actually been away for 20 years, not just the 10 covered in this story.

“He stood there for a second, narrowing his eyes at the mark, then let the arrow fly. The cord twanged, the arrow sang through the air, and passed through the axe-rings, all twelve of them. Then, paralyzed by amazement, they saw him calmly sling the quiver over his shoulder and straighten up so that his breastplate gleamed through the rags. He stood tall and, throwing back his head, spoke to the heavens: ‘So the dread ordeal ends, and I come to claim my own.’”

Ulysses finally returns to his castle, defeats the other suitors in a contest that only he is strong and skillful enough to win, then lays claim to his wife and throne. Things get bloody very quickly, but Ulysses, his son Telemachus, and two servants fight well and make short work of 100 usurpers. This sort of climax, in which a hero reigns victorious through a feat of athleticism, is common to Greek myth.