After losing the bag of wind given to him by ---Odysseus
and his crew row back to the land of the Laestrygonians, powerful giants who hurl
boulders at them, sinking all the ships but that of Odysseus and his crew. They, then,
sail to Aeaea, where dwells the beautiful witch-goddess Circe, who drugs a band of
Odysseus’s men and turns them into pigs so she can keep Odysseus with her. Fortunately,
Hermess appears to Odysseus in the form of a young man; he instructs Odysseus to eat the
herb moly that will protect him against the drugs of Circe. He then confronts her and
forces her to change the men back to their human forms. But, she seduces Odysseus, and
it is a year before the men can convince him to depart. Still, Circe instructs Odysseus
to take aboard sheeip on onto his ship as sacrifice.
In
Book Xi, Odysseus arrives at the River of Ocean in the land of the Cimmerians. There he
pours libations and the sheeps' blood as offerings to the dead spirits. First appears
the spirit of the young man, Elpenor, who passed out the night before and fell off
Circe's roof before the men departed. He begs Odysseus to pile rocks as a burial for his
body; Odysseus promises to do so. After this, his mother's spirit appears, but Odysseus
holds it back until he has spoken with the spirit of the blind prophet Teiresias, who
does appear and drinks the blood offered. He warns Odysseus not to eat Helios's cattle
at Thrinakia or he will die. Nevertheless, he will meet hardship and all his men will
die, but Odysseus will arrive in Ithaca. In response, Odysseus asks about the spirit of
his mother which he has just seen. Tiresias instructs Odysseus to offer her the blood
and she will approach him. So, when his mother comes, she knows him instantly; further,
she explains how she came to this land of the dead: Anticleia tells her son that
Penelope has been faithful to him, his son Telemachus farms his estate, but her husband,
his father, stays in the fields and beds down in the leaves, or he sleeps in the house
where servants once were--all because he longs for his son. But, she could bear the
longing for Odysseus no more and died.
Soon the spirits of
other women approach and Odysseus must hold them at bay with his sword, but allows them
to come and drink. Afterwards, men approach and Odysseus meets Agamenmnon, who relates
how he died because of the treachery of his wife, Slytemnestra, to whom he revealed too
much of his dealings. She had him slain and many of his party, as well. Next Odysseus
meets Achilles, who asks about his son, Neoptolemus; so, Odysseus recounts as much as he
can relate. Afterwards, Odysseus sees Telamonian Ajax, and entreats him to forget their
quarrel over Achilleus's arms in Troy where Odysseus and Ajax competed for the arms of
Achilleus, who had been slain. (Because the arms were to go to the braves man and the
Greeks could not reach a decision. But, because they could not afford to lose the two
men, the Trojan captives were made to decide. The Trojans chose Odysseus, and Ajax was
so enraged that he committed suicide.) But, Ajax has not forgotten, and he turns away
from Odysseus.
After this encounter, Odysseus sees Jocasta,
wife and mother of Oedipus, who killed herself, among many other figures of Greek
mythology. Odysseus is frightened by all the souls converging upon him to ask about
their families; consequently, he flees to his ship and departs.
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