Summaries: “Land of the Dead,” “The Sirens,” “Scylla and Charybdis,” and “The Cattle of the Sun God”

“Land of the Dead” Odysseus and his men leave the Cyclops’ island Aeolus gives him a bag of winds Within 10 days they are in sight of Ithaca The men think the bag is treasure, rip it open, and cause a storm They get lost again “Land of the Dead”

“Land of the Dead” They row to the island of the Laestrygonians Men get eaten Everyone else runs away to Aeaea Circe turns Odysseus’s men into pigs He defeats her, and she turns the men back into men Then Odysseus and Circe become lovers, and he stays there for a year Odysseus’s men convince him to leave Circe tells him he must sail through Hades The men aren’t happy “Land of the Dead”

In the land of the Cimmerians, Odysseus offers a sacrifice like Circe said Dead people start showing up Elpenor – soldier who fell off Circe’s roof and wants to be buried Tiresias – explains Poseidon is mad at them for blinding the Cyclops Anticleia – Odysseus’s mother who guilts him for being gone so long Agamemnon – tells that he got killed by his own wife when he got home from war Achilles – asks about his son Ajax – still mad at Odysseus and doesn’t talk Various Greek Mythology characters (Hercules, King Minos, Orion, Sisyphus, Tantalus) “Land of the Dead”

“The Sirens” They return to bury Elpenor Then they have to travel past the island of the Sirens Odysseus’s men plug their ears with beeswax and tie him to the mast He begs them to let him go to follow the Sirens’ song The men tie him tighter “The Sirens”

“Scylla and Charybdis” The crew has to sail between Scylla (a six-headed monster) and Charybdis (a living whirlpool) As they are sailing, focused on Charybdis, Scylla’s heads swoop down and eat six men “Scylla and Charybdis”

“The Cattle of the Sun God” Eurylochus convinces Odysseus to stop and rest They get caught in a storm and are beached for a month When the men get desperate they slaughter the Sun God’s cattle The Sun asks Zeus to punish Odysseus and his men When they leave, Zeus creates a storm that takes them all out (except Odysseus who is almost swallowed up by Charybdis) Odysseus ends up on Calypso’s island but doesn’t want to rehash all that in the story “The Cattle of the Sun God”