Book Summaries

 Aiolos, the ruler of the winds, gives Odysseus and his men food, drink, and wind for their voyage. The men are nearly home to Ithaca when they open Odysseus’s package of wind, and it causes a gale to blow them off course.  Their ships end up in the land of the cannibalistic Laestrygonians, whose massive army massacres most of Odysseus’s troops. Only the men on Odysseus’s ship survive. Wall painting from the late 1st century BC

 Next they go to the island Aeaea, where Circe lives. She lures some of the men into her cave with her singing, gives them a potion, and turns them into pigs. Hermes finds Odysseus and gives him another potion to protect him from Circe’s spell. “Circe Offering the Cup to Ulysses” by John W. Waterhouse (1891)  Odysseus rescues his men and befriends Circe. Circe tells them to not go straight home to Ithaca but to Hades, to talk to the blind prophet Tiresias, who can see the future.

 Odysseus travels with his men to Hades. First they see the ghost of their former shipmate, Elphenor.  Then Tiresias tells Odysseus that, in order to make the journey home to Ithaca, he must not touch Helios’s cattle on Thrinacia, the island of the sun. Tiresias appears to Ulysses during the sacrificing Johann Heinrich Füssli (c )

 Odysseus also talks to his mother, who died from sadness during his time away from home. She tells Odysseus how his father, son, and wife are doing.  Odysseus also talks to the spirits of Achilles, Patroclus, and Agamemnon. These three fought with Odysseus during the Trojan War.  Odysseus also sees two famous mythological figures: Sisyphus, who is still pushing the boulder, and Tantalus, who is tempted by food and drink but can never get them.