Sunday, May 16, 2004
the Odyssey
i dreamed of becoming Odysseus.
i have just watched this movie last night. aside from my opinion about the movie and the slight alteration of the story (and history), it inspires me to imagine the life of Odysseus.
i mean, who wouldn't want to be the son of Laertes from Ithaca, fighting with fellow Achaians for 10 years in the Trojan war and come up with the idea to build a wooden horse in order to break into the city just to burn it and have a quarrel with Ajax over Achilleus' armour and spend another decade to come home which at first start off with 12 ships but during the great journey has to sack and plunder the city of Ismarus so the Cicones can launch a counter-attack, nearly tricked to eat the lotus that can induce a memory-loss, find a way to be able to escape from the man-eating cyclop Polyphemus son of Poseidon and thus cursed in the sea by the father, meet Aelous the lord of the winds, land at Telepylus and forfeit the chance of being eaten by Antiphates the Laestrygonian chef, risk the danger of being turned into a pig but instead charm the Circe and stay with her for a whole year, go to the Land of Perpetual Mist and enter the house of Hades ruler of the Underworld to speak with the soul of mother Anticleia and find an oracle from Teiresias yet also deppresed to see the sufferings of the dead sinners, listen to the deadful songs of the Sirens, sacrifice the sailors to be eaten by the six-headed beast Skylla, being cursed again by Hyperion for eating his cattles at the Sun God's island so at the end being the sole survivor from the ship wreck, cling to a piece of wood for days in the sea and almost get swallowed by the Charybdis whirlpool, washed up to the island of Ogygia and stay there for seven years with the company of Calypso's love, nearly drowned in a storm and saved by the sea-nymph Ino, creep to the Scheria helpless and naked but manage to take a peek at some girls bathing in the river and meet Nausicaa the daughter of the king of the Phaeacisians, receive noble service from the kingdom and hear the adultery gossip between Aphrodite and Ares trapped by Hephaestus in the Olympus from Demodocus before finally come to the homeland Ithaca but still have to disguised as a ragged beggar, stay in Eumaeus' hut, getting insults from the Suitors and compete with them to string the great bow of Odysseus so that at the end slaughter them and finally reunite with son Telemachus and wife Penelope even though still have to make peace with Poseidon the earth shaker and have another journey?
i wish modern life still embodies such passion and sense of adventure.
i dreamed of becoming Odysseus.
i have just watched this movie last night. aside from my opinion about the movie and the slight alteration of the story (and history), it inspires me to imagine the life of Odysseus.
i mean, who wouldn't want to be the son of Laertes from Ithaca, fighting with fellow Achaians for 10 years in the Trojan war and come up with the idea to build a wooden horse in order to break into the city just to burn it and have a quarrel with Ajax over Achilleus' armour and spend another decade to come home which at first start off with 12 ships but during the great journey has to sack and plunder the city of Ismarus so the Cicones can launch a counter-attack, nearly tricked to eat the lotus that can induce a memory-loss, find a way to be able to escape from the man-eating cyclop Polyphemus son of Poseidon and thus cursed in the sea by the father, meet Aelous the lord of the winds, land at Telepylus and forfeit the chance of being eaten by Antiphates the Laestrygonian chef, risk the danger of being turned into a pig but instead charm the Circe and stay with her for a whole year, go to the Land of Perpetual Mist and enter the house of Hades ruler of the Underworld to speak with the soul of mother Anticleia and find an oracle from Teiresias yet also deppresed to see the sufferings of the dead sinners, listen to the deadful songs of the Sirens, sacrifice the sailors to be eaten by the six-headed beast Skylla, being cursed again by Hyperion for eating his cattles at the Sun God's island so at the end being the sole survivor from the ship wreck, cling to a piece of wood for days in the sea and almost get swallowed by the Charybdis whirlpool, washed up to the island of Ogygia and stay there for seven years with the company of Calypso's love, nearly drowned in a storm and saved by the sea-nymph Ino, creep to the Scheria helpless and naked but manage to take a peek at some girls bathing in the river and meet Nausicaa the daughter of the king of the Phaeacisians, receive noble service from the kingdom and hear the adultery gossip between Aphrodite and Ares trapped by Hephaestus in the Olympus from Demodocus before finally come to the homeland Ithaca but still have to disguised as a ragged beggar, stay in Eumaeus' hut, getting insults from the Suitors and compete with them to string the great bow of Odysseus so that at the end slaughter them and finally reunite with son Telemachus and wife Penelope even though still have to make peace with Poseidon the earth shaker and have another journey?
i wish modern life still embodies such passion and sense of adventure.
